Post by stewartdonald on Feb 23, 2016 8:29:09 GMT
Michael - Crewe with over a million in league funding are struggling at the foot of league one with barely any money if rumours are true and with a youth set up that costs them 1m - 2m a year. They have been struggling financially for years and the FPP or whatever it is now hampers most club like Crewe probably. How many clubs that have been promoted from the Conference in the last 10 years have a successful youth policy. Bringing young players through is great and must be an aim but with FPP rules now it is almost impossible. It is completely stacked against you in terms of youngsters. To have a really successful youth policy at this stage would realistically cost me around another 300k to 500k a year and in all serious if someone wants to seriously contribute I will be very pleased. That is why you get that sort of sum when you get in the league for youth development. Even then most clubs don't use it to produce youngsters. All the young kids get poached by all the top clubs who have loads and loads of kids. Some of the top kids are earning well over 10k a year and when you enquire on a youngster who has been released by a local prem club and ask him to come and play for you and he won't cos he is used to earning between 6-10k a week it is hard.
We play games against other league clubs who then poach our youngsters and whose parents have their head turned and you can't blame them. Play for us or Bournemouth is a no brainer. Then the ones we do keep have no bridge for development which is the same as almost every club as there is no sensible league for us to compete in which will give them meaningful football at a correct level - we try development games where we can but lots of clubs are giving up on these. Premier league clubs even struggle with youngsters and competitive fixtures as development football does not equip them properly. Luke Coulson is a prime example of a youngster who has been poached by Man City who has been deprived of games because of the sheer volume of youngsters they take. It is an issue in football not just Eastleigh - we are trying our best but the odds are very much stacked against us and when we are trying to achieve things as well then that does compound the issue - which I except.
If we want to see our team full of youngsters then at this stage without investment and trying to break even I would suggest Ryman Premier is probably the level we should be aiming for - which was where we were heading a few years ago as Bairdy pointed out to me the other night. Something which Terry Brown comments on for his next job where he is wanting to work with kids and develop them and is looking for a Ryman Premier challenge. The sad fact is that without league funding it will be almost impossible for us to remain competitive and develop youngsters. We will do our best and try and find and develop Tony Lee and Lewis etc but they need games which will tell you everything when teams in the league below don't want youngsters and this hampers their progress also.
We are not helped as I have said by the league structures to develop our own youngsters in the correct league. People have mentioned Sam Wilson but he is playing in the Wessex Prem. Not even at Gosport or Totton, Havant or Dorchester so to suggest he will move up 4 leagues and be successful I think is suggesting quite a lot. Looking at the other most successful local clubs Gosport and Havant being the logical clubs to go to they don't want youngsters either. One is trying to get promoted and one staying in the league and they both will probably take the view they need experience unless they can get youngsters with real quality. We have a lad as I mentioned in Luke Coulson released from Man City and is deemed right for this level at 21. They have loads of lads who are released like all Prem clubs. I am not sure people realise how many youngsters get taken by these clubs now. Finding young players, keeping them and then developing them is almost impossible and the FA do not have a sensible league for us to give theme experience. We need a proper reserve league for teams to play in but most clubs have not got a reserves and there is a reason for this - primarily cost.
It would be great to see young lads coming through and I completely agree with the sentiment but most clubs aiming for the league focus on getting there and then trying to sort the youth policy out then. Sorting it out will give you an advantage possibly before hand but my guess is you would need to commit about £1 million to it over 3 to 4 years before you had any chance of any meaningful wins. Most clubs won't do that as it will take away from their main objective and I am the same. i have to hope we can somehow get Tony Lee and Lewis to the standard we need in the circumstances we find ourselves. If the seasons become meaningless with weeks to spare then I agree we could give them far more game time then. Look at Grimsby, Tranmere, Forest Green Saturday those teams are full of experienced players none of whom have come through the youth structures and they have far more experience at this level and longer youth structures than us. When their teams struggle they go into the market for players not to their youth set ups.
What do our fans want? Days at Bolton and a competitive team that can make the play offs or a team full of youngsters that we will put the club progression on hold for, for around 4 years. PROBABLY BOTH - otherwise know as cake and eat it!!! That is not what is selling season tickets etc. We could have both but people will have to help pay for it as it is not something I will fund without league support on my own. The club is more self sufficient than its ever been and could survive in the Conf Prem on a budget of 400k possibly and break even or close to it. This is a huge achievement as it was losing money on a 250k budget in the league below which costs about 150k a year less to be in. So that is a good 300k a year upturn in revenue - probably more. To compete however it needs another 600k and a contingency in case we have unforeseen off field costs as 400k would leave us well into the bottom 8.
Also a point would be that I don't think the youngsters feel mucked about this year at all. They are delighted to be involved in the first team squad more than ever. They are exposed to first team training all the time, they enjoy travelling when they can and getting the feel of the match day which gives them a huge incite etc. We have tried to get them out on loan to develop them and worked hard on this which is a hard balance.
Suggesting ways of spending money is one thing but we do have to generate it. We mention a new ground and ice rinks and retail centres come along. We mention players and youth structures with no one mentioning how it is funded. There are loads of other examples too. We are improving all the time but this club has gate receipts and season ticket sales of £250k tops and has an expense base of circa £2 million to run as it is. An awful lot of effort goes into raising the other 1.75 million. The other things we mention on these threads usually come at a cost so some thought on how we fund them would not go unnoticed!!
We play games against other league clubs who then poach our youngsters and whose parents have their head turned and you can't blame them. Play for us or Bournemouth is a no brainer. Then the ones we do keep have no bridge for development which is the same as almost every club as there is no sensible league for us to compete in which will give them meaningful football at a correct level - we try development games where we can but lots of clubs are giving up on these. Premier league clubs even struggle with youngsters and competitive fixtures as development football does not equip them properly. Luke Coulson is a prime example of a youngster who has been poached by Man City who has been deprived of games because of the sheer volume of youngsters they take. It is an issue in football not just Eastleigh - we are trying our best but the odds are very much stacked against us and when we are trying to achieve things as well then that does compound the issue - which I except.
If we want to see our team full of youngsters then at this stage without investment and trying to break even I would suggest Ryman Premier is probably the level we should be aiming for - which was where we were heading a few years ago as Bairdy pointed out to me the other night. Something which Terry Brown comments on for his next job where he is wanting to work with kids and develop them and is looking for a Ryman Premier challenge. The sad fact is that without league funding it will be almost impossible for us to remain competitive and develop youngsters. We will do our best and try and find and develop Tony Lee and Lewis etc but they need games which will tell you everything when teams in the league below don't want youngsters and this hampers their progress also.
We are not helped as I have said by the league structures to develop our own youngsters in the correct league. People have mentioned Sam Wilson but he is playing in the Wessex Prem. Not even at Gosport or Totton, Havant or Dorchester so to suggest he will move up 4 leagues and be successful I think is suggesting quite a lot. Looking at the other most successful local clubs Gosport and Havant being the logical clubs to go to they don't want youngsters either. One is trying to get promoted and one staying in the league and they both will probably take the view they need experience unless they can get youngsters with real quality. We have a lad as I mentioned in Luke Coulson released from Man City and is deemed right for this level at 21. They have loads of lads who are released like all Prem clubs. I am not sure people realise how many youngsters get taken by these clubs now. Finding young players, keeping them and then developing them is almost impossible and the FA do not have a sensible league for us to give theme experience. We need a proper reserve league for teams to play in but most clubs have not got a reserves and there is a reason for this - primarily cost.
It would be great to see young lads coming through and I completely agree with the sentiment but most clubs aiming for the league focus on getting there and then trying to sort the youth policy out then. Sorting it out will give you an advantage possibly before hand but my guess is you would need to commit about £1 million to it over 3 to 4 years before you had any chance of any meaningful wins. Most clubs won't do that as it will take away from their main objective and I am the same. i have to hope we can somehow get Tony Lee and Lewis to the standard we need in the circumstances we find ourselves. If the seasons become meaningless with weeks to spare then I agree we could give them far more game time then. Look at Grimsby, Tranmere, Forest Green Saturday those teams are full of experienced players none of whom have come through the youth structures and they have far more experience at this level and longer youth structures than us. When their teams struggle they go into the market for players not to their youth set ups.
What do our fans want? Days at Bolton and a competitive team that can make the play offs or a team full of youngsters that we will put the club progression on hold for, for around 4 years. PROBABLY BOTH - otherwise know as cake and eat it!!! That is not what is selling season tickets etc. We could have both but people will have to help pay for it as it is not something I will fund without league support on my own. The club is more self sufficient than its ever been and could survive in the Conf Prem on a budget of 400k possibly and break even or close to it. This is a huge achievement as it was losing money on a 250k budget in the league below which costs about 150k a year less to be in. So that is a good 300k a year upturn in revenue - probably more. To compete however it needs another 600k and a contingency in case we have unforeseen off field costs as 400k would leave us well into the bottom 8.
Also a point would be that I don't think the youngsters feel mucked about this year at all. They are delighted to be involved in the first team squad more than ever. They are exposed to first team training all the time, they enjoy travelling when they can and getting the feel of the match day which gives them a huge incite etc. We have tried to get them out on loan to develop them and worked hard on this which is a hard balance.
Suggesting ways of spending money is one thing but we do have to generate it. We mention a new ground and ice rinks and retail centres come along. We mention players and youth structures with no one mentioning how it is funded. There are loads of other examples too. We are improving all the time but this club has gate receipts and season ticket sales of £250k tops and has an expense base of circa £2 million to run as it is. An awful lot of effort goes into raising the other 1.75 million. The other things we mention on these threads usually come at a cost so some thought on how we fund them would not go unnoticed!!