With all the transfer speculation, I thought it worthwhile re-visiting where the Club stands in relation to the 25-man squad rule. The actual rules are :- 1) All Premier League clubs must submit a squad of up to 25 players. 2) Each 25-man squad must include at least eight 'home-grown' players. 3) A home grown player is defined as one who, irrespective of his nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association or the Welsh Football Association for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons or 36 months prior to his 21st birthday (or the end of the season during which he turns 21). 4) In addition to the 25-man named squad, clubs can use an unlimited number of players aged 21 or under. An Under 21 player is defined as one who is under the age of 21 on 1st January in the year in which the season commences. For the 2012/13 campaign Under 21 players will have been born on or after 1st January 1991. If a team does not field 8 home-grown players in their squad, their allotment will be reduced by the number of players they lack. In other words, if they only name 6 home-grown players, they will only be allowed 23 players. An easy way to think about this is that teams are allowed to have up to 17 players over the age of 21 that do not qualify as home-grown. Based on the current ‘Player Profiles’ on the Club site, I reckon this is where we stand : * Not ‘Home Grown’ * Home Grown * Under 21 Goalkeeper- Defender.. Midfield.. Attacker Shwarzer...... (Kelly)........Diarra..... Ruiz Somogyi....... JA Riise......Dempsey. Rodellago (Etheridge) ... Hangeland.. Dembele.. Petric Stockdale..... (Baird)........Duff ....... Trotta ...................(Senderos)..Davies .....Mesca ...................Grygera.... .Etuhu ...................Halliche.... .Sidwell ...................Riether...... Frei ...................Hughes..... Kacanaklic ...................Briggs........ Kasami That means we will only be allowed a 23-man squad, plus 6 players Under 21. However the total number is 33. My conclusions are : 1. We have 4 players surplus to requirements 2. We need to sign 2 x ’home grown’ players EDIT - As FulhamIreland has correctly pointed out, both (Kelly) and (Baird) qualify as 'home-grown' Therefore we have a legitimate 25-man squad and only 2 players among the existing squad are surplus to requirements Edit 2 - As Surlyc has also correctly pointed out both (Etheridge) and (Senderos) qualify as 'home-grown' .The situation remains however that 2 players among the existing squad are surplus to requirements
Baird and Hughes are Northern Irish, Duff and Kelly are Republic of Irish (lol). As I started typing that, I realised this makes no difference to the numbers and it just makes me sound pedantic! Sorry C58, good post and lots of great info. Also, I may be completely wrong, but would Schwarzer, Riise and Hangeland not be classed as home-grown too?
Not according to Rule 3) in my post, Bidley (as I understand it anyway). And that applies to Kelly and Baird also. As you say, nationality is irrelevant.
Just had a quick look on wiki to check Frei hadn't been with us 3 years, which I thought might then mean he could be considered HG and U21 (he hasn't) when I noticed the intro to his profile; "He is becoming known for his quick feet and dribbling, and due to his playing style and short stature has been likened to a young Lionel Messi." I'm not sure I've heard a fellow fan make that comparison before! Thanks for posting up the full squad! Looking at it- we could maybe do with one more DF, we're good for experience so a punt on a Smalling type player would be great. MF looks solid enough, providing we keep everyone. If we could get a replacement for Etuhu, similar to Diarra in terms of experience (although we only got him through unusual circumstances) that would be great. The wings look strong and our starting 4 are up there with other top level prem teams. FW looks a bit light- I'm not sure where Ruiz will be deployed next year. He looked most effective on the left last season, where he has a bit more space, but MJ might slot him in alongside Rod/Petric. An out&out striker would be a good addition, although if we avoid injuries, the players we have are all quality. I've not seem much of Trotta, it may be that he ready to break in and make an impact. Overall I'd be confident of us finishing between 8th and 12th with that team- if we can hold on to Moussa and bring in 1 or 2 more top level players then I think maybe we could kick on- 6th is wildly unrealistic at this stage- but I don't think it's a question of us lacking quality, it's just away form and consistency.
So are Kelly and Baird home-grown too? Apparently Jol wants to add at least 2 more players so I wouldn't be surprised if they are home-grown players.
Yeah, we signed him in August 2010 so he only qualifies as U21. No FI, neither Kelly or Baird qualify as home-grown. Like you, my conclusion is that the two new signings should be home-grown because if they are not, Jol either can't play them as part of the 25-man squad (which doesn't make sense) OR he has to leave out two existing one's. As a matter of interest, assuming 4 of the existing 33 squad players were not allowed under the Rules to be in the 25-man squad, who do you think Jol will elect to leave out? My first 2 are kind of easy - Somogyi and Halliche. The next 2 more difficult. Candidates are Senderos (only because nobody has seen him), Etuhu (because Jol said yesterday "he's still here"), Sidwell (because Jol didn't mention him at all) and Davies (age and injuries unfortunately).
But Kelly signed for Spurs at the age of 17 and was with them for 6 years. Baird signed for Southampton as a 16 year old and was with them until he was 25 so why aren't they home-grown?
I stand corrected FI - sorry for that. I've tried producing a new list (table) here and in the original post but fiddling with the colours got the better of me - again apolgies. So I've annotated the the original post by way of a correction. Any conclusion is obviously different in relation to surplus players - there would in fact be 2. However the point about new signings stands - 'if they are not home-grown a further 2 players become surplus to requirements'
Sorry to poke further holes in your post C58, but Neil Etheridge has been with us since he was 16 and is therefore home-grown too. On an aside as he's 22 now we need to decide between him and Somogyi; I'd be tempted to stick with Etheridge. In addition, Senderos joined Arsenal as a 17 year old so should be considered home-grown too. This means Baird could be deemed disposable.
Blinking heck surly, can't work out now if we've got too many or too few. No thanks for that and at least it means Jol is working with a "full pack". The bottom line though is that he has to nominate 25 (excluding the U21s of course) and it make no sense to have 2 (or 3 or 4) around (earning wages) that he can't play. That applies even more so with the new Academy set up (see my earlier post) since there will no longer be a Reserve team (or as it was called last season a Development team). If, as he said he was, Jol intends to bring in 2 more 1st Squad players he's going to have to offload some. I really hope Chris Baird isn't one of them. Not that I would want it to happen but being realistic, Demps could be one and it looks as though Etuhu may be another.
