Insight into to Barca Academy

[GovanAllan 0]

Firstly are you saying their team didn't cost millions? I'm pretty sure our current Rangers squad could beat that three man team. If they are so good at it, why is their whole squad not free?

 

With their resources I doubt they'd be crap in Div3 too. Newsflash, we don't have their resources. Would they be better than us with our resources? We have absolutely no way of knowing. I doubt they would know where to start as they have no experience of this part of the market.

 

A friend of mine once asked me to help him buy his son a bike for £120 as I'm pretty into bikes and have four. However, my bikes cost from between 800 quid for a Brompton and £2500 for a mountain bike. I often spend more than twice his budget on a service for the latter - my XTR cassette cost more than the bikes he was looking at. I had absolutely no idea about the sector of the market he was interested in. The cheap ones all worked on the same principles and I could ride them but I couldn't really compare them.

 

Barcelona could possibly learn very quickly but they would not be instant experts. Trying to copy Barcelona would be like trying to copy Chris Evans when looking for a second hand car.

 

I give up, you just can't see the forest for the trees.

 

There is nothing that Barca have done when it comes to youth that we can't, only difference will be we can't keep hold on to any really talented kids we bring on because we don't have the budget to pay the wage they will command.

 

To say otherwise is just being defeatist.

 

As for your Bike analogy a bit of research would've worked wonders, you know learning something new its a cracking concept.

[pete 2,499]

I think you will find that Barcelona also pay millions for some of their youth players. In some cases they also pay for their families to live in the area. I doubt you can compare their youth budget to that of Rangers. You may not even be able to compare our first team budget to their youth budget.

[the gunslinger 3,366]

were not trying to end up like barca here. what we are trying to achieve is an equivelant where we have a team that has 6 - 8 home grown players that are the best in the spl.

 

were not trying to find the next messi. we couldnt afford the next messi. but if we build a team of home grown stars at a commensurate level. then we can spend a little cash on the other few.

 

frankly having a philosophy that isnt humping long balls up the park at youth level would be great. do i have to tell the story about a player being told he was getting taken off if he didnt start pinging long balls to the strikers as soon as he got the ball again.

[simplythebest 0]

were not trying to end up like barca here. what we are trying to achieve is an equivelant where we have a team that has 6 - 8 home grown players that are the best in the spl.

 

were not trying to find the next messi. we couldnt afford the next messi. but if we build a team of home grown stars at a commensurate level. then we can spend a little cash on the other few.

 

frankly having a philosophy that isnt humping long balls up the park at youth level would be great. do i have to tell the story about a player being told he was getting taken off if he didnt start pinging long balls to the strikers as soon as he got the ball again.

 

Indeed, I don't get the mentality from some that we should only have one or two academy players in the team.

 

We should be aiming to have as many playing for us as possible by focussing on their developement.

[calscot 0]

As for your Bike analogy a bit of research would've worked wonders, you know learning something new its a cracking concept.

 

When someone asks for advice, they are usually asking for the results of knowledge you've gained over years so that they don't have to learn all of it themselves. For example you ask a lawyer for advice about law as you don't want to have to do a law degree first and then gain 10 years of experience before making a decision.

 

You're saying that when someone asks you advice where you don't have much knowledge you should do a load of research for them in an area you're not interested in and then give them the answer? Where is the wisdom in that?

 

I agree learning is good, and also that you should take your own advice. I am learning all the time, and if there is one thing I've learned is that there is an infinite amount of knowledge our there and you can't learn it all in a thousand lifetimes, never mind one.

[calscot 0]

Indeed, I don't get the mentality from some that we should only have one or two academy players in the team.

 

We should be aiming to have as many playing for us as possible by focussing on their developement.

 

Surely there is a trade off between concentrating on development and immediate success? I don't get the mentality that there is something wrong with playing experienced players that are over 23. As I've said before when you take that to extremes then you should bin every player who hits that age. 23 should therefore be the retirement age. Then everyone will be playing young players and developing them.

 

The question is, developing them for what exactly? Early retirement? Or are you saying we should be a youth feeder team to supply richer clubs when our players mature?

 

Please just think about it as you really don't seem to get this point. If everyone constantly plays more and more youngsters, where do the older players play and consequently the very same young players when they get a bit older?

[Zappa 0]

This is slightly pedantic, but pretty important too IMO: I don't class Messi and others like him as REALLY coming through the Barca youth Academy. If I'm not mistaken, Barca scouted Messi in Argentina and bought him at the age of 16 for a relatively large amount of cash, so I don't see why that should be classed as coming through the Barca Academy. That's more like the Barca Academy buying in talent at a ripe/mature age (in youth system terms) and the sort of age where a youngster has already developed a lot of technique and skills which are easy for scouts to spot. Obviously Barca then helped develop Messi and others who they've bought in at that sort of age even further, but it's not as if they deserve all the credit for training existing talent they've bought in from other youth Academies for millions of Euros.

[pete 2,499]

This is slightly pedantic, but pretty important too IMO: I don't class Messi and others like him as REALLY coming through the Barca youth Academy. If I'm not mistaken, Barca scouted Messi in Argentina and bought him at the age of 16 for a relatively large amount of cash, so I don't see why that should be classed as coming through the Barca Academy. That's more like the Barca Academy buying in talent at a ripe/mature age (in youth system terms) and the sort of age where a youngster has already developed a lot of technique and skills which are easy for scouts to spot. Obviously Barca then helped develop Messi and others who they've bought in at that sort of age even further, but it's not as if they deserve all the credit for training existing talent they've bought in from other youth Academies for millions of Euros.

 

That was what I was getting at as well.

[Zappa 0]

That was what I was getting at as well.

 

Sorry pete, I was still reading page 1 when I decided to post. Yes, you said what I wanted to say with far fewer words.

[simplythebest 0]

Surely there is a trade off between concentrating on development and immediate success? I don't get the mentality that there is something wrong with playing experienced players that are over 23. As I've said before when you take that to extremes then you should bin every player who hits that age. 23 should therefore be the retirement age. Then everyone will be playing young players and developing them.

 

The question is, developing them for what exactly? Early retirement? Or are you saying we should be a youth feeder team to supply richer clubs when our players mature?

 

Please just think about it as you really don't seem to get this point. If everyone constantly plays more and more youngsters, where do the older players play and consequently the very same young players when they get a bit older?

I think you're the one not getting the point.

 

It isn't about some kind of ageism, it's the fact that bringing in established players within their prime years costs a lot of money in transfer fees and wages, even a free agent isn't really a 'free' signing when you bring in the various payments to agents etc. It's also a gamble much of the time if there's any sell on value, they really need to be a roaring succeess for that especially if you've already spent several million.

 

If you're like Man City with a bottomless pit of money to spend on these guys then fine, but we certainly aren't. We play in Scottish football which has very little in the way of good finance and prospects, the chances of moving to any other league system are still very far away, and any European progress is always touch and go at best. Not to mention that we went into administration just under a year ago and got demoted three divisions.

 

Developing our own players is a brilliant way to be self sustainable, you aren't having to spend a fortune to get them and if they become part of the first team their wage demands will rise more gradually. Then they're either long term Rangers players that we haven't had to splash out on to have at the club or if they're so good that we can't keep them, we'll make a very good profit since they came from our academy, there's even bonus payments for that if they're young enough. That's what the developement is for.

 

I don't think anybody has said we don't purchase or play established players but the idea is that should be kept to much more of a minimum with much more focus on bringing through our own. And even if that means sacrificing a bit of short term success then sobeit, as has been shown the last year we can't afford to simply buy our way to the top.

Edited January 23, 2013 by simplythebest