centre of excellence closed

http://www.wycombewanderers.co.uk/page/LatestNews/0,,10430~2805483,00.html

very very surprised to hear this news, given the number of fantastic young players who have come through (and im sure would have continued to). this also means we will have to pick up more free agents and journeymen players as oppose to developing our own

hopefully this isent the start of a price cutting strategy until we get the trust in charge

 

This is really sad news, we're all very proud of our youth system and the players it has produced over the years. This is an inevitable consequence of cost cutting by the Trust in readiness for its takeover and more so that awful EPPP system coming in. Yet another casualty of the greed of the Premier League and Sky.

 

Sad but unavoidable. Unfortunately, when it's a case of survival or bust, some very tough decisions have to be made. I'm absolutely certain there will be more cost cutting measures, simply because there has to be. I'd be surprised if every club above us in the league has the set up we had. Therefore it can only be considered an expensive luxury which, under the new rules, is not viable. Sounds cold but that's the way it is unfortunately.

 

I agree hopefully we can reintroduce a youth team and maybe even a C.O.E once we are in a more stable place. The only silver lining at the moment is that it looks like the trust is taking a sober look at the financial state of the club and making the necessary changes and not just rushing in blindly to take ownership.

 

Sad times indeed but has to be done.survival of the club has to come first.

 

I think what makes it worse is that we can't see the cost structure behind the running of the club and therefore we have no real idea if the correct decisions (from a club survival point of view) are being made.
For example - how much money has the club made in the past 3-4 yrs from the sale of players brought up through the youth system I.e Matt Phillips, Jordan Ibe, Kadeem Harris etc. does this outweigh the expenditure over that period of time?
It's very easy to look at a cost and cut it without properly analysing it's worth!
Will we see clarity on such matters from the trust or will be in the same blind position going forward. I appreciate that we can't necessarily hold a fans forum for very club decision as it would be a farce, but the flow of information as to why decisions have been made will be essential as many fans will find some of the hard decisions to come unpalatable

 

the cold hard facts are that its not worth spending money on the youth system only to see the big boys come in and get your top young talent for next to nothing.its not steve hayes or the trusts fault its the new regulations brought in and the premiership fat cats ruining football.some of the best players at the big premiership clubs have started out at clubs the size of ours,they have a short memory,look how many players have come through the ranks at dario gradis crewe for example,yet another nail in the coffin of the lower league clubs.

 

Unfortunately Slasher, those days of selling the likes of Matty Phillips and Jordan Ibe etc to boost the cub's funds are gone and therefore fees we got for those are no longer relevant. I think the reasons they gave for this action were clear enough, short of supplying full details of the costs and projected income from sales of players under the new rules. But it's probably reasonable to assume that, under the new rules, we would have to sell 4 players at the maximum rate to get close to what we received for Matty Phillips, for example. That is a considerable loss of potential income, which the club would not have been able to withstand.

Agreed it would be clearer if all the figures were revealed but that is probably too much to ask. However I would have thought that a special general meeting of the WWT should be held (with all members of the WWT, with voting rights, allowed to attend) where the proposed decisions were put forward with backing information before pushing them through. To avoid the tail wagging the dog though these would have to put forward as "done deals" and only not ratified if a constructive counter proposal is tabled within a limited timescale.

 

i do hope the wobblers can raise some dosh soon. how about staging a pop concert or the like. the very best of luck next season

 

Good idea. Would you like to be our new marketing manager.

 

I think this kind of measure was inevitable unfortunately. Lets face it, if this is the worst casualty of the Trust taking over then i can roll with it. Its not like we'll never have a youth structure again....