Well it seems that Red Nose Ferguson from Manure has decided he might be interested in bringing Rafa’s old assistant to the Theater of Illusions. (by the way, I love Kopblog’s name-calling, and have borrowed it)
One thing I don’t hear much about, I have to say, is the Man U youth program. It seems that they bring up some promising youngsters but they really have little chance to go straight into a first team where £25 million is the valuation of each position on the field. These young players go off to Sunderland or wherever and disappear into the good night.
The opposite of that is becoming the norm at Melwood and the Academy these days however for our club. Rafa has assembled a talent pool that is unrivaled in the Premiership in my opinion, as evidenced by the absolute spanking we gave the reserve league on the way to the title. Our average age in the squad was, I believe, the lowest in the league. We are throwing 17-19 years olds at veterans and Premiership tested players a lot of the time, and coming away successful. There was a story just today in the Liverpool Echo suggesting that Rafa has thrown down a gauntlet to several players, demanding they justify inclusion in the first team. Not only Nemeth, but also young Pacheco now. Let’s not forget what a prized asset he was to Barcelona, and how devastated they were to lose him to us.
Basically, the time is soon approaching where I think we will find ourselves with an abundance of talent coming up through our own program. Much like Barcelona with Messi, Bojan, dos Santos etc etc. Rafa knows this style of development and has brought it to our club. For this, more than any other reason, I should hate to ever see the backside of our manager heading out the door. Not only is he tactically astute on the pitch, but he is putting us in a position to hold court in the EPL for years to come. I personally will not be satisfied with only #19, having Man U so close behind us. I want #20, #21, #22, and on and on forever, until the scum are so far behind us that we can’t even see them anymore.
We have been the most successful club in English history, there is no reason we can’t be the most successful one in the future.
Great post Ben! I really like the Theatre of Illusions one – that is a classic. I agree, we have a great youth system in place and we should start using. The youngsters showed us last season by winning the reserve league so Rafa should give some of them a chance. Why should we go out and spend millons on players in the transfer market when we have our very own talent?
Look at how Rouy Evans gave Michael Owen a chance. If Nemeth gets a chance this season I am sure we are going to see ‘the next big thing’ since El Nino at Anfield.
Thanks but credit for the name must go to Gerry on Kopblog, and wherever it came from before that. I read his blog regularly.
As for giving the youth a chance, I think we can’t go wrong between Nemeth, Pacheco, and some of the others coming up. Go go youth team.