AVB (Chavs Boss) has suggested that having a "B" team in a lower league might benefit the development of young English talent instead of loaning out. http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/s...-a-chelsea-b-team-in-the-championship?cc=3436 I know they do it in Spain & Italy, but would it work on England? Thoughts?
Didn't he mean reserve sides? David Moyes wanted to put an Everton reserve side in the Conference 4-5 years ago but the FA blocked it.
As you'd expect, there's rules for them (Barca B), I thought what happens if they win the 2nd Division and get promoted, so I looked it up and they're not allowed promotion to the same league as Barca. Nor are they allowed to enter the Copa Del Rey, their equivalent of the FA Cup. The thing there for me is what team do you know that could assemble a squad of their reserves that would last in the Championship...our's wouldn't! , had enough trouble against part-timers in the EL. I agree most top sides could field 3/4 of a team full of internationals, after that, those couple of weak links would cost you in that league, we've seen it in cup games. Villash Boash talking more bollocksh...just like his article in the paper today saying Torres and Drogba can play together...he fails to then explain why we've seen no evidence of this yet.
I think they said he could put the team about 8 divisions lower then that! The Scottish leagues could do with more teams
Nope it's an awful idea and shouldn't happen in any country's league. The day it does here the football league will die.
Just read the FL has knocked the idea on the head. They said there is some heritage issues with the clubs and wouldn't allow this to happen. Even "Whinger" has said it's a bad idea- well he would wouldn't he,he didn't think of it.
What about a rule where you can send players to play for a lower league side on a game to game basis to suit both sides needs. Like we could send players returning from injury, fringe players or youngsters to a designated club. I could just imagine Gomes or Pienaar at Leyton Orient lol.
Espanyol are also from Barcelona and still play in La Liga, but are a separate club - Barca B used to be called Espanya, though.
AVBs' idea may be unacceptable for a number of reasons, but the problem that he hopes to address certainly exists - and it is one that this forum returns to time and time again: Basically, how do you keep a large PL (title-challenging?) squad matchfit through a season, whilst maintaining a relatively consistent first 11-14? Loaning out to other clubs is one answer for sure, but that can have contractual issues when by necessity that player is needed back at his parent club. Also, if the player is training and playing with another club, there is no way that he will be on the same page as his colleagues when he comes back, so will take time to readjust. At the moment, if you discount the EL, LC and FAC opportunities, we seem to have some cobbled together friendlies at the training ground to support the fringe players and those returning from injury. Is this really sufficient for purpose? Short of re-establishing a full reserve team league is there any practical alternative to a version of the one proposed by AVB and run in Spain?
Beating the only part-time side in our group 7-1 on aggregate counts as having trouble now? Anyway, whilst Barca, the Madrid clubs and numerous other Spanish clubs have B teams in the Spanish system, how many of their graduates actually step up to the first team? By and large, it's a shop window for players who won't step up - and it should be asked how many Chavlings will actually be making their way to the first team? Carlton cole and Scott Sinclair didn't, nor did Tom Taiwo (which really justified the £5m compensation they had to pay Leeds for tapping him up...)
The only reason that we failed to qualify from the Europa League group was injuries, in my opinion. If everyone was fit, then we could have fielded a second XI of Cudicini, Corluka, Dawson, Gallas, Rose, Kranjcar, Sandro, Huddlestone, Pienaar, Pavlyuchenko and Defoe. Instead we ended up with a bunch of academy players in unfamiliar position, for most of it. As for the B team league, why don't we use the League of Wales or SPL? Probably a bit offensive, in theory, but both leagues are currently awful and it would boost attendances, interest and quality, while removing any conflict of interest issues and still keep our healthy league system. I love the fact that we've got relatively big teams in our lower tiers, as it keeps them interesting and freshens it all up every so often.
But hang on - people are mentioning the problem with having players in the 25-man squad not getting game time and suggesting B teams a s a means of dealing with this. Can players be registered for both teams?! Can a player be registered for two teams - one in the EPL - One in the SPL? Am I missing something? Surely having a B team is just about bringing on youngsters who are not in your 25-man squad, no?
I was under the impression PAOK used part-timers, having checked, thats not the case anymore, they did a few yrs ago apparently, due to chronic finance trouble, unable to pay wages and still owe the Greek government millions. Either way it does not change the point of the post that our team wouldn't last in the Championship. Well done on your brownie point for a side issue though.
It was WUMs that were going on about us playing part-time sides - Wikipedia is apparently beyond their expertise. Anyway, if we fielded a reserve side in the Championship, we wouldn't embarrass ourselves by any stretch of the imagination - Caulker and Naughton have demonstrated they can handle Championship football as well as Premier League football, for example. The only way it would be an embarrassment is if it was packed with players that couldn't be arsed, but that's less likely given Townsend and Falque are ahead of Bostock in the pecking order.
