Well, first my apologies for the delay. I've been busy, but hopefully we'll be back to weekly articles from next week.
Our Academy is in its second year of operation. We run teams from Under-9s to Under-19s, but that also means that every year there are going to be some players who are too old to remain in the Academy programme.
Of the first batch of such players, only Jamie Ashdown is going to stay as a (potentially) long-term member of the squad. The question is whether one player from a year's worth of Academy scholars is a good enough return or not.
Well, for a start you could say that if a team has a squad of 25 spread over ages 20 to 35, then you might expect only one or two players at any particular age. In that case, then one or two players coming through from the Academy each year with the abililty to be close to the first team would be what you would expect.
Another way of looking at this is to compare with previous Reading youth teams, and see how many of them made it into the first team as regulars. In the 90s, Stuart Lovell, Adie Williams, Scott Taylor and Jamie Lambert all came through at about the same time, and that's more or less it unless you take the view that Byron Glasgow and Neville Roach could have done so much more under a different manager than Tommy Burns. Before that there's only Steve Hetzke, Neil Webb, Steve Wood, Lawrie Sanchez and Jerry Williams who are really worth talking about since the early 70s (perhaps Wayne Wanklyn and Michael Barnes, as well). On that basis one a year would be considered very impressive!
Another factor to take into account is that we have already received a transfer fee for the goalkeeper Shaun Allaway, with the promise of much more to come if his career with Leeds United does develop. Although Allaway wasn't in the age group that have just become too old for the Academy, I think it's reasonable to take this fee into account somewhere along the line.
Finally, you have to say that the young men who have just left the Academy are only the first year's intake. Our Academy system wasn't in place early enough to follow them through their formative years, and there must have been other good players from that age group who we lost to other clubs. The players who we have let go are Neville Stamp (recently started a short-term contract with York), Jason Bristow (at Basingstoke Town) and Steve Arkins (currently at Maidenhead United). None of those locations suggest that those players would be fighting for a place in the Reading first team in the near future had we kept them on.
Let's look forward a year and see what might happen to the players currently in the Under-19s but who will not be eligible for the Academy next season. That means Joe Gamble, Alex Haddow, Darius Henderson, Nathan Tyson and Adam Lockwood. The difference does rather jump out, doesn't it? Gamble and Henderson already have contracts for two more seasons, and Lockwood for three more. All but Lockwood have appeared in the first team already, and Lockwood has been on the bench. This time next year we will clearly be able to see a far greater return from the Academy than we have done at the start of this season.
That doesn't necessarily mean that all those players will still be with Reading in a few years' time. However, you would expect that all five of them would either bring in a fee (EU rules permitting!) or at least would be able to find another club quite easily should the club decide that they don't have a future at Madejski Stadium. Assuming that we are in Division 1, each of them will have to show sufficient pedigree to be able to make it at that, higher level to justify staying with the club. From what I've seen of them, all five players have that potential.
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