Clayton Donaldson

Agree, I think Nuno insisted wolves do the same too.

 

The problem with the development is that those in charge expect instant results and do not give players time to develop. Look at the number of players we have signed, like Clare, who are binned after a season. He was injured for large parts and then cast off. If we are serious about developing these kids, they should be signed on 3yr development contracts and left to develop. Signing them for 1yr and releasing them serves zero purpose

 

it was apparent that a lot of these guys wouldn't ever be good enough so to release is the best option. We aint here as a charity for shit footballers despite Edin's best efforts.

 

I think the point is young players need time, good coaches to develop in to full grown footballers. Of course not all of them will make it; spotting talent in children is difficult and you need excellent scouts, and a system to plug you into all the coaching going on in your area.

 

Richard O'Donnell weirdly spoke similarly when he signed...

 

Of course but v few of what we signed had the potential to kick on which is the most important thing, we'd essentially have been handing out 3 year contracts to develop players for park avenue

 

If course they’re not ready, but how can you know they would never be good enough? You’ve seen Clare play? Regular? There are loads of examples of players not developing until into their 20s. We sign these boys, give them 12mths and if they haven’t broken through, bin them again.

It’s not a development policy

 

Life as a footballer. It happens.

Don't like it then work for BT repairing phone boxes of something.

 

You have missed the completely.

 

- ‘point’?

 

Missed what? Goal?

Hole?

What have I missed?

 

Why, do BT not try to fix a ‘broken’ phone line? Do they just bin it off and replace it with a new one? Strange analogy mate

 

I agree with just about all of that. However, just one point - Sad as it is, for both Club and player ........ Some kids, unfortunately 'peak' about 18 years old. The secret is to discover gems who are good, with the potential to keep growing at 18 ....... Difficult to spot two years earlier, when initially recruited.

 

If he had any significant potential he'd still be at Barnsley. The people there who know a million times more than me and you about football and young players in particular as they do have a good youth setup, decided they could afford to part with him. Why would you sell a young prospect to a local and later divisional rival if he was any good?

Finally, name me one young player at city who we've developed over a 3 year period into a first team footballer successfully. Yupp, never. We don't have the infrastructure, we don't have the coaches and we don't have the money. But here's the caveat. Yet.

Further up the pyramid with proper investment then its probably our best way to survive. But as we dont have poshes non league contacts or charltons academy for example we'd be building from scratch. This means its gonna cost a shitload of money that I simply dont think is viable for us until we are in the championship.

 

Totally agree, the only difference with signings like Clare was that they were mostly over seen by Rahic/Abbot. I'd put more trust in getting players to develop under Bowyer and a proper development plan going forward. Players like Patrick, Gibson, Devine will definitely get the chance to develop under a proper coach like Bowyer rather than like the previous development idea before. Which didn't work at all, pure pie in the sky.

 

This, no issues whatsoever with allowing youth proper time to develop, but they have to have obvious and clear potential in the first place. Otherwise we'll continually hand out 3 year contracts the Omari Patricks of this world.

 

Still an absolute howler that we handed him that contract after a couple of goals!!

 

The club are in a no win situation really, offer long contracts at first sign of talent and then it doesn’t turn out or offer one year and then they become good and leave at end of the year for little compo. Either way the fans complain

 

And yet they signed Miller? And before that, took the young winger from us that had the double-barrelled name? All clubs make some poor decisions at some point, whether that’s giving a contract to a ‘talent’ or binning off one because they didn’t think a player would make it.

The point you make about developing players is all well and good. There are no examples as you say. But name me the last players we signed and retained for 3yrs.

 

But this is my point. If we hand out a 3yr dev contract, with an option to the club to convert it to a full contract if they make significant progress, we should stick to it. The lads like Robinson and Patrick were signed on 1yr terms but after a couple of decent performances, we panicked into tying them down. Then, once they got those contracts, they were no longer deemed ‘development’ players and were suddenly expected to perform as 1st teamers. All rush, rush and no time to nurture them. This has to stop