Two words: Ian Wright.........

A stairway to Heaven and a Highway to Hell give some indication of expected traffic numbers

Although Ian Wright wasn't a top tier talent loaned out to a nothing team for experience....whereas the players in our academy were presumably scouted as big talents when we signed them then allowed to stagnate (or found not to be good enough). In my humble opinion, if you're loaned out to a League 2 side (or lower) after the age of 18, the best you can hope for is to one day be a peripheral player if you want to stay in the top tier.

ive often wondered if, when a lot of youngsters go to div 1 or 2 sides, they do stagnate or even go backwards. we've heard about so many of our academy players being tipped to be future stars for us. only to be released a year or two later. this may be a bad comparison, but when i played football and cricket, i found that i played better, against higher standard opposition, and not so well against lesser.
i know you cant gamble on a premier league game by throwing someone in, just to see if theyre good enough. but then how do you bring players through? bit of a double edged sword. hopefully, de boer has the answer.

a rich man is only a poor man with an obscene amount of money

I don't know the figures, but the number of players that make it from all the talent in the world is absolutely minuscule. And I don't really blame the top clubs when survival in the Premier League is so important and valuable to a team. Some of our recent managers have taken players along to bench warm which is good but in reality you need to be about 4-0 up in the league before you're going to bring on an un-tested player. For me the Championship is the place to prepare players. Get 17 and 18 year olds out on loan in the Championship. If they can secure a good few games and perform well then they are much less of a risk than a 22 year old that has been player of the month twice at a League 2 club.

This is all hyperbole I'm sure, and makes me sound like I've been playing Football Manager so much that I can make sweeping and over-simplified commentary on the subject. I'd love for our academy to produce first teamers, but I don't buy it that anyone loaned out to League One or Two clubs is really going to be the next big thing. It's as rare as hen's teeth.

What youngsters can you see playing this season?

Another Damien Diagonal - Total Football

Tony Book

Enjoying getting up later and not having someone who knows better than me (apart from the missus of course).