We're at home to Burnley on Saturday pal: )
So when do we start to give our youngsters starts in games, or do we not bother? Tommy Doyle is an excellent prospect who could be our longterm holding DM because Rodri certainly won't be the way he's playing. Throwing money at other clubs for their best young players is starting to piss me off when we have several youngsters ourselves. It is disrespectful to our academy staff and young players who patiently wait their chance only to have their nose pushed out because we can go out and blow another 62 mil on some other foreign player not cut out for the PL.
People go on about Pep being the greatest ever manager, fuckin' lol. When he has hung around here long enough and brought half a dozen through from the academy winning trophies regularly (like Fergi did) then he may go up a few notches towards being the games greatest manager. Until then he'll struggle to shed the term 'textbook manager' that opposition fans have given him.
It's no wonder Sancho left to further his career, and Sane will certainly get more starts with Munich than he will with us.
Clubs usually blood a few youngsters in the early rounds of the domestic cups but we're not really seeing much of any of them. Ok we have a few in the match day squad bit I can't recall many who have been given a proper chance apart from Foden and he isn't holding a starting place down just yet. I thought Delap would be given a chance seeing as Aguero and Jesus were injured. The lad scored on his debut against Bournemouth and hasn't played since. Oh, but he's not old enough. He's only 17 so we must wrap him in bubble wrap and put him back on the shelf as not to burn him out. Lol. Rooney was banging them in at 17 and I'm not talking about banging grannies!; )
'If they are good enough they are old enough'...
Good question, and a question we won't know the answer to unless players are tried in competitive games against decent opposition. I'm sure not all will make it, more pressure nowadays like you say. But players coming through in a batch has happened before. We brought several through around 85/6 and the rags had their Busby babes and class of 92. Liverpool were famous for bringing youth through in the 70/80s. Everyone is talking about signing Haaland. He's doing great and ticking all the boxes of a top striker. But I'd love to see how good Delap is this season for us. Too easy to go and keep throwing big money around to solve a problem. It's a good job our owners are loaded because a hell of a lot of money has been wasted on players since they came.Me not knowing if home or away shows my level of interest this year.
I share many of your views, but really are they good enough at the moment to be all available and used in the first team on a regular basis, I’m not convinced. Certainly 15 years ago they’d all be starters, but less pressure then.
I would love it if we developed a first team full of local academy boys, as you say Peps challenge I suppose
Can’t disagree, and reckon the majority of fans would prefer to see 3 academy boys replace Mahrez, gundy and Fernandinho (hard to type that) in the first instance and see how they do.Good question, and a question we won't know the answer to unless players are tried in competitive games against decent opposition. I'm sure not all will make it, more pressure nowadays like you say. But players coming through in a batch has happened before. We brought several through around 85/6 and the rags had their Busby babes and class of 92. Liverpool were famous for bringing youth through in the 70/80s. Everyone is talking about signing Haaland. He's doing great and ticking all the boxes of a top striker. But I'd love to see how good Delap is this season for us. Too easy to go and keep throwing big money around to solve a problem. It's a good job our owners are loaded because a hell of a lot of money has been wasted on players since they came.
I hear what‘s said in public but actions speak louder than words.
Even after last season’s COVID restart, when the League was long lost, the youngsters other than Foden were hardly given a run-out. And if hadn’t been for top 4 being more or less in the bag, and Foden grabbing his opportunity by the scruff of the neck, how much would we have seen of Phil?
Unfortunately, there’s also pressure to avoid pissing off established fringe players by playing them in “easier” games - depending on their faces. In fairness there is balance to be struck but a bit more towards our academy prospects would be welcome. It might even avoid another £50m signing in the not too distant future.
I accept that and alluded to it. The debate is simply about the balance.He feels he needs to keep the senior players match fit and not ruin moral.
I hope so, otherwise it’ll be a long two years
He is going to find a solution
And our four PL titles in this period were under three different managers.Go on then, give us recent examples of successful teams with long serving managers. Because I can't think of any.
People might want a long term manager but we don't need one. There's no reason to think otherwise.
Edit: and Chelsea are the second most successful English club of the last decade after us.