Warne Out Out

[On the Ram Page]

3 hours ago, Returning ram said:

Really didn't want to get involved in this forum again, as last time it became time consuming however given the criticism around the academy, I thought I'd share my experience and snippets of information having being around it for a number of years.

We are not a "2 club city", our area includes wolves, WBA, Foxes and others, teams use development centres to circumvent the hour catchment. The academy is going through a revamp, but given the lack of results over the years I'm surprised we continue to put in the funding to retain cat 1. PW contrary to opinion is often seen around the training ground, he does know players names, not all of them but it's not his responsibility to do so, the academy has people in place that run it.

I had the joy of attending a Man City session recently, the topic turned to stats and how Pep believes them to mean nothing without context, they are mainly for accountants and they are better served staying in computer games because they dont provide the full story and you can spin them anyway you want to back your opinion. I also smile when PW gets bashed for not backing the academy, why would you give players minutes over established players that are your key players for the season, or returning from injury, for example, that's without even going into contracts that have certain triggers and all the other stuff around that.
 

An even bigger smile is his failure to bring in youth at Rotherham, once again I'm not sure how a managers responsibility is to bring youth players through in such a short period of time and if the ones you have aren't good enough, why would you play them over your senior players when your chasing promotion ?

Hopefully DC will get the academy producing and hopefully it's as easy as some make out on here, but in my experience it's not. As I alluded to earlier, we have been trying for a good number of years and although we have wonderful facilities, a manager whose remit is to get us out of this division, isn't the gatekeeper for this objective, imo.

 

 

Blimey - you talk far too much sense to be on this Forum - no wonder you left - but why come back to read some of the drivel on here? BUT please stay around a bit longer - it’s been good to hear from someone with a bit of background substance to his views rather than just wild speculation.

[SKRam]

3 hours ago, Returning ram said:

Really didn't want to get involved in this forum again, as last time it became time consuming however given the criticism around the academy, I thought I'd share my experience and snippets of information having being around it for a number of years.

We are not a "2 club city", our area includes wolves, WBA, Foxes and others, teams use development centres to circumvent the hour catchment. The academy is going through a revamp, but given the lack of results over the years I'm surprised we continue to put in the funding to retain cat 1. PW contrary to opinion is often seen around the training ground, he does know players names, not all of them but it's not his responsibility to do so, the academy has people in place that run it.

I had the joy of attending a Man City session recently, the topic turned to stats and how Pep believes them to mean nothing without context, they are mainly for accountants and they are better served staying in computer games because they dont provide the full story and you can spin them anyway you want to back your opinion. I also smile when PW gets bashed for not backing the academy, why would you give players minutes over established players that are your key players for the season, or returning from injury, for example, that's without even going into contracts that have certain triggers and all the other stuff around that.
 

An even bigger smile is his failure to bring in youth at Rotherham, once again I'm not sure how a managers responsibility is to bring youth players through in such a short period of time and if the ones you have aren't good enough, why would you play them over your senior players when your chasing promotion ?

Hopefully DC will get the academy producing and hopefully it's as easy as some make out on here, but in my experience it's not. As I alluded to earlier, we have been trying for a good number of years and although we have wonderful facilities, a manager whose remit is to get us out of this division, isn't the gatekeeper for this objective, imo.

 

 

I hope you requested a test of knowledge for  Pep and his academy players. He would naturally know them all including middle names.
Great  post by the way 

[RadioactiveWaste]

8 hours ago, Returning ram said:

I had the joy of attending a Man City session recently, the topic turned to stats and how Pep believes them to mean nothing without context, they are mainly for accountants and they are better served staying in computer games because they dont provide the full story and you can spin them anyway you want to back your opinion. I also smile when PW gets bashed for not backing the academy, why would you give players minutes over established players that are your key players for the season, or returning from injury, for example, that's without even going into contracts that have certain triggers and all the other stuff around that.
 

 

 

 

Good post.

I particually enjoyed this bit. SO many people get caught up in statistics, when a statistic is just a number, what that number tells you, if it tells you anything at all, is the important part.

But numbers being bigger or smaller is easy, having lots of numbers and churning them around to say the number is bigger or smaller is pretty easy, using statistics to interpret information and data into useful conclusions is the hard part, and football, like many other industries, I'm sure has no shortage of "very clever people" claiming to be the ones who can do that "turning data into powerful conclusions" bit. It's also easier to have "the numbers said to do this thing" as cover for your judgment I guess.

Used well, statistics can be a useful and powerful tool, but they are only part of the toolkit but of themselves, they are just a number.

 

 

 

[Ghost of Clough]

19 hours ago, Returning ram said:

Really didn't want to get involved in this forum again, as last time it became time consuming however given the criticism around the academy, I thought I'd share my experience and snippets of information having being around it for a number of years.

We are not a "2 club city", our area includes wolves, WBA, Foxes and others, teams use development centres to circumvent the hour catchment. The academy is going through a revamp, but given the lack of results over the years I'm surprised we continue to put in the funding to retain cat 1. PW contrary to opinion is often seen around the training ground, he does know players names, not all of them but it's not his responsibility to do so, the academy has people in place that run it.

I had the joy of attending a Man City session recently, the topic turned to stats and how Pep believes them to mean nothing without context, they are mainly for accountants and they are better served staying in computer games because they dont provide the full story and you can spin them anyway you want to back your opinion. I also smile when PW gets bashed for not backing the academy, why would you give players minutes over established players that are your key players for the season, or returning from injury, for example, that's without even going into contracts that have certain triggers and all the other stuff around that.
 

An even bigger smile is his failure to bring in youth at Rotherham, once again I'm not sure how a managers responsibility is to bring youth players through in such a short period of time and if the ones you have aren't good enough, why would you play them over your senior players when your chasing promotion ?

Hopefully DC will get the academy producing and hopefully it's as easy as some make out on here, but in my experience it's not. As I alluded to earlier, we have been trying for a good number of years and although we have wonderful facilities, a manager whose remit is to get us out of this division, isn't the gatekeeper for this objective, imo.

 

 

A few points I would like to pick you up on, but I'll comment on the 3 big ones.

1. 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. 
    
2. 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.
    
3. 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.

[Crewton]

9 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

A few points I would like to pick you up on, but I'll comment on the 3 big ones.

1. 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. 
    
2. 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.
    
3. 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.

I think the * and the ** are the wrong way round?

[duncanjwitham]

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.

[RoyMac5]

3 minutes ago, duncanjwitham said:

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.

Exactly, why loan someone else's youth (at this level particularly) when your own is potentially as good and will benefit from the challenge?

[duncanjwitham]

3 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

Exactly, why loan someone else's youth (at this level particularly) when your own is potentially as good and will benefit from the challenge?

I actually think that can be ok, at least at Championship level anyway.   Max Lowe is an obvious example - that Lampard season, he clearly wasn't ready for a full season at Championship level (he got absolutely torn apart by Leeds on opening day), and our only other option was Fozzy who was just back from one of his ACL injuries.  So you don't want to be in the position where Fozzy re-injures himself and you're forced to play Lowe all season, even if he starts really struggling.  So the idea of sending Lowe out on loan to play at a lower level is fine, but we should have gone and got a prem youngster on loan for a season, or a 30+ year old on a one year contract.  What we shouldn't have done, is spent big money and wages on giving Scott Malone a 3 year contract, where he just acts as a blocker to Lowe.  Especially since we also had Buchanan who was just on the verge of breaking through too.

[Returning ram]

@Ghost of Clough

I can only give my opinion on the academy but to reply to your points.

1 To many people get hung up on Cat 1 status. At the moment, our red dog friends have a better set up that us at the youth level ( hence the revamp ). The Cat 1 status only really comes into affect in the latter years (facilities aside), you can still only have a certain amount train at each age level and if you dont attract the right standard, doesn't matter how good your academy is. Worth noting that some of the players you mentioned, our cat 1 status didn't stop us losing them, being in the third tier is not as an attractive prospect at the moment. Once again my views, not PWs, I just dont believe that the expenditure with the current format produces the results.

2 As I mentioned, PWs remit is to get us out this league and generate as much revenue as possible. If only it was as simple as giving a few mins here and there, that's just a linear way of looking at it. You can as easily damage a lads career within them few minutes as you can give them confidence.
 

3 I don't think I have missed the point, it's not in PWs remit to manage the academy or a youth prospects career. So PW hasn't played Thompson, I fail to see the connection between that and the academy, another manager comes in and puts more trust in a different player.

What is your criteria for Cashin being different to Thompson, surely they can both be put in the same bucket ?

[Chris_Martin]

44 minutes ago, Returning ram said:

@Ghost of Clough

I can only give my opinion on the academy but to reply to your points.

1 To many people get hung up on Cat 1 status. At the moment, our red dog friends have a better set up that us at the youth level ( hence the revamp ). The Cat 1 status only really comes into affect in the latter years (facilities aside), you can still only have a certain amount train at each age level and if you dont attract the right standard, doesn't matter how good your academy is. Worth noting that some of the players you mentioned, our cat 1 status didn't stop us losing them, being in the third tier is not as an attractive prospect at the moment. Once again my views, not PWs, I just dont believe that the expenditure with the current format produces the results.

2 As I mentioned, PWs remit is to get us out this league and generate as much revenue as possible. If only it was as simple as giving a few mins here and there, that's just a linear way of looking at it. You can as easily damage a lads career within them few minutes as you can give them confidence.
 

3 I don't think I have missed the point, it's not in PWs remit to manage the academy or a youth prospects career. So PW hasn't played Thompson, I fail to see the connection between that and the academy, another manager comes in and puts more trust in a different player.

What is your criteria for Cashin being different to Thompson, surely they can both be put in the same bucket ?

I suspect warne doesn't play him because he doesn't see him as physical enough or tall enough

[YorkshireRam]

[Stive Pesley]

On a similar note

[RoyMac5]

He has one of the best budgets in the league, doesn't mean he won't buy 💩 and play 💩 As long as we win 👍 He'll drown in the Championship 😅

[YorkshireRam]

[Srg]

1 hour ago, YorkshireRam said:

I get what you’re trying to do but I’d have probably picked the Barnsley result before the Bristol one 😂 

[May Contain Nuts]

If we're going to meme it...

[Stive Pesley]

 

[Gerry Daly]

I don't think he's right for us at all but accept that sacking him right now makes no sense. Results are improving though performances are not. Tonight will be very interesting.  We have to give him the January window to make further changes to the squad and then the rest of the season. However if he fails to deliver promotion then he should be sacked

[Stive Pesley]

[YouRams]

He's out out tonight, on the jars with John Jules youuuu Rams.