Remi Garde - Departs Aston Villa

[Risso]

Our much heralded Academy has proved to be complete toss, all the talk from Stevie Me a few years back about Villa being a really good side in a few years, complete toss.

As well as Garde having a tough job clearing out the deadwood we also need to start producing something worthwhile from the Academy instead of nearly but not quite's.

KMacs legacy has been destroyed by the way they've pretty much all turned out to be duds
as well as the horrendous management experience he gave us at Newcastle and Tottenham.

I think you make a good point.  It's all very well people hoping that we follow in Southampton's footsteps when we go down, and rebuild, but where's the evidence that we're any good at bringing through kids who are good enough for the Premier League?

[supertom]

Our much heralded Academy has proved to be complete toss, all the talk from Stevie Me a few years back about Villa being a really good side in a few years, complete toss.

As well as Garde having a tough job clearing out the deadwood we also need to start producing something worthwhile from the Academy instead of nearly but not quite's.

KMacs legacy has been destroyed by the way they've pretty much all turned out to be duds
as well as the horrendous management experience he gave us at Newcastle and Tottenham.

I think you make a good point.  It's all very well people hoping that we follow in Southampton's footsteps when we go down, and rebuild, but where's the evidence that we're any good at bringing through kids who are good enough for the Premier League?

We need to be giving them a better chance. How many of our 18 year old kids have we loaned out this season too? Probably not enough.

I think we've at the very least got youngsters who can make it in the championship. Gardner and Baker will do okay there. I would hope we're still bringing through players at least of that level.

We've given far too many squad spots to fucking useless donkey's, piss poor cheap foreign imports and kids from League 1-2 clubs over the last 4 years.
We could have spent the money more wisely on better players to get a reasonable first 18, and then brought through a few youngsters as and when. Obviously you don't throw too many in at once, but we can ease more in. There are lads scoring for fun in the yoofs. We had Rushian make one appearence. But then what? Why not loan him out in Jan?

I still think we have one of the better academies. We're one of all too few clubs at the higher levels who still make use of their academy, but we don't do it enough given how well we do at Youth and reserve level. Not everyone will be a Grealish but at the very least we might raise kids, who if well handled, and shown a bit more faith, might work for us in the Championship and then hopefully the Prem.
How on Earth can we not bring through better than Westwood, Bacuna, Sylla, Tonev, etc, etc?
If we can't, then you're probably right, it's shit. But I reckon we probably can. Not being funny but Daniel Johnson would be pushing to get in our side now. I think we missed out on him.

I'd rather we had a decent spine with which to build around with useful squad players and our better youngsters. But we don't. We have summers of signing 7-8-13 players, who for the most part are mediocre. I'd rather make 3-4 good signings in a window and then perhaps invest more in the academy to ensure that we're bringing through players good enough.

[aj2k77]

Good point Supertom. We are struggling for a left back, we look to the under 21's and have Kinsella who is 21 and has played 2 games for Luton and that's it.

Why hasn't he been on loan from a much younger age building up experience? If the answer is because he's shit and no one wants him then why is he still on our books? If that isn't the answer then why has he had so little match experience by now? It's a failing of the club.

[Clampy]

Good point Supertom. We are struggling for a left back, we look to the under 21's and have Kinsella who is 21 and has played 2 games for Luton and that's it.

Why hasn't he been on loan from a much younger age building up experience? If the answer is because he's shit and no one wants him then why is he still on our books? If that isn't the answer then why has he had so little match experience by now? It's a failing of the club.

He has been on loan to Luton.

[aj2k77]

Good point Supertom. We are struggling for a left back, we look to the under 21's and have Kinsella who is 21 and has played 2 games for Luton and that's it.

Why hasn't he been on loan from a much younger age building up experience? If the answer is because he's shit and no one wants him then why is he still on our books? If that isn't the answer then why has he had so little match experience by now? It's a failing of the club.

He has been on loan to Luton.

And played how many games?

[Clampy]

Good point Supertom. We are struggling for a left back, we look to the under 21's and have Kinsella who is 21 and has played 2 games for Luton and that's it.

Why hasn't he been on loan from a much younger age building up experience? If the answer is because he's shit and no one wants him then why is he still on our books? If that isn't the answer then why has he had so little match experience by now? It's a failing of the club.

He has been on loan to Luton.

And played how many games?

Three according to Wikipedia. It's not many and maybe he will move on eventually, who knows.

[LTA]

A clean sweep of coaching staff would do harm.  MacDonald, McAndrew and Cowans have been here for over 20 years and some new ideas wouldn't go amiss.  Plus Kevin MacDonald's team selections post Sherwood were mind boggling to say the least.

Have to say as much as he's a legend, Gordon Cowans has never shown much to suggest he's a brilliant coach.

[aj2k77]

Yes, some fresh blood at that level of the club is needed I'd say.

[Hoppo]

Kinsella would have had about 12 Premier games if we had started playing him when we should of.
Daniel Johnson should of been given a chance and look.at what Jordan Graham is doing at Wolves.
All cock ups from the Club.

[aj2k77]

These players should be going out at 17/18 and learning like Grealish did, not reaching the age of 21 with 2/3 competitive games under their belt.

They should be coming back to us, under 20 with 50-100 first team games, not sitting around playing pretend football for 4 years. What are they learning playing u21 football?

[BC54 VFC]

A clean sweep of coaching staff would do harm.  MacDonald, McAndrew and Cowans have been here for over 20 years and some new ideas wouldn't go amiss.  Plus Kevin MacDonald's team selections post Sherwood were mind boggling to say the least.

Have to say as much as he's a legend, Gordon Cowans has never shown much to suggest he's a brilliant coach.

Tony McAndrew is the pick of those three; sentiment should be put aside and the other two got rid of.

[Gareth]

A clean sweep of coaching staff would do harm.  MacDonald, McAndrew and Cowans have been here for over 20 years and some new ideas wouldn't go amiss.  Plus Kevin MacDonald's team selections post Sherwood were mind boggling to say the least.

Have to say as much as he's a legend, Gordon Cowans has never shown much to suggest he's a brilliant coach.

Tony McAndrew is the pick of those three; sentiment should be put aside and the other two got rid of.

I would expect a director of football remit to be heavily focused on the academy - advocating a clean sweep of those coaches because the first team is doing badly is dangerous, they should be judged on the work they are doing with the next generation - the Hepburn-Murphy / Sellars / Toner's etc.

The youth system will bring players to a certain point then the first team coaches take over to continue the development - seems to me that is the step where it fails and the DoF needs to judge whether there are holes in quality of player / process to develop to first team and how to rectify.  It might be the staff does need a shake up but binning long serving people for changes sake sounds off to me.

[oswald funkletrumpet]

These players should be going out at 17/18 and learning like Grealish did, not reaching the age of 21 with 2/3 competitive games under their belt.

They should be coming back to us, under 20 with 50-100 first team games, not sitting around playing pretend football for 4 years. What are they learning playing u21 football?

my thoughts exactly

at 21 a player should be good enough for the first team or shipped out

i raised the poinj of kinsella a couple of weeks ago, if he is that shit that he cant make the team with as shit as we are he needs to go

grealish apart we have bought no one through in 4 seasons so what is the point of the academy?

[dave.woodhall]

These players should be going out at 17/18 and learning like Grealish did, not reaching the age of 21 with 2/3 competitive games under their belt.

They should be coming back to us, under 20 with 50-100 first team games, not sitting around playing pretend football for 4 years. What are they learning playing u21 football?

my thoughts exactly

at 21 a player should be good enough for the first team or shipped out

i raised the poinj of kinsella a couple of weeks ago, if he is that shit that he cant make the team with as shit as we are he needs to go

grealish apart we have bought no one through in 4 seasons so what is the point of the academy?

At 21 Peter Withe was being sacked by Barrow and Paul McGrath was a security guard.

[Clampy]

Just because a player can't make the first team doesn't make them shit. Someone mentioned Jordan Graham earlier I think. He's done well for Wolves but didn't get a sniff of our first team.