On the 23's.... The business model for clubs is to bring kids through and loan them out for big fees and then either use them or sell at a huge profit. Youth setups don't magically fall in to place overnight. That Italian idiot Cellino decimated our youth teams. One of Radz first instructions was for Orta to fill up the youth teams and get them going again. He went out and signed the rejects and nearly men of Europe just so we could field a side. Although only Struijk made it, that team was very competitive at youth level. Fast forward a couple of years and we can attract better youth players. We can afford to buy them (Summerville, Greenwood, Gelhardt, Hjelde etc) and also now we are seeing our own catchment area filtering through in to the younger sides. We signed Dramah for just over a million 18 months ago. I don't know the exact loan figure that Cardiff have paid but there seemed to be a bidding war for him between Forest, Swansea and Cardiff. It wouldn't surprise me if it was getting close to 7 figures and they will pay his wages. He gets experience and is in the shop window. If he goes well his value will probably soar to 5 million plus. That is the business model for youth teams at this level. Look at Rhian Brewster for example. He went from Liverpool on loan, scored a few goals, nothing spectacular and Sheff Utd bought him for 20 million. They sold Solanke to Bournemouth for around 12 to 15 million a couple of years previous. That's 35 million quid. Paid for Mane fee. Firmino only cost 25 million. Because of Cellino, we are behind the 8 ball on this system. The senior u23 lads are suffering from it but the conveyor belt is moving and in a couple of years we as a club will be reaping the benefits not only in the first team but in transfer fees.
This lad will be schooled under Cresswell and Hjelde plus have Nohan Kenneh around him. He will probably replace Charlie Cresswell at some stage as Charlie gets involved with the first team
I’m going back to when I first started following Leeds United. We had both the reserves and the youth team in those days who all got regular football. The reserves were always able to slot into any team which didn’t weaken the first team. If a lot of these lads are not getting regular football but only training that in itself is not good for their development. They are then expected to perform miracles although that saying I thought Hjelde played really well on Sunday. I do feel getting rid of the reserve leagues was a mistake for squad strength.
Nohan Kenneh, Alfie Hughes and Josh Galloway will either be released or sign a new contract in the coming weeks as all contracts due to end in June. For me Nohan Kenneh should take over from Cresswell as skipper when Cresswell not around. Plays anywhere in defence or midfield including DM
5 million gor Drameh are you on drugs maaann. We will be lucky to get our money back as he has forced a move.
He's 18 months in to a 4 year contract. He ain't going nowhere unless we allow him to. If we allow him to go then we will want money. England u21 International and has played PL football. If he plays 20 games at Cardiff then yes his value will increase significantly. If nobody will pay for him permanently we can easily loan him out for two years until he walks away for free. That incurs loan fees. We won't lose money on Dramah. It's been a good investment.
What you put it's just your opinion all ifs and maybes. What if he just walks away or breaks a leg. Maybe loses his desire and ends up in league one and we just let him go. It's only good business if it happens so i say sell him as he is a traitor and wanted put on us when we were bare bones. So feck him.
Yep. He could be hit by a bus. He could end up on drugs. Anything could happen. All I'm saying is Cardiff will be paying his wages and a loan fee. Just like we did for Harrison, Blackman, Nketiah, Izzy Brown, Ben White etc. It's how the business works. If nobody comes in with a fee in the summer then he will go out on loan again if he and Leeds don't want to work together. Cue another loan fee and wages paid. Same the year after. That will cover the initial outlay on him. If he goes well at Cardiff he may go for quite a big fee. For example, Lloyd Kelly played a season with Bristol City as a 20 year old as a defender. Played at U21 level for England. One season in the Championship, one season! Bournemouth bought him for 13 million.
agree with the conveyor belt, Cellino and that it’s part of the formula in modern football just a minor correction. This wasn’t radz instruction to orta - it was orta selling the Seville model to radz. Radz had no experience in football and bought into the plan. the problem with it, and my beef at the time was we didn’t have the luxury of long term planning when we needed the limited available funds for the first team. We spnked too much money we didn’t have on it and because we were scatter gun the quality control was poor. We got into a financial mess where we were letting first teamers go because we couldn’t afford their contracts. radz is on record as saying that first year was an expensive mistake it is far and away my biggest beef with orta - other than recommending Christiansen as a puppet he could control. Victor subsequently redeemed himself by going all in on bielsa (which was a huge risk which could have backfired, but thankfully turned out great)
Very true but very nearly worked out. You have to remember that Pascal Struijk was brought in from Ajax and his value now will have paid for the mistakes made. Aapo Halme was also brought over from Norway and was doing a really good job before he spat his dummy out like Drameh and we sold him to Barnsley. Hugo Diaz was another great find for the 23s and was our title winning skipper under Carlos Corberan. He was sold back into sPain, but the likes of Mujica, Jordan Stevens and a bunch of Carlos Kickaballs who all went back to Spain never paid off
Always said it that orta got lucky with bielsa. Don't rate orta but i know who does... Himself. Ffs he was only at boro
like I said bud… I have no beef with the concept and process. One superstar or several ok’s pays for all the misses. Given we had no academy and we needed to fill it quickly there were bound to be a lot of misses. So right idea at the wrong time. To me the available funds needed to go to the first team as a priority. You develop a premier league youth system when you’re premier league or cash rich. We were neither. It wasted a year and then denied us the funds that might have helped secure promotion in bielsa’s first year. That was my take at the time… and still my position but Now we are in the Prem i’m happy we have it!
Agree. I think we did spend too much on numbers rather than quality. However, it was catch 22 after Cellino had basically shut down our youth teams. The young players the club brought in to the 23's back then have kind of laid the foundation to our youth system today. It's still recovering from Cellino and as Doc says, the kids aren't getting enough football at the minute. However, as the next lads get another year or two behind them we will gradually get a bit more depth. Then hopefully reap the rewards that City and Chelsea get from the loan to sell markets.
