Saints to restructure academy

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I thought that's how they used to be. 1st team, "B" team, under 18s and then Youth team. Didn't they change the names when the Premier was introduced?
 
Copy and paste for anyone that doesn't want to give the Daily Mail any money:

Southampton's academy turns to B team to replace the Under 23 side as club switch to European model


Southampton are set to approve a restructuring of their famed academy by replacing their Under 23 side with a senior B team.


The Saints academy has helped develop Gareth Bale, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Adam Lallana and Theo Walcott, and before that the club produced legends Alan Shearer and Matt Le Tissier.


The model of having a senior B team has been used successfully in Europe by Barcelona, Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund.


If the switch is agreed, as is likely, the training for the B team will mirror the schedule of manager Ralph Hasenhuttl's first team at the club's Staplewood headquarters.


Where possible, the B team will play their matches on different days to the senior side to allow Hasenhuttl to watch their games - the club will continue to play in Premier League 2.


It is hoped that by Hasenhuttl keeping an eye on B-team matches, it will help facilitate the promotion of players into the first-team set-up.


It is understood the academy players have been informed of the club's planned structural revamp.
 
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SaintMarv said:
Don't the Barcelona etc B teams play in the lower Spanish leagues?
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The third level of Spanish football is called Segunda División B and contains 4 groups of 20 teams, including several of the B teams from the top 2 divisions. The top 4 teams of each group qualify for playoffs for promotion to Segunda División A but only teams whose first team is in the Priméra División can be promoted to the second level.
 
Used to love it at 6-a-side tournaments, when you'd get picked for the B-team, and then inevitably go on to beat the A-team. I remember a tournament at Redbridge school. Scored the winner for the Bs against the As in the semi-final. The As were mostly made up of the manager's "star player" of a son, and his best mates. I knew we'd beat them. They didn't even stick around to watch us in the final.
 
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Susan said:
Used to love it at 6-a-side tournaments, when you'd get picked for the B-team, and then inevitably go on to beat the A-team. I remember a tournament at Redbridge school. Scored the winner for the Bs against the As in the semi-final. The As were mostly made up of the manager's "star player" of a son, and his best mates. I knew we'd beat them. They didn't even stick around to watch us in the final.
Click to expand...



Some of the adults managing kids football teams want shooting tbh.
 
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Not overly exciting news by the lack of comment on here
I think we definitely need to do something to inject life into our academy that has drifted in a downwards spiral since Dodds/OConnor left and Jaidi seemed to let the whole academy drift into obscurity
 
Probably a bit harsh on Jaidi. I thought the talk on him was he just wasn’t a very good manager. Call ups and recruitment weren’t his area and you can only work with what you have. Players really seemed to have the knives out for Hunter when he left though. Certainly was the bad guy in the story. A succession of short term managers in firefights make it hard for players to come into the first team too.

My big positivity on this is that it comes from Ralph (who wrote a club coaching manual for all levels during lockdown and wants to use the academy) and Matt Crocker as DoF. Remember Crocker was academy head when we had our best run of players coming through (Bale, AOC, Shaw, Chambers, Reed, JWP. He also helped recruit the young signings like Stephens and Valery joining as teens). I think any decision made about the academy is in really sound hands tbh.
 
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