I have a few questions and observations in regards to the Hull City Youth System and Set Up and why it has failed to produce many quality footballers in recent years. Hull City must look at youth team set ups around the country with the likes of Crewe, Middlesbrough, Sheff Utd, Derby County and Southampton etc. regularly producing top quality young footballers. Understandably funding is a key issue when it comes to the development of players but funding alone can not be the entire answer and more naturally gifted players should be pushing through the ranks. I find the lack of any youth team players anywhere near the senior squad worrying. The likes of Southampton and Derby have a similar yet smaller population than the City of Hull yet are consistently producing top Premiership/Championship players with many linked with the top clubs around Europe. More worrying is that many lower league teams in the Championship and League One are producing a much better crop of players than us such as Sheff Utd, Middlesbrough and Crewe. Catchment area could be a partial reason and with much of the catchment area being the sea then obviously the crop of talent is reduced. However the city of Hull, many surrounding villages and towns, Southbank, East Yorkshire Coast, Scunthorpe and Grimsby you would expect a much larger pool of talented players to have been scouted especially with the lack of top quality competitor football clubs to the north and south of the City. Other clubs with much smaller finances and much more competition from neighbouring rival clubs are still producing a more impressive crop of players. Now I am not expecting these players to be drawn out of mid air and it is a long process of years of development but something is surely wrong when so few are making the grade or getting close to the first team. Many North West Clubs produce top quality players despite and massive competition from top clubs Man Utd, Wigan, Everton, Liverpool, Bolton, Man City We have had a culture of being afraid to blood young talent in the first team squad with Cairney, Clayton Donaldson and Cooper been some of the only notable players of recent years. Cooper going from playing the Premiership to dropping down the league to Chesterfield and the best player of them all Cairney unfortunatley been sold Blackburn. Many potential prospects that come with high hopes never make the grade like Cullen, Atkinson, Featherstone, Devitt, Lamplough etc. and something is clearly going missing in the middle. We appear to be buying in our current youth system which is definitely a good start but obviously not a good advert for local talent. I don't watch the Hull City reserves and was wondering whether any of the current local youth players or imported players look likely to ever make the grade in the first team? Players like Dougie Willson, Mark Oxley, Calaum Jahraldo-Martin, Conor Henderson, Conor Townsend, Elliott Kebbie (Athletico Madrid), Johan Ter Horst. Basically I am just wondering what your take on the current youth system is? Cheers
At present, the only youth players I think that have a shot are Oxley, Cracknell, Clappison, Ter Horst and Clark.
-> The likes of Southampton and Derby have a similar yet smaller population than the City of Hull yet are consistently producing top Premiership/Championship players with many linked with the top clubs around Europe. More worrying is that many lower league teams in the Championship and League One are producing a much better crop of players than us such as Sheff Utd, Middlesbrough and Crewe. Catchment area could be a partial reason and with much of the catchment area being the sea then obviously the crop of talent is reduced Last time I looked, both Southampton and Middlesborough were both located next to the sea too Credit to the Allam's for investing in our youth / development structure. Something previous regimes have failed miserably with.
Within the next couple of years hopefully we will start seeing a vast improvement in the youth set up with some proper prospects for the future.
The players I've listed are the ones that I know are rated. Margetts is a decent player but whether or not he will become a Pl striker is yet to be seen. He's done well at Gainsborough, though. There was a young striker at City a few seasons back, Sam O Connor I think his name was, anybody know what happened to him? Funny the op should mention Joe Lamplough, I'm playing against him in two weeks in our 6 a side league.
What about Townsend? Isn't he showing remarkable potential? Maybe he could stay here next season and help cover the mass of games?
He got injured and I think his loan at Carlisle was cancelled, his last game for them was back in January.
He did indeed get injured, he was doing really well for them too. I think his deal runs out next year, so unless he has a barnstorming pre season, he will probably go back out on loan. I also forgot about Daniel James, his family are friends with my parents. Apparently some big clubs are looking at him.
Liam Cooper seems to be doing all right at Chesterfield. Got promoted with them & came runners up in the Johnston's Paint Trophy.
He probably should be playing in the Championship. There are a few Championship clubs (think Charlton was one of them) looking at Sonny Bradley earlier in the season, I think both could do a job at that level. Danny East, on the other hand, can't even make the matchday squad for Portsmouth. Is he injured, or just a bit ****? He featured for us in the cup the season before last and was average against a plucky Macclesfield side.
He's forever getting injured but he came back from his latest one the other day in their win against Northampton and scored.
Danny East isn't a bad player, he might not make it at a major level, but he's good enough to make a decent living in the game.
I think that a percentage of school kids who are sufficiently athletic and talented to become professional footballers get encouraged to aim for rugby league and are creamed off from the pool available to soccer. Also the rugby clubs appear to have been more high profile and pro-active at developing links with schools. I am not sure that City's lack of success in bringing local lads through the system is entirely 100% down to their lack of facilities and the league they have played in.
Well that's a point. What, exactly, are we competing with inside the city? What are Hull's and KR's facilities and youth programmes like? Either club bring many through their own ranks?
I'm not exactly sure what Rovers do, but Hull are quite proud of their record with young players in the last few seasons, and had 2 recent academy graduates in the team of the season last year. A big part of what FC do is have players on scholarship deals from 12/13 before they sign academy terms at 15. When they leave school they go onto the AASE programme which is at Bishop Burton where they study in the morning for A Levels or for a BTEC in sport or whatever and then in the afternoon they train. Effectively these kids are full time rugby players with a bit of studying thrown in on top if they don't make it pro. I've no idea how City do it, whether once the kids leave school it's effectively **** or bust or if they operate something similar. Maybe that's some of the motivation behind the move to Bishop Burton or part of the criteria for the next level of EPP - to provide further education for players as well?
Ye they do bob and always have done. But you gotta remember you only have to be a big **** to make it in RL for the most part. A few mates from my generation never played it or wanted to but took it as an option as they werent good enough at football. Had good careers too. They do always seem to go into schools, lot more than City do. The poster on here who works in the youth set up said Billy Russell (i think) went round senior schools in Hull offering coaching etc and the heads ****ed him off.
