I was thinking this morning about how over the years we seem to have produced a vast ammount of exceptional talent from our academy system. Unfortunatley over the years many of these have had to move on for obvious reasons, but im delighted that we seem to be able to retain them of late. I am interested to know if anyone feels there is a better place in the country to start a career. Below is a list of some of the great names to have come through our academy system (or back in the days started at saints) TERRY PAINE MICK CHANNON MATT LE TISS ALAN SHEARER DEXTER BLACKSTOCK ANDREW SURMAN CHRIS BAIRD GARETH BALE LEON BEST WAYNE BRIDGE THEO WALCOTT ADAM LALLANA (Debatable hahaha) ALEX CHAMBERLAIN NATHAN DYER DAVID MCGOLDRICK LLOYD JAMES MARTIN CRANIE I mean some of the above are not such hot property but they are all established players and gone on to do well. Maybe there are a few more. But in recent times can anyone think of any other club to rival ours. Watford and Palace come to mind for me! We deffinately have a fantastic reputation and some of the lads in our current set up must take positives from this. Its a great time to be a saints fan! Lets really get behind the lads tomorrow!!!! COYRs!
Hey, i agree it is a great academy. For me one of the reasons why maybe due to the lack of clubs within the area. For example if the club was in London then you are competing against so many other sides. I think Saints have been able to take their pick from the whole of the south coast. I used to play against the Saints academy and it was great then. I am due ot be a father in May and if say it was aboy that was quite good saints would be a great place rather than having to go places like London...
Hahaha i like your optimism of your boy (fingers crossed) making it to the big time You make a valid point in regards to location as there is very little if any competition around the south coast lol.......... Its good to see the players coming through and as posted above, finally we seem to be able to keep hold of them for now at least! Promotion is a must for this to remain the same i feel!
Well you need to dream lol.. I still thnk out academys are way, way short of the ones accross Europe as we still concentrating on winning as youngsters rather than developing the appropriate skills..........might change though.... I agree if we Bournemuoth dont go up ,we will lose a few players, but if you dont i actually think it will affect your club a lot lot more than us....
Oh if we dont get promoted it will have a massive impact on us. I fear the fans will slowly disapear!!! I fear the likes of lambert, fonte, lallana and oxo will look for an exit!!! Who knows! But anyway .... need not worry.... we are going up As are you i hope! COYRs!
Yeah exactly i think if dont all those players will leave and you could be in trouble........... However your right we both can still go up and still along way to go.....................
Are you taking the piss? Great names? Lloyd James, Martin Cranie? I nearly spat my coffee all over my keyboard. They wouldn't be allowed anywhere near Lawrie's sides of the past. West Ham, Man Utd, before that Burnley. What about Crewe? We have produced some fantastic young players over the years, but Dyer,Surman,Cranie, Blackstock,Best ect aren't fit to lace their boots. They are no better than most other clubs produce. Terry, Mick, Stevie Williams, Danny Wallace, Matt, Shearer-these guys went on to play for England. Lloyd James went on to play for Colchester.
Mate are you all about going about opposing to everyones comments! Read the post... i stated not all players are of huge calibre,,,, but just the sheer numbers of players we have brought through the system as opposed to many many clubs buying them in etc! Also i couldnt think of others of the top of my head! Of 17 i chose, u eliminated 10 as correct so not too bad! The most have gone on to be successful and value highly by their clubs! I personally like James! He didnt quite cut it but still doesnt mean we cant be happy we produced this many players through our system with many more to come Maybe im too young to appreciate the lawrie days but many will agree our academy set up and produce is right up there. Just wondered what others thought and who our main rivals in this field was.
I'm not opposing everyone's comments, just giving my opinion. Isn't that what forums are all about. My opinion is that we haven't produced any more or better players than most other clubs in recent times. Players like James, Best, Blackstock,Dyer, Cranie,Surman ect are no better than what other clubs produce. lallana and AC appear to be so, but it's early days. I guess my generation were spoilt, but Lawrie produced youngsters that not only starred in the top flight but did it season in season out. I would put Stevie Willimas in my side ahead of Surman & James and he's 52.At Lallana's age Steve Williams was an ever present in the top flight and had played for the under 21's 14 times. That's nothing against Lallana, but he's a League 1 player with bags of potential. Who knows whether he'll ever play in the top flight? Even players that didn't go on to play international were still really strong top flight players, look at Nick Holmes. I would say the past 15 years only Bridge has produced the goods season in season out in the top flight. Bale has started to and the jury is still out on Walcott. Baird has done ok and been a solid pro. Rupert Lowe hyped up our Academy, but the truth is we've spent a lot of money on it, and it is still not producing the players we did in the past. Let's hope with the investment that NC is making in it bears fruit, but it is no better than loads of other clubs.
I have never known you to be so honest.....................................what has come over you? love the reponse..
That is a very fitting and accurate respone so fair play! My article is simply an expression to the recent success of the academy, all be some youngsters not so hot. I was just wondering others thought and for those who may disagree - i wondered who our rivals in this area was and the players to have come from them. Just because we are seen as a very good club for youngsters. I agree this is maily due to walcott, bale, lallana and oxo.... but the slightly smaller players still deserve credit perhaps
As Arsne Wenger said "everyone thinks they have the Prettiest wife". A lot of clubs will argue that they produce good young players. The ones mentioned like Best, Surman and Craine will be pretty unknown amongst the general footballing population and certainly people wont be saying "what a great system it produced Crainie, Surman, Dyer and James". In the past they would have done, we were universally known for producing youngsters, like Crewe were. Older fossils will remember Burnley produced a few themselves as well. The problem as I see it was that Rupert banged on about it so much that our younger supporters (and this is not a dig) started to believe it. It is not the case as yet.We used to produce youngsters that played a number of seasons for the club and then moved on. Nowadays we have produced youngsters that play a handful of games then move. We spend a lot of money on our Academy, and I want to see 5/6 regulary first team players promoted from within. But, and this is where Rupert got it wrong, they need to be good enough. The other thing we used to do was devolop players. mark Wright came from Oxford reserves and Lawrie turned him into a class act. Players like Seabourne and Dickson seem to stay still or go backwards. Part of a club must be the devolopment of young plaers brought in, and again we need to work on this.
That is hopefully where we will be able to improve. To do so we need to have the staff that is fully capable of doing just that. Bring on the imported players as well as bring forward the academy players.
I agree with a lot of what you have said (even though I am not an "older fossil" like yourself ), but you cannot overlook the fact that Bale is the most wanted player on the planet, and could become one of the top three players in the world, something that no other Saint has done. The closest was Ron Davies, an import, when Busby called him "the best centre-forward in Europe" after that 4.1 at Old Trafford. Walcott could have given more, perhaps Wenger has not nurtured him sufficiently or the hype over him was exageration, but there can be no denying that he is a very influential cog in a side that may just be about to win the title. We have then had a decent output of standard players, and many regard Arsenal or Chelsea as having the best academies. If you compare Wilshere and Gibbs to Bale and Walcott, I would take the latter option for shere impact; Wilshere has undoubted class, but I am yet to see him destroy Barca (Walcott last season) or Inter (Bale twice this year). He had a very good game against Barca, and I may be basing my argument on specific games, but Walcott changed that game when he came on completely. Chelsea's academy is actually, mostly, a hybrid of other club's youngsters (though we could be guilty with the acquisition of Lallana, and potentially also with Channon, cheeky old Ted). Who in England has produced four players of the potential/ ability of Chamberlain, Lallana, Bale and Walcott in the last six years? There is little point in saying that potential is not ability, in a game where money is more dominant and foreign imports are dominating the higher echelons of english football, there is no doubt that our 'fab four' our shining lights for the British game, and that in years to come our current two players could possibly walk into any side, whilst Walcott and Bale already can. I do agree, however, that under Lawrie we had a more regular output of class players, and as the man himself said at the 125th anniversary thing at the Mayflower it was him that established I widely respected and renowned academy, not Lowe.
