The loaning out to the 'lesser' clubs is IMHO more to get the players used to the hurly-burly of proper competitive English league matches, from the physical side, number of games played, to the crowd environment. No amount of academy training can do that. From the coaching viewpoint, Spurs getting smart on how to produce even better players with the basic technical skills, is something the likes of Ajax and Sporting could no doubt offer.
The main issue there is, whilst the academies of various clubs in the old Soviet bloc are very good (Dynamo Kyiv, Shakhtar, Dnipro, Metalist Kharkiv, various clubs dotted around Belarus) there would be issues with work permits if we were interested in bringing over one of their top prospects, which wouldn't be the case with various clubs in England, Portugal, Holland, France, Spain, or Belgium. Also, I'm not sure if the likes of Lameiras or Beltaleb would be as keen to spend a season in Kyiv or Donetsk compared to Lisbon, Amsterdam or Lille. This may be learned from Football Manager, rather than any basis in the real world, but it does seem that clubs in Spain, Portugal and Italy have a leg-up in regards to South American players getting work permits compared to English ones through some loophole or other.
I'd rather avoid that subject, its bloody ridiculous, our borders are open to unemployed individuals from Eastern bloc countries who wander in and straight onto our welfare system, but our home office question an individual with a guaranteed, very taxable, well paid job.
On one hand it's odd that Russian clubs don't have top youth facilities - on the other a godsend, given the amount of paperwork, red tape, and general dodginess involved with negotiating with Russian clubs. I'm sure a top prospect at right back from Belgium will be as good, if not better, than their Russian counterpart - and signing them would be a lot less hassle. Given our habit of helping ourselves to West Ham's best players, they would be a good team to partner up with on paper - on the other hand, though, if one of their top prospects moved to us we can be guaranteed a few weeks of hatchet jobs from Karren Brady and Sam Allardyce in their newspaper columns, even if the agreed fee would cover some debts from playing in a 2/3 empty white elephant in Stratford...
Eugh, why would we consider taking any member of the Wet Spam squad let alone a youth prospect with the ugly anti-football they play? We'd have to teach them how to play from the ground up
We may want to include in that agreement that Redknapp rejoins West Ham as manager seeing as he developed and gave chances to Lampard, Cole, Ferdinand, Carrick, Defoe, Johnson!
We could argue that Avram Grant developed Scott Parker, so arrange him to have a successful return to the club...
Yes, but none of those teams played the anti football they do now. In fact the ex hammers we have taken have come from decent footballing west ham sides if I recall.
