I appreciate its being discussed in the comments on a few threads but I thought it may be worth starting a thread to discuss the academy. For context there are rumours going around it is going to be trimmed to u23s and u18s. What are everyone's thoughts on the academy in general? My understanding is that under Patrick it lost around £1 million a season to run but seemed worth it during that time as we had numerous prospects come through - stones, Holgate, bree, Butterfield, Digby, oates, rose, etc some made us a decent wedge and some may still Holgate will have a sell on. Diggers oates and Rose all playing but at a lower level. Do we think it is worth keeping it running at a loss to the club though? Only Jacob brown in our team at the moment and aiden Marsh coming through? For me the brightest prospect of young players at oakwell at moment is clarke odour we bought him and I can't imagine it was more than half a million would expect less. If we can purchase players that can play for us for cheaper than running the academy it does make sense. It's sad to think the academy will go but I also think if it isn't able to produce enough first teamers for us is it worth it? For more context here's a link to professional players who have come out of our academy it's short reading. https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/fc-barnsley/jugendarbeit/verein/349 Just thought I'd throw my 2 penneth in given some are saying it would be disastrous. Also please don't think I don't appreciate it will cost people's jobs I would keep it personally not only for the community and that it gives young coaches a chance but I believe its worth it that it should be a focus to develop 'one of our own' players we can appreciate. God knows we don't keep any players here long enough these days to get any real connection with.
It’s great when we can produce players such as Stones who played at every Academy level, and that we can take a punt on other promising youngsters who started at other Academies but were released such as Adam Davies. I also think it’s a great way to bring promising young non- league talent like Simoes. It would be a great shame to lose this. A work colleague’s son plays for the Academy, I think he’s about 15 and has even played for the under 23s. She is so proud of him and she can’t speak highly enough of the Academy staff, can’t remember his name as he doesn’t have her surname. They don’t live in the Barnsley area and would otherwise would’ve had no connection/ affiliation. She does tell me her community are watching her son’s progress and have even took to coming to Barnsley games.Edit, I should’ve added, and this is quite pertinent, Several clubs are watching him,and initially he nearly joined Doncaster Rovers, but the reputation of our Academy and speaking to the Academy staff who impressed immensely swung it for her and her son.
Hi hopster, my post wasn't aimed at you or this as I hadn't seen it till now. I think that looking at the academy purely on the basis of cost per year versus academy player SALES per year is very short sighted. For me you have to take into account the cost of buying a replacement player and the cost of wages for each. So for example the cost of producing Jacob brown versus the cost of buying Patrick Schmidt and the difference in wages between the two. The cost of producing Jack Walton versus the cost of buying Sami Radlinger and the difference in wages between the two. The list goes on. Then you have to compare what value they've added to the SQUAD in the time they've been here Jack Walton has earned us more points in about 5 games than Radlinger managed all season. Brown has added far more to our team than schmidt has etc. Only when you take all this into account and do a lot of modelling can you really asses the true value and cost of the academy and I honestly think that when you take into account all of the players we have produced for the first team over the years and actually think about how much it would have cost us in transfer fees to sign alternative players the only conclusion can be that it's great value for money. If the academy is scrapped because you have to pay to get players from it then the spreadsheet and James Cryne should also be scrapped as they do not come for free.
I agree to an extent, I do want to keep the academy don't get me wrong, I'd have loved us to give Danny Rose, Jordan Clark and rhys oates a full season with plenty of games when we went down under Wilson. The point on weighing it up for me was that if we could pick up players like odour from Leeds, for small fees that can make an impact i can see why it'd make more sense money wise for the owners. Don't really know why we felt the need to sign radlinger Walton looked decent for me everytime he played and has really shown how good he is over the last few games. To justify the expense to the owners the academy has produce players into the first team and it doesn't seem like we've done that enough over the last ten years. My point on the sales was more that for our long term goals of sustainability and building a better team we have to produce and sell players to cycle that system up. We stand to make more profit from academy players than we do buying a pinnock or mawson and selling them on if the talent is right I guess?
In an ideal world, we'd keep the academy going, and gamble on producing a saleable asset every couple of years, to ultimately cover it's costs. A local lad making the grade, and potentially being the next John Stones is what we'd all love to see. The majority of clubs will be looking at cost cutting measures, in the current climate, and the academy is a costly area a club could easily survive without. How many players actually step up from the YDP level, and make an impact in our first-team? The last player I can think of is probably James Bree (I could be wrong here). Most of the current crop came from other academies post-YDP level - Brown from Guiseley, Williams from Blackburn, Palmer from Man City, Simoes from FC United and Walton from Bolton, so not having an academy, below under-18 level wouldn't have made much difference in 'producing' these players.
We signed Jack Walton when he was 15. https://www.barnsleyfc.co.uk/teams/first-team/goalkeeper/jack-walton/
Correct and I'm guessing he must count as being an academy player as he got a lovely trophy for being academy player of the year 6 years ago
I’d hate to see us close the academy. It’s one of the things I love about the club, and it’d be really sad to see it go. Another step away from the club we all know and love
I've always been quite a sceptic with regards to our academy, although I think ironically, if it is to be scrapped, its a big part of the boards long term strategy that is compromised, rightly or wrongly. My own view is that I'm not convinced that for what an academy does produce that it is any better than the old structure of Northern Intermediates, Reserve Team and First Team. I'm not a big believer in the seemingly arbitary age groups that currently exist up to the u-23's. I still yearn for the days of the Central League, but that's a ship that's sailed as I cannot ever see the Premier League clubs favouring anything like that now. But for clubs like ourselves, it gave our squad players, younger players and first teamers who were regaining fitness after injury, weekly competitive football against relatively strong opposition. I've seen the likes of Bryan Robson, Paul Gascoigne, John Aldridge and a few others who were recovering fitness playing even 45 minutes against our reserves. At championship level in particular, I feel we need players who are ready, to some degree, to come straight into first team football, not necessarily take months "to develop", the latter was achieved in the Central League. Eric Winstanley had two muddy training pitches to work with, he led our intermediates to successive titles IIRC, and plenty of his young players were good quality players who didn't look out of place in the first team - Tiler, Watson, Liddell, Moses, Eaden for example. Their value, both financial and on the pitch, was primarily for us on both counts.
Perhaps, in the current climate, it would make sense to mothball it until we have a bit more cash in the bank, then reopen it.
I don't think our owners actually have a long term plan. I think their plan is all based around quick turn around. They'd rather buy a player for a middlish low price and sell for a little profit so they get a constant stream of cash every few months than invest any time in producing a player long term even if the value would be higher. The evidence for them wanting to make small amounts as quick as possible is just how quickly they're willing to sell players and also how quickly they sold nice.
The two current England center halves who've been sold for about £100 Million.have been in the academy at Oakwell. Our problem is the club never get maximum value from player sales
I would personally suck up the shít of having to sell our best player or players every single window than close/restructure/reduce the academy. And from the owners' point of view, surely it (the academy) represents the most cost-effective way of being able to generate a profit. For the cost of one Mallik Wilks, you get a season's worth of development from innumerable academy prospects. It only needs one decent one every three seasons to more than pay for itself.
It seems strange to me that there is real suggestion that the academy will be closed yet just this week, current season ticket holders were told that if they hadn't made a decision on their refund by close of play 21st July, it would be assumed that their money could be invested in the academy.
