duncanjwitham

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

6-0 now. Have Forest put their first team out or something?

We are already suffering from 3.  We actively chose to go there the moment we let Rosenior build a possession-based team and replaced him 10 games later with a guy that wanted to play very directly.  And despite a dozen or so summer signings, I *still* think that we have a squad that is more suited to playing possession football than WarneBall.  It will take less squad chopping and changing to get a new manager in to play some kind of possession football (it doesn't have to be exactly what Rosenior was trying to use) than to let Warne build the team he actually wants.  And I am fully aware that we have a lot of players out of contract in the summer, but I honestly think that with a different manager, there's a decent chance we get to keep a fair chunk of those if we want to.
And as for 4, see point 3 really.  We looked at what happened under Morris (in terms of squad upheaval, if not finances) and decided to just repeat that all over again.

There seems to be this attitude amongst certain posters that you shouldn't ever play youth players if they aren't already better than the first teamers they're coming in for.  I saw another poster pretty much saying we should give up on Darren Robinson because his performances haven't been "stunning" so far.  If that's the attitude you have to youth development, we'll never produce anyone.  How many of the youngsters that have gone on to play for us (or other clubs) at championship level  or higher, were better than the guys they were replacing on day one? Or even during season one?  Maybe Will Hughes. Maybe Cashin (but only because we had nobody else in the admin season).  Certainly the likes of Bird, Knight, Hendrick weren't when they first broke through.  Bird, for example, really struggled with the physicality of senior football early on.  But those experiences improved them and they all kicked on to be excellent players.  If we'd taken that attitude, and never given these guys the minutes they needed, they would have never become the players they are.
Nobody is saying youth development is easy, but if you put insane requirements on those youth players abilities before you even give them a chance, you're just making it harder for yourself.
The other point is, while everybody loves a superstar wonderkid, that's not really the best way to judge an academy.  If you get the next Bellingham, or Brennan Johnson, or whoever then great.  What really matters is churning out solid players for the level you're at.  Every academy player that is making your squad on a regular basis, is one less player you have to pay money to acquire (be that transfer fees/ signing on fees/whatever).   You don't need to spend money on a Scott Malone if you have a Lee Buchanan or a Max Lowe, you don't need to spend money on a Jacob Butterfield if you have a Max Bird.  You can then spend that money where it really matters, on a player or 2 that will really make a difference.

There seems to be this attitude amongst certain posters that you shouldn't ever play youth players if they aren't already better than the first teamers they're coming in for.  I saw another poster pretty much saying we should give up on Darren Robinson because his performances haven't been "stunning" so far.  If that's the attitude you have to youth development, we'll never produce anyone.  How many of the youngsters that have gone on to play for us (or other clubs) at championship level  or higher, were better than the guys they were replacing on day one? Or even during season one?  Maybe Will Hughes. Maybe Cashin (but only because we had nobody else in the admin season).  Certainly the likes of Bird, Knight, Hendrick weren't when they first broke through.  Bird, for example, really struggled with the physicality of senior football early on.  But those experiences improved them and they all kicked on to be excellent players.  If we'd taken that attitude, and never given these guys the minutes they needed, they would have never become the players they are.
Nobody is saying youth development is easy, but if you put insane requirements on those youth players abilities before you even give them a chance, you're just making it harder for yourself.
The other point is, while everybody loves a superstar wonderkid, that's not really the best way to judge an academy.  If you get the next Bellingham, or Brennan Johnson, or whoever then great.  What really matters is churning out solid players for the level you're at.  Every academy player that is making your squad on a regular basis, is one less player you have to pay money to acquire (be that transfer fees/ signing on fees/whatever).   You don't need to spend money on a Scott Malone if you have a Lee Buchanan or a Max Lowe, you don't need to spend money on a Jacob Butterfield if you have a Max Bird.  You can then spend that money where it really matters, on a player or 2 that will really make a difference.

A few points I would like to pick you up on, but I'll comment on the 3 big ones.
Whilst we may have produced the likes of Hughes and Hendrick prior to our increase academy spending, how many other league players did we produce? Between the U18 intakes in 2008 and 2015 we have produced: Hendrick (2008), Hughes (2011), Bennett, Hanson, Rawson (all 2012), Lowe, Guy, Vernam, Zanzala (all 2013), Kellan Gordon, MacDonald (both 2014)
As you can see, that's only 1 player of significant value every other year, sometimes not even producing a single league level player.
With the increased spending, we achieve greater consisitency - higher number of league level players, and even the bad years produce players of significant value: Bogle (2016), JBrown, Buchanan, Bird, Knight, Whittaker (all 2017), Cashin, Ebosele**, ABrown*, Sibley, LThompson, Stretton (all 2018), Delap (2019), Gordon, Williams (2020), etc...
*Some may argue Serie A is a higher level of football than League 2 or higher
**Technically not league football either, but just transferred to Gent for £3.5m
Reduced expenditure on the academy means the best prospects will almost certainly be snapped up by Cat 1 clubs, and because of the reduced training hours, the players we do retain aren't as developed as they otherwise could have been under a Cat 1 academy. 
  Perhaps because it planning for the long term future and not immediate results? No one is saying the academy players should be thrust into the first team and play regularly. It's just one off games or helping to see the last 15 minutes of games out, especially when 2 or 3 goals up. It gives a clearer indication of how far off regular first team football they are than U21 football ever will. If they aren't ready for our first team, those experiences will help them earn loan moves out so they can progress as quickly as possible.
  You've taken this comment completely out of context. The point made wasn't that Warne has never given youth an opportunity at Rotherham, but that he has no experience in doing so because of their youth setup. It's like going down to your local pub side and questioning why they haven't developed any England internationals. At no point in his career has Warne been at a club where it is expected to develop youngsters, so it's unsurprising that his view on bringing players through is different to other Cat 1 clubs, especially those outside of the Premier League. Rooney trusted Thompson to play in a Championship squad, accumulating 1611 minutes on the pitch. Despite being in a league below, and being in the first team squad longer than just a few months, Warne has so far only given him 792 minutes across all competitions. It doesn't give much hope to those further behind him in the pecking order.
Sunderland gave a 16 year old Bali Mumba 2 consecutive starts in League 1, before loaning him out to a National League North side towards the end of the season.

To be fair, I never meant the club is sitting around twiddling their thumbs - that was specifically in reference to another poster effectively saying the only way we ever get to the Prem is if a rich owner throws money at us.  My comment was more of a "what else do you expect us to do, twiddle our thumbs while we wait for that?"  I have no doubt that there is good work being done on the academy side of things, but I think the first team management are effectively working counter to that good work, and until the entire club is pulling in the same direction, it's mostly wasted effort.
I really don't think you can count Bird, Knight and Sibley as youngsters when they've played 100+ games already. And Cashin had already established himself in the first team before Warne got here.  Thompson and Rooney have only ever really been used as last ditch replacements when there's literally nobody else available.
The thing that really winds me up, is that it's not even difficult opportunities that we're missing.  Warne hasn't even had to go out of his way to give minutes to youngsters, there have been opportunities right there in front of him (3-0 up with unused subs, for example) that he hasn't taken.  It's very clear from both what he does and what he says in interviews that he has no intention of really using the academy.

In my opinion, the criticism of Warne is fully deserved. The results are only just acceptable; the standard of play is sometimes good, but often poor; a couple of players aside, his signings are average at best; his use of the academy is awful; management of players fitness and doing his best to keep them injury free is shockingly bad.
However, there are enough positive signs to keep me clinging to the hope that he can take the club where it needs to be. Other people have different opinions, including those who don't think he is capable of improving, so think it's best to part ways now. That's their justified opinion.
A united club isn't one where the manager comes out with snide remarks, pushing some fans even further away. He should be doing everything he can to prove them wrong and get them back on board. Your comments are just as bad because they're divisive and you gain absolutely nothing from it

We don't actually have any clue what Robinson is like at League One level, because he's literally played zero minutes in that competition.  So if you're a Derby youth player, and you're looking at stuff like that, and the way Weston was used (or wasn't used, to be more precise), then what are the pitfalls of leaving?  You may as well go and not play for a Prem club's first team than stay and not play for a League One team's one.  And the worst case, you end up out on loan like Delap and make a decent Championship career out of it.
It's not even about whether Robinson is actually good enough *right now*, it's about giving him the chance to turn into a player that's good enough in the future.  Max Bird's early appearances were pretty poor too, but we stuck with him, gave him chances, let him develop, and he's turned into an excellent player.  

At the sake of repeating the massive post I made only a page or 2 ago... If you don't give chances to the lads that are ready to break through, then you're basically writing off that bunch of players.  They won't break through if you don't give them chance to.  And you're also sending the message out to potential academy recruits (and current academy lads who are being linked with moves away) that there's no point being a youth player at Derby, as they don't give youngsters a chance.  We had a fantastic reputation for bringing players into the first team, to the extent that young players were picking us over premier league academies, and we're systematically shredding that reputation.  So it really doesn't matter what Hale and co are actually doing to the academy, if the manager doesn't have the same vision.

At the sake of repeating the massive post I made only a page or 2 ago... If you don't give chances to the lads that are ready to break through, then you're basically writing off that bunch of players.  They won't break through if you don't give them chance to.  And you're also sending the message out to potential academy recruits (and current academy lads who are being linked with moves away) that there's no point being a youth player at Derby, as they don't give youngsters a chance.  We had a fantastic reputation for bringing players into the first team, to the extent that young players were picking us over premier league academies, and we're systematically shredding that reputation.  So it really doesn't matter what Hale and co are actually doing to the academy, if the manager doesn't have the same vision.

At the sake of repeating the massive post I made only a page or 2 ago... If you don't give chances to the lads that are ready to break through, then you're basically writing off that bunch of players.  They won't break through if you don't give them chance to.  And you're also sending the message out to potential academy recruits (and current academy lads who are being linked with moves away) that there's no point being a youth player at Derby, as they don't give youngsters a chance.  We had a fantastic reputation for bringing players into the first team, to the extent that young players were picking us over premier league academies, and we're systematically shredding that reputation.  So it really doesn't matter what Hale and co are actually doing to the academy, if the manager doesn't have the same vision.

I'm not saying that a 30k stadium gives us a divine right to be in the prem or anything, just that we have the capability and facilities to be one.  So what do we have to do to make that happen?  We can't just sit around twiddling our thumbs hoping a rich owner comes along, because what happens if one never does?  The onus is on the club to do everything it can to make the most of the stuff that we can control. 
Academy-wise, we are in an excellent position - we're a one-club city, with only 2 other major clubs within any kind of distance, so we should be in a strong position to compete for the best youngsters across the whole East Midlands.  That is a massive in-built advantage that we should be chasing, not binning off because the current management don't seem interested in anything beyond the next 5 minutes.  If we can't compete with the rich clubs for for buying players, then we should be focussing on developing our own.  You don't get to be "5-10 managers away from the prem" if your current manager isn't actually building anything.
And beyond anything else, a strong academy system is an attractive feature to a potential rich owner.  Who would you rather buy, a club with a squad full of 30 year olds who are all out of contract in the summer, or a team with a load of promising 18-23 year olds in the team, and a bunch more ready to come in if they move on.

Random is what you want if you think you’re the weaker team and need something lucky to drop to even things up a bit.  Wanting your players to have the ball at their feet, pass it around, and trusting they’ll create something is what you do if you think you’re the better team. Says it all really.
And that’s a great clip too, it’s refreshing to see a manager clearly thinking about the game, trying to figure how to make the best use of what he has, and be willing to talk about it so well too.

And it's not just the bringing an extra centre half on, it's all the other changes we seem to make at the same time to accommodate it - Niambe going across to left wingback, Sibley into midfield, Wilson dropping back to wingback etc.  I know it was slightly forced due to Bird going off, but it just disrupts the entire backline unnecessarily.

Like I’ve said a hundred times on here, when teams stand off us, we pass it round a bit and look okay. The moment a team makes the slightest effort to stop us doing that, we immediately resort to the other stuff and look terrible.  Crewe the other night being an obvious example.  And by and large, teams at this level are going to be trying to stop us playing because we’re one of the biggest teams in the league.

Like I’ve said a hundred times on here, when teams stand off us, we pass it round a bit and look okay. The moment a team makes the slightest effort to stop us doing that, we immediately resort to the other stuff and look terrible.  Crewe the other night being an obvious example.  And by and large, teams at this level are going to be trying to stop us playing because we’re one of the biggest teams in the league.

The fact he repeatedly goes on the radio and says he wants the ball playing wide as quickly as possible, the post Cheltenham comments about not wanting the ball played in the middle because it’s too congested, and literally watching the team play for the last year.

Coulldn’t miss out on a pic with Rammie 🐏