We have the best academy in Scotland.

[portobellojambo1]

8 minutes ago, avhudtheteeshirt said:

Given its a tried and tested route for young players, it seems churlish to keep them on the side lines at Tynecastle.

Years ago youngsters were sent out to Junior sides to toughen up, now older players work that way in reverse, finishing their careers in the Juniors.

In the last season we have seen some really good youngsters playing against us, the problem is who do they belong to?

Quite a few of the best ones belong to Premiership teams out on loan to these clubs, if they can get results doing it, why can't we???

I agree in as much as we don't want to have kids sitting about forever, but this season we were playing against the level of sides these players would have played against wherever they had potentially gone on loan. So rather than send them to x, y  or z why not just think along the lines of we are weak in such and such a position, lets see what this player can do for us. This season we weren't  a Premier club, we were playing against sides receiving players from a higher division, to find out if they could make the step up. Of the ones I've seen playing against us I think the player Raith Rovers got from Rangers might have what it takes to make it. We could have done the same, put a youngster in at full back or centre back, for example, and discovered someone who is ready for next season if called upon. If we were looking to loan out players it would have involved them playing their football at a lower level than the Championship, and in the modern game I'm just not sure what we would have learned from that.

 

[graygo]

1 hour ago, portobellojambo1 said:

But why put them out on loan,when we have a first team that they could have been used in, to get all the experience they needed in an environment they work in. Gary Locke prepared the youth for the first team during the season prior to us being placed in the Championship last time, and Neilson had a ready made team once officially announced as coach. They are either good enough or not and finding out this time round would have helped the new coach when next season starts, we needed to know if they are good enough to play for HMFC, not if they are good enough to play for Montrose, Cowdenbeath or the likes.

 

Because they would probably only have got 2 or 3 games at our level, they decided rightly or wrongly that it would be better for their development to get more games albeit at a lower level.

Gary Locke had no choice but to play the young players, good job as he would have got pelters if he had a squad like ours is now and got relegated even with the points deduction. If RN had put in youngsters like Locke did and we never won this league I can imagine things would be a lot worse than they are just now.

[Norm]

Who says we have the best academy? 

 

We might have the best facilities but a youth academy is more than running machines and all weather pitches. I could be wrong but I'm sure when Ann took over, someone on here said the youth players were pretty poor. Other than one age group, the rest didn't really have much going for them. 

 

We had to completely rebuild it, recruit staff, recruit scouts, recruit players. That takes time. Building a youth academy is not like building a first team. 

 

Whilst it's perfectly fair to have a pop at the club for the 1st team not progressing over a 10 year period, I think it takes a bit longer to build a good youth academy that regularly sees 1st team players being produced. 

[graygo]

3 hours ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

Looked into it this week and the youth narrative is a wee bit of a busted hand tbh. Seems to be a bit of a podcast meme that doesn’t properly add up in reality. 
 

End of the day it has always been the case that from 10-15 youths that gets whittled down to 2 or 3 making it to the first team squads. OP appears to follow the academy so you should know that. Go back however far you want. The one time we were forced to play an entire youth team under Locke in 13-14 with Dylan McGowans and Kevin mchatties etc Hearts literally could not compete, Locke went 20 odd games without a win mid season, we got relegated, and would have been in a relegation battle and still bottom even without the points deduction. In the end, from that crop, only Walker, Paterson and Nicholson made it into an actual Hearts team that was up to Hearts standards and finished 3rd in the league.
 

These players today who are out at Montrose or Cove Rangers need to really skyrocket to go from that level up to Hearts first team, you can look back all through history and you’ll see that most of the time, they don’t. But this season in particular the kids are at an even bigger disadvantage as they are all way way off the game time levels they need. Covid has been a real spanner in the works. How can folk slate the club when the normal progression from U20s to reserves to first team hasn’t even been operational for a year? These kids haven’t even played reserve games till now? They need to get those 10-15 games which they’ll hopefully get now. So we’ll see pre season, but the only names on OPs list there who I’m optimistic about are Logan and Henderson. The rest, I am calling it now, none of them will be playing any games in the Hearts Premiership first team next season. Maybe either Cochrane or Smith, if Irving leaves. Even if we changed the manager it’d be the same. The pressure to win and get above Hibs next season and get to the latter stages of cups, is absolutely immense. And we also actually have a bit of a transfer war chest too, with the large amount of dross that’s getting slashed off the wage bill.  
 

From the last crop it was whittled down to Brandon, Irving, Henderson. A few like Leonard, Morrison, Doig and others chose to leave in search of football or a different path into pro level. Others like Moore weren’t good enough and were let go. 1 was sold for 7 figures and that bankrolls the whole academy for a few more seasons. Yes we’ve not given very many debuts which is disappointing at surface level, but these things do go in cycles as OP will know from his stellar knowledge of youth football. You’ll have a season where there’s a lot of debuts then the next few years it gets whittled down as you sort wheat from the chaff. Next crop will be similar. Great to see the U18s are back playing, I’m sure a number of them will have great careers to look forward to. Maybe 1 of them could even be on to bigger things and english Premier etc. But the vast 90% majority won’t. If there’s any more than 3-4 youth players age 20 or under in a matchday squad of 18 players, I would say we’re doing pretty well. 20% matchday squad representation would be 3-4 academy players under the age of say 23. I think that’s a very decent aim and if you look at the facts we’ve actually been pretty close to that this season, a pity McGill hasn’t got more games but how good is he really? Is he a better player than Haring Mceneff Irving and Halliday? 

 

Maybe you would advocate that 20% squad levels to be say 30%. That would be 6 academy U23s out of the matchday 18 players. I actually agree with that, but would say maybe it would just be an age thing rather than just academy. We need to be signing more 20-21 year old players as well. Thats something we’ve not done. But the main thing, our overall squad age has been too high. I think that is achievable and what I’d be wanting as well  But that would have to be a long term thing to manage. And it would be very ambitious to get consistently to Europe while doing it. Because the fact is, not every kid is particularly good. A lot of them just aren’t. We can sign better quality players than them. Mceneff vs Irving, case in point. Mceneff is pushing for full international caps for his country. Irving will likely never get a cap. So what, we have to just not sign anyone and play Irving? That’s where it gets difficult. 

 

If Cochrane and Smith were not attached to hearts, they were just 20 year old Cove/ Montrose players. Would you be advocating for Hearts to go and buy them for next season from these clubs, for Hearts first team? Talking shite if you say yes tbh 

 

Next season i hope to see 2 or 3 more of them into the squad as the likes of White Berra and others move on. But I expect signings as well. A shame none of these kids are a top Center half as we could really use an 18 year old version of Berra to come through now.  That would be very handy. Next season there will hopefully be a full pre season, youth season and reserves season underway and we will be in a position to give a couple of debuts, if a few of the u18 lads look ready. 

 

Neilson is a long way away from putting that cup exit right. He’s at the bottom of Mount Everest in fact. But we got the promotion job done and avoided the disaster of failing to get up first time of asking as happened with other “biggest clubs in the division” of previous years. So it’s basically time to move on. Maybe he’s at base camp of Mount Everest now. A mammoth task ahead for him to recover, and that’s without of forcing him to have to play an absurd number of 10-15 kids next season. That won’t be happening and it doesn’t matter who the manager is. That’ll never happen. 
 

And if you want to discuss what’s happened to Irving as well, that is pretty obvious to me. Peter Haring has got back to fitness, he is now only 70-80% back to his best and he is better than Irving. Mceneff has come in to the club and he is better than Irving in terms of his pedigree, experience, pace, athleticism. Took some games to get up to speed but showed what he’s about now. Fact is Irving should be signing on, and looking to be Peter Harings shadow and start to copy all these wee tricks Haring plays, traps he sets and the way he skids the ball about. Irving can be that good if he has the patience to be a sponge, he’s only 20 so next season is ideal for him to turn 21, then on to 22 you’d think it’s perfect progression for him. But he isn’t going to be a certain starter or on big money. That’s not “ruining” him that’s just having better players than him and setting high standards for him to reach which at this time, Irving, looking back to the last 2 years under 3 managers, he just hasn’t got there yet. Nowhere near. And those standards I expect to be even higher next season as my expectation is for a Djoum type athletic power house midfielder to come into the engine room as well.

 

As for Doig well to be honest, I’m not going to use him as a stick to beat Neilson and Savage with. Neither of them was at Hearts when he was let go. We have already binned the man who was responsible. Folk need to understand that Craig Levein is gone from Hearts. The first step in recovery from Levein, was to get back promoted. That’s only the starting line. So folk need to start to move on from going over every single cock up the man made, there are literally hundreds. And though Doig was let go, we did still get 7 figures for Hickey so it’s not all bad. Give Savage and Neilson their first chance in the Premiership, that’s what we will do now. And if you don’t like that cancel your dd and stay away till budge and her appointees savage and Neilson are all gone. 

 

So the short version of the above. It’s right to have high hopes for the academy. But the first team bar is high and needs to go way way up next season. 

 

Wish I had read that before my post above this one, I wouldn't have needed to bother. 👍

[Jambos1983]

If we're keeping neilson as manager we'd be as well shutting the academy down 

[4marsbars]

6 hours ago, ri Alban said:

If Robbie had used youth this season, he'd have put us in the shite. Experienced players were needed to get us out of this league. Job done. End of. 

 

 

Well put.

 

The fact that Neilson's got the job done in spite of all the strangeness of (necessary) Covid restrictions goes against the prevailing Kickback narrative.

 

[Nookie Bear]

10 minutes ago, Norm said:

Who says we have the best academy? 

 

We might have the best facilities but a youth academy is more than running machines and all weather pitches. I could be wrong but I'm sure when Ann took over, someone on here said the youth players were pretty poor. Other than one age group, the rest didn't really have much going for them. 

 

We had to completely rebuild it, recruit staff, recruit scouts, recruit players. That takes time. Building a youth academy is not like building a first team. 

 

Whilst it's perfectly fair to have a pop at the club for the 1st team not progressing over a 10 year period, I think it takes a bit longer to build a good youth academy that regularly sees 1st team players being produced. 

We produced better youth under the shambolic Vlad era

 

Perhaps we just look for the wrong type of player. 

[Nookie Bear]

7 hours ago, ri Alban said:

If Robbie had used youth this season, he'd have put us in the shite. Experienced players were needed to get us out of this league. Job done. End of. 

Now, tell us more about your hero DS, and how he fecked us right over. 

He could have shown a bit of faith. Henderson did more in one game than Frear, Roberts, GMS and Kastaneer have managed all season. 
 

Nobody suggested starting 11 kids but there is room on a 7-man bench for 2/3 to be available. 

[The Mighty Thor]

The academy will always fail to deliver if the final transition from youth to first team set up is blown out the water by you tube videos of huddies like Kasteneer and Gnanduillet and freer and countless others in the faceless cast of thousands. 

 

[Hesh]

10 hours ago, Awbdy Oot said:

It has already been explained that the club felt it was better to loan out the young players so that they could perhaps get around 15 games rather than not going on loan and maybe getting 1 or 2 games.

 

Does anyone know how going on loan affects salary, pro Academy contracts are normally f all but can go up significantly once a first team appearance is made. See loan salaries agree before the move?

[wavydavy]

2 hours ago, DH1986 said:

I’m pretty sure our Youth set-up has been mothballed for most of the season.....which hasn’t helped. The 5 subs instead of 7 didn’t do the promotion of youth any favours either.

 

 

 

I think I also recall Levein saying that he was concentrating on the younger age groups rather than the reserves.

 

So maybe we will have a better chance of some of those in the Under 18/16 sort of age bracket coming through.

 

The problem is of course getting Robbie to play them.

 

Clubs like Motherwell and Hamilton who have produced some decent young players over the years are forced to play many of them when they have injuries or suspensions because they don't have big enough squads or enough cash to continually bring in players the way we have.

 

Is it better to give a few young guys a chance or bring in players like Frear and Kastaneer who have hardly kicked a ball for us.

 

If we had no money to afford to bring in players like them then we would have had to play the youngsters.

Edited April 11, 2021 by wavydavy

[graygo]

2 minutes ago, Hesh said:

Does anyone know how going on loan affects salary, pro Academy contracts are normally f all but can go up significantly once a first team appearance is made. See loan salaries agree before the move?

 

Well there's an angle and stick to beat the club with that nobody thought about. Well played.

 

ps. No idea of the answer to your question.

[jr ewing]

2 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

I think I also recall Levein saying that he was concentrating on the younger age groups rather than the reserves.

 

So maybe we will have a better chance of some of those in the Under 18/16 sort of age bracket coming through.

 

The problem is of course getting Robbie to play them.

 

Clubs like Motherwell and Hamilton who have produced some decent young players over the years are forced to play many of them when they have injuries or suspensions because they don't have big enough squads or enough cash to continually bring in players the way we have.

 

Is it better to give a few young guys a chance or bring in players like Frear and Kastaneer who have hardly kicked a ball for us.

 

If we had no money to afford to bring in players like them then we would have had to play the youngsters.

Don't forget Popescu Roberts Stewart......

[wavydavy]

Just now, jr ewing said:

Don't forget Popescu Roberts Stewart......

 

I was trying to until you reminded me.

[Nookie Bear]

10 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

I think I also recall Levein saying that he was concentrating on the younger age groups rather than the reserves.

 

So maybe we will have a better chance of some of those in the Under 18/16 sort of age bracket coming through.

 

Those paragraphs contradict each other. 

[wavydavy]

Just now, Nookie Bear said:

Those paragraphs contradict each other. 

 

Do they. Tell me what I should have written then.

[kingantti1874]

11 minutes ago, jr ewing said:

Don't forget Popescu Roberts Stewart......

roberts has been very good for motherwell. I wonder why 🤔

[Nookie Bear]

2 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

Do they. Tell me what I should have written then.

Unless I’ve misread it of course. 
 

Basically I wouldn’t trust Levein to look after any age group of footballer. 

[jr ewing]

19 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

I was trying to until you reminded me.

🤣

[jr ewing]

8 minutes ago, kingantti1874 said:

roberts has been very good for motherwell. I wonder why 🤔

Maybe get a player swap for him. 

[wavydavy]

Just now, Nookie Bear said:

Unless I’ve misread it of course. 
 

Basically I wouldn’t trust Levein to look after any age group of footballer. 

 

I don't think I suggested he did and neither do I trust him.

 

My point was that CL had said that he wanted to concentrate on bringing in the best players possible at the younger age groups.

 

By doing this and assuming the club brought in the right type of players it would take a while before these players would start to break through to have a chance of being involved in the first team squad.

 

They need to be given a chance of first team football though to show what they can do at a higher level. Will they get that with Robbie? We might see one or two in our last few games in the Championship.

 

If we are really serious about bringing a decent percentage of players through the Academy into the first team then they have to be givebn games to show if they can make it.

 

Our problem at the moment is that Robbie seems to prefer to bring in journeynmen type players that have been around the blocka a few times but offer nothing.

[wavydavy]

2 minutes ago, jr ewing said:

Maybe get a player swap for him. 

 

Was he not stretchered off yesterday ?

[wavydavy]

12 minutes ago, kingantti1874 said:

roberts has been very good for motherwell. I wonder why 🤔

 

I think they have been playing him alongside Watt in a more central striking role rather than wide right where Robbie had played him.

 

Although I think when we first signed him his CV suggested that he was a striker/wide right attacker.

 

He made some sort of comment about being allowed the freedom to play or some sort of comment along those lines which will possibly not go down too well with Robbie and his coaches.

 

He still has a year left on his contract or maybe more.

[Silverwolf]

4 hours ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

Looked into it this week and the youth narrative is a wee bit of a busted hand tbh. Seems to be a bit of a podcast meme that doesn’t properly add up in reality. 
 

End of the day it has always been the case that from 10-15 youths that gets whittled down to 2 or 3 making it to the first team squads. OP appears to follow the academy so you should know that. Go back however far you want. The one time we were forced to play an entire youth team under Locke in 13-14 with Dylan McGowans and Kevin mchatties etc Hearts literally could not compete, Locke went 20 odd games without a win mid season, we got relegated, and would have been in a relegation battle and still bottom even without the points deduction. In the end, from that crop, only Walker, Paterson and Nicholson made it into an actual Hearts team that was up to Hearts standards and finished 3rd in the league.
 

These players today who are out at Montrose or Cove Rangers need to really skyrocket to go from that level up to Hearts first team, you can look back all through history and you’ll see that most of the time, they don’t. But this season in particular the kids are at an even bigger disadvantage as they are all way way off the game time levels they need. Covid has been a real spanner in the works. How can folk slate the club when the normal progression from U20s to reserves to first team hasn’t even been operational for a year? These kids haven’t even played reserve games till now? They need to get those 10-15 games which they’ll hopefully get now. So we’ll see pre season, but the only names on OPs list there who I’m optimistic about are Logan and Henderson. The rest, I am calling it now, none of them will be playing any games in the Hearts Premiership first team next season. Maybe either Cochrane or Smith, if Irving leaves. Even if we changed the manager it’d be the same. The pressure to win and get above Hibs next season and get to the latter stages of cups, is absolutely immense. And we also actually have a bit of a transfer war chest too, with the large amount of dross that’s getting slashed off the wage bill.  
 

From the last crop it was whittled down to Brandon, Irving, Henderson. A few like Leonard, Morrison, Doig and others chose to leave in search of football or a different path into pro level. Others like Moore weren’t good enough and were let go. 1 was sold for 7 figures and that bankrolls the whole academy for a few more seasons. Yes we’ve not given very many debuts which is disappointing at surface level, but these things do go in cycles as OP will know from his stellar knowledge of youth football. You’ll have a season where there’s a lot of debuts then the next few years it gets whittled down as you sort wheat from the chaff. Next crop will be similar. Great to see the U18s are back playing, I’m sure a number of them will have great careers to look forward to. Maybe 1 of them could even be on to bigger things and english Premier etc. But the vast 90% majority won’t. If there’s any more than 3-4 youth players age 20 or under in a matchday squad of 18 players, I would say we’re doing pretty well. 20% matchday squad representation would be 3-4 academy players under the age of say 23. I think that’s a very decent aim and if you look at the facts we’ve actually been pretty close to that this season, a pity McGill hasn’t got more games but how good is he really? Is he a better player than Haring Mceneff Irving and Halliday? 

 

Maybe you would advocate that 20% squad levels to be say 30%. That would be 6 academy U23s out of the matchday 18 players. I actually agree with that, but would say maybe it would just be an age thing rather than just academy. We need to be signing more 20-21 year old players as well. Thats something we’ve not done. But the main thing, our overall squad age has been too high. I think that is achievable and what I’d be wanting as well  But that would have to be a long term thing to manage. And it would be very ambitious to get consistently to Europe while doing it. Because the fact is, not every kid is particularly good. A lot of them just aren’t. We can sign better quality players than them. Mceneff vs Irving, case in point. Mceneff is pushing for full international caps for his country. Irving will likely never get a cap. So what, we have to just not sign anyone and play Irving? That’s where it gets difficult. 

 

If Cochrane and Smith were not attached to hearts, they were just 20 year old Cove/ Montrose players. Would you be advocating for Hearts to go and buy them for next season from these clubs, for Hearts first team? Talking shite if you say yes tbh 

 

Next season i hope to see 2 or 3 more of them into the squad as the likes of White Berra and others move on. But I expect signings as well. A shame none of these kids are a top Center half as we could really use an 18 year old version of Berra to come through now.  That would be very handy. Next season there will hopefully be a full pre season, youth season and reserves season underway and we will be in a position to give a couple of debuts, if a few of the u18 lads look ready. 

 

Neilson is a long way away from putting that cup exit right. He’s at the bottom of Mount Everest in fact. But we got the promotion job done and avoided the disaster of failing to get up first time of asking as happened with other “biggest clubs in the division” of previous years. So it’s basically time to move on. Maybe he’s at base camp of Mount Everest now. A mammoth task ahead for him to recover, and that’s without of forcing him to have to play an absurd number of 10-15 kids next season. That won’t be happening and it doesn’t matter who the manager is. That’ll never happen. 
 

And if you want to discuss what’s happened to Irving as well, that is pretty obvious to me. Peter Haring has got back to fitness, he is now only 70-80% back to his best and he is better than Irving. Mceneff has come in to the club and he is better than Irving in terms of his pedigree, experience, pace, athleticism. Took some games to get up to speed but showed what he’s about now. Fact is Irving should be signing on, and looking to be Peter Harings shadow and start to copy all these wee tricks Haring plays, traps he sets and the way he skids the ball about. Irving can be that good if he has the patience to be a sponge, he’s only 20 so next season is ideal for him to turn 21, then on to 22 you’d think it’s perfect progression for him. But he isn’t going to be a certain starter or on big money. That’s not “ruining” him that’s just having better players than him and setting high standards for him to reach which at this time, Irving, looking back to the last 2 years under 3 managers, he just hasn’t got there yet. Nowhere near. And those standards I expect to be even higher next season as my expectation is for a Djoum type athletic power house midfielder to come into the engine room as well.

 

As for Doig well to be honest, I’m not going to use him as a stick to beat Neilson and Savage with. Neither of them was at Hearts when he was let go. We have already binned the man who was responsible. Folk need to understand that Craig Levein is gone from Hearts. The first step in recovery from Levein, was to get back promoted. That’s only the starting line. So folk need to start to move on from going over every single cock up the man made, there are literally hundreds. And though Doig was let go, we did still get 7 figures for Hickey so it’s not all bad. Give Savage and Neilson their first chance in the Premiership, that’s what we will do now. And if you don’t like that cancel your dd and stay away till budge and her appointees savage and Neilson are all gone. 

 

So the short version of the above. It’s right to have high hopes for the academy. But the first team bar is high and needs to go way way up next season. 

If you are going to continue to talk sense; using fact based logic and pragmatic analysis, then there is no place for you on Kickback. Moderator.........

Great post.

 

[tcjambo]

We should have won the league two or three games earlier. Now we only have three games to give youth an outing in the team. QoS, Alloa and Ayr are all games where we should have been able to have played the youngsters without any worries about the league. Who gets a run now - presumably we can't use loanees?

 

 

[Pasquale for King]

4 hours ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

Looked into it this week and the youth narrative is a wee bit of a busted hand tbh. Seems to be a bit of a podcast meme that doesn’t properly add up in reality. 
 

End of the day it has always been the case that from 10-15 youths that gets whittled down to 2 or 3 making it to the first team squads. OP appears to follow the academy so you should know that. Go back however far you want. The one time we were forced to play an entire youth team under Locke in 13-14 with Dylan McGowans and Kevin mchatties etc Hearts literally could not compete, Locke went 20 odd games without a win mid season, we got relegated, and would have been in a relegation battle and still bottom even without the points deduction. In the end, from that crop, only Walker, Paterson and Nicholson made it into an actual Hearts team that was up to Hearts standards and finished 3rd in the league.
 

These players today who are out at Montrose or Cove Rangers need to really skyrocket to go from that level up to Hearts first team, you can look back all through history and you’ll see that most of the time, they don’t. But this season in particular the kids are at an even bigger disadvantage as they are all way way off the game time levels they need. Covid has been a real spanner in the works. How can folk slate the club when the normal progression from U20s to reserves to first team hasn’t even been operational for a year? These kids haven’t even played reserve games till now? They need to get those 10-15 games which they’ll hopefully get now. So we’ll see pre season, but the only names on OPs list there who I’m optimistic about are Logan and Henderson. The rest, I am calling it now, none of them will be playing any games in the Hearts Premiership first team next season. Maybe either Cochrane or Smith, if Irving leaves. Even if we changed the manager it’d be the same. The pressure to win and get above Hibs next season and get to the latter stages of cups, is absolutely immense. And we also actually have a bit of a transfer war chest too, with the large amount of dross that’s getting slashed off the wage bill.  
 

From the last crop it was whittled down to Brandon, Irving, Henderson. A few like Leonard, Morrison, Doig and others chose to leave in search of football or a different path into pro level. Others like Moore weren’t good enough and were let go. 1 was sold for 7 figures and that bankrolls the whole academy for a few more seasons. Yes we’ve not given very many debuts which is disappointing at surface level, but these things do go in cycles as OP will know from his stellar knowledge of youth football. You’ll have a season where there’s a lot of debuts then the next few years it gets whittled down as you sort wheat from the chaff. Next crop will be similar. Great to see the U18s are back playing, I’m sure a number of them will have great careers to look forward to. Maybe 1 of them could even be on to bigger things and english Premier etc. But the vast 90% majority won’t. If there’s any more than 3-4 youth players age 20 or under in a matchday squad of 18 players, I would say we’re doing pretty well. 20% matchday squad representation would be 3-4 academy players under the age of say 23. I think that’s a very decent aim and if you look at the facts we’ve actually been pretty close to that this season, a pity McGill hasn’t got more games but how good is he really? Is he a better player than Haring Mceneff Irving and Halliday? 

 

Maybe you would advocate that 20% squad levels to be say 30%. That would be 6 academy U23s out of the matchday 18 players. I actually agree with that, but would say maybe it would just be an age thing rather than just academy. We need to be signing more 20-21 year old players as well. Thats something we’ve not done. But the main thing, our overall squad age has been too high. I think that is achievable and what I’d be wanting as well  But that would have to be a long term thing to manage. And it would be very ambitious to get consistently to Europe while doing it. Because the fact is, not every kid is particularly good. A lot of them just aren’t. We can sign better quality players than them. Mceneff vs Irving, case in point. Mceneff is pushing for full international caps for his country. Irving will likely never get a cap. So what, we have to just not sign anyone and play Irving? That’s where it gets difficult. 

 

If Cochrane and Smith were not attached to hearts, they were just 20 year old Cove/ Montrose players. Would you be advocating for Hearts to go and buy them for next season from these clubs, for Hearts first team? Talking shite if you say yes tbh 

 

Next season i hope to see 2 or 3 more of them into the squad as the likes of White Berra and others move on. But I expect signings as well. A shame none of these kids are a top Center half as we could really use an 18 year old version of Berra to come through now.  That would be very handy. Next season there will hopefully be a full pre season, youth season and reserves season underway and we will be in a position to give a couple of debuts, if a few of the u18 lads look ready. 

 

Neilson is a long way away from putting that cup exit right. He’s at the bottom of Mount Everest in fact. But we got the promotion job done and avoided the disaster of failing to get up first time of asking as happened with other “biggest clubs in the division” of previous years. So it’s basically time to move on. Maybe he’s at base camp of Mount Everest now. A mammoth task ahead for him to recover, and that’s without of forcing him to have to play an absurd number of 10-15 kids next season. That won’t be happening and it doesn’t matter who the manager is. That’ll never happen. 
 

And if you want to discuss what’s happened to Irving as well, that is pretty obvious to me. Peter Haring has got back to fitness, he is now only 70-80% back to his best and he is better than Irving. Mceneff has come in to the club and he is better than Irving in terms of his pedigree, experience, pace, athleticism. Took some games to get up to speed but showed what he’s about now. Fact is Irving should be signing on, and looking to be Peter Harings shadow and start to copy all these wee tricks Haring plays, traps he sets and the way he skids the ball about. Irving can be that good if he has the patience to be a sponge, he’s only 20 so next season is ideal for him to turn 21, then on to 22 you’d think it’s perfect progression for him. But he isn’t going to be a certain starter or on big money. That’s not “ruining” him that’s just having better players than him and setting high standards for him to reach which at this time, Irving, looking back to the last 2 years under 3 managers, he just hasn’t got there yet. Nowhere near. And those standards I expect to be even higher next season as my expectation is for a Djoum type athletic power house midfielder to come into the engine room as well.

 

As for Doig well to be honest, I’m not going to use him as a stick to beat Neilson and Savage with. Neither of them was at Hearts when he was let go. We have already binned the man who was responsible. Folk need to understand that Craig Levein is gone from Hearts. The first step in recovery from Levein, was to get back promoted. That’s only the starting line. So folk need to start to move on from going over every single cock up the man made, there are literally hundreds. And though Doig was let go, we did still get 7 figures for Hickey so it’s not all bad. Give Savage and Neilson their first chance in the Premiership, that’s what we will do now. And if you don’t like that cancel your dd and stay away till budge and her appointees savage and Neilson are all gone. 

 

So the short version of the above. It’s right to have high hopes for the academy. But the first team bar is high and needs to go way way up next season. 

Good post. 
I would say that the youngsters all started back in August with the rest of the squad and Neilson played guys like McGill/Cochrane/Moore/Brandon/Henderson and decided to go with experienced players. His choice to sign 13 players and restrict the chances for young guys, he decided they weren’t good enough. 
Moore has over a year left on his contract, like a few others being told you’re free to go and them actually leaving is a different thing altogether. Guys like Damour are still costing us a fortune and unfortunately things like that will mean although he’s gone Levein still haunts the club. 
Oh and his defensive disciple also. 
 

[Pasquale for King]

1 minute ago, tcjambo said:

We should have won the league two or three games earlier. Now we only have three games to give youth an outing in the team. QoS, Alloa and Ayr are all games where we should have been able to have played the youngsters without any worries about the league. Who gets a run now - presumably we can't use loanees?

 

 

Yes so it’s only McGill and we need Haring  to play these last three games to get matches so he’s ready for next season. 

[Pasquale for King]

25 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

I think they have been playing him alongside Watt in a more central striking role rather than wide right where Robbie had played him.

 

Although I think when we first signed him his CV suggested that he was a striker/wide right attacker.

 

He made some sort of comment about being allowed the freedom to play or some sort of comment along those lines which will possibly not go down too well with Robbie and his coaches.

 

He still has a year left on his contract or maybe more.

He said it was good to play with the shackles off.
It’s a three up front they’ve been playing a bit like Liverpool with Watt, Roberts and Cole. He looks motivated. He has a year left. 

[tcjambo]

1 minute ago, Pasquale for King said:

He said it was good to play with the shackles off.
It’s a three up front they’ve been playing a bit like Liverpool with Watt, Roberts and Cole. He looks motivated. He has a year left. 

What's Cole's contract situation - he looks the best of that three?

[graygo]

16 minutes ago, Pasquale for King said:

He said it was good to play with the shackles off.
It’s a three up front they’ve been playing a bit like Liverpool with Watt, Roberts and Cole. He looks motivated. He has a year left. 

 

Did I read that right? Motherwell have been playing a bit like Liverpool? 😆

 

I know what you meant. 👍

[Mr Brightside]

1 hour ago, milky_26 said:

not having the ability to have 5 subs has not helped either

That’s a good point.

Look at Doig at Hibs he has been subbed a lot, would he have got as many games if there were only 3 subs and 1 was needed for him most weeks.

[wavydavy]

29 minutes ago, Pasquale for King said:

He said it was good to play with the shackles off.
It’s a three up front they’ve been playing a bit like Liverpool with Watt, Roberts and Cole. He looks motivated. He has a year left. 

 

👍

[Pasquale for King]

14 minutes ago, Awbdy Oot said:

 

Did I read that right? Motherwell have been playing a bit like Liverpool? 😆

 

I know what you meant. 👍

It’s daft I know 😆. Watt/Cole/Roberts have a passing resemblance to those three also. 

[Pasquale for King]

31 minutes ago, tcjambo said:

What's Cole's contract situation - he looks the best of that three?

Out of contract in the summer 🤔. 
I didn’t know he was Andys son. 

[wavydavy]

32 minutes ago, tcjambo said:

What's Cole's contract situation - he looks the best of that three?

 

Out of contract end of May this year according to this.

 

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/devante-cole/profil/spieler/186924

[jambonian]

32 minutes ago, wavydavy said:

 

Out of contract end of May this year according to this.

 

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/devante-cole/profil/spieler/186924

 

There's one or two players at Motherwell that's caught the eye. Cole, Campbell and i like the pace of Chris Long upfront. Then you add Steven O'Donnell who should've been at Hearts anyway. Maybe Roberts can be used as part of a deal to get one of them. Campbell would be my choice but the others wouldn't be bad signings either.

[wavydavy]

38 minutes ago, jambonian said:

 

There's one or two players at Motherwell that's caught the eye. Cole, Campbell and i like the pace of Chris Long upfront. Then you add Steven O'Donnell who should've been at Hearts anyway. Maybe Roberts can be used as part of a deal to get one of them. Campbell would be my choice but the others wouldn't be bad signings either.

 

I would take any of those you mention for Roberts. Not sure they are that niave though.

[Hesh]

4 hours ago, Awbdy Oot said:

 

Well there's an angle and stick to beat the club with that nobody thought about. Well played.

 

ps. No idea of the answer to your question.

no looking to beat the club at all, I think you could be putting up to a couple of grand on the wage bill every month once a player makes a first team league debut.

[Bongo 1874]

11 hours ago, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

The thread title is some claim. I don't see any evidence of us having the best academy.

 

7 hours ago, kingantti1874 said:

I’ve no idea why people think or academy is great.  I’m not the club have even claimed that.

 

as I said - it is nowhere near the best. I know many people have had kids in an around it. And watched plenty of games. 

 

7 hours ago, DS98 said:

Take a day off ffs. For your own sake.

 

7 hours ago, part_time_jambo said:

Would probably carry more weight if you didn't hide behind a username, but still a bit OTT.

 

9 hours ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

Looked into it this week and the youth narrative is a wee bit of a busted hand tbh. Seems to be a bit of a podcast meme that doesn’t properly add up in reality. 
 

End of the day it has always been the case that from 10-15 youths that gets whittled down to 2 or 3 making it to the first team squads. OP appears to follow the academy so you should know that. Go back however far you want. The one time we were forced to play an entire youth team under Locke in 13-14 with Dylan McGowans and Kevin mchatties etc Hearts literally could not compete, Locke went 20 odd games without a win mid season, we got relegated, and would have been in a relegation battle and still bottom even without the points deduction. In the end, from that crop, only Walker, Paterson and Nicholson made it into an actual Hearts team that was up to Hearts standards and finished 3rd in the league.
 

These players today who are out at Montrose or Cove Rangers need to really skyrocket to go from that level up to Hearts first team, you can look back all through history and you’ll see that most of the time, they don’t. But this season in particular the kids are at an even bigger disadvantage as they are all way way off the game time levels they need. Covid has been a real spanner in the works. How can folk slate the club when the normal progression from U20s to reserves to first team hasn’t even been operational for a year? These kids haven’t even played reserve games till now? They need to get those 10-15 games which they’ll hopefully get now. So we’ll see pre season, but the only names on OPs list there who I’m optimistic about are Logan and Henderson. The rest, I am calling it now, none of them will be playing any games in the Hearts Premiership first team next season. Maybe either Cochrane or Smith, if Irving leaves. Even if we changed the manager it’d be the same. The pressure to win and get above Hibs next season and get to the latter stages of cups, is absolutely immense. And we also actually have a bit of a transfer war chest too, with the large amount of dross that’s getting slashed off the wage bill.  
 

From the last crop it was whittled down to Brandon, Irving, Henderson. A few like Leonard, Morrison, Doig and others chose to leave in search of football or a different path into pro level. Others like Moore weren’t good enough and were let go. 1 was sold for 7 figures and that bankrolls the whole academy for a few more seasons. Yes we’ve not given very many debuts which is disappointing at surface level, but these things do go in cycles as OP will know from his stellar knowledge of youth football. You’ll have a season where there’s a lot of debuts then the next few years it gets whittled down as you sort wheat from the chaff. Next crop will be similar. Great to see the U18s are back playing, I’m sure a number of them will have great careers to look forward to. Maybe 1 of them could even be on to bigger things and english Premier etc. But the vast 90% majority won’t. If there’s any more than 3-4 youth players age 20 or under in a matchday squad of 18 players, I would say we’re doing pretty well. 20% matchday squad representation would be 3-4 academy players under the age of say 23. I think that’s a very decent aim and if you look at the facts we’ve actually been pretty close to that this season, a pity McGill hasn’t got more games but how good is he really? Is he a better player than Haring Mceneff Irving and Halliday? 

 

Maybe you would advocate that 20% squad levels to be say 30%. That would be 6 academy U23s out of the matchday 18 players. I actually agree with that, but would say maybe it would just be an age thing rather than just academy. We need to be signing more 20-21 year old players as well. Thats something we’ve not done. But the main thing, our overall squad age has been too high. I think that is achievable and what I’d be wanting as well  But that would have to be a long term thing to manage. And it would be very ambitious to get consistently to Europe while doing it. Because the fact is, not every kid is particularly good. A lot of them just aren’t. We can sign better quality players than them. Mceneff vs Irving, case in point. Mceneff is pushing for full international caps for his country. Irving will likely never get a cap. So what, we have to just not sign anyone and play Irving? That’s where it gets difficult. 

 

If Cochrane and Smith were not attached to hearts, they were just 20 year old Cove/ Montrose players. Would you be advocating for Hearts to go and buy them for next season from these clubs, for Hearts first team? Talking shite if you say yes tbh 

 

Next season i hope to see 2 or 3 more of them into the squad as the likes of White Berra and others move on. But I expect signings as well. A shame none of these kids are a top Center half as we could really use an 18 year old version of Berra to come through now.  That would be very handy. Next season there will hopefully be a full pre season, youth season and reserves season underway and we will be in a position to give a couple of debuts, if a few of the u18 lads look ready. 

 

Neilson is a long way away from putting that cup exit right. He’s at the bottom of Mount Everest in fact. But we got the promotion job done and avoided the disaster of failing to get up first time of asking as happened with other “biggest clubs in the division” of previous years. So it’s basically time to move on. Maybe he’s at base camp of Mount Everest now. A mammoth task ahead for him to recover, and that’s without of forcing him to have to play an absurd number of 10-15 kids next season. That won’t be happening and it doesn’t matter who the manager is. That’ll never happen. 
 

And if you want to discuss what’s happened to Irving as well, that is pretty obvious to me. Peter Haring has got back to fitness, he is now only 70-80% back to his best and he is better than Irving. Mceneff has come in to the club and he is better than Irving in terms of his pedigree, experience, pace, athleticism. Took some games to get up to speed but showed what he’s about now. Fact is Irving should be signing on, and looking to be Peter Harings shadow and start to copy all these wee tricks Haring plays, traps he sets and the way he skids the ball about. Irving can be that good if he has the patience to be a sponge, he’s only 20 so next season is ideal for him to turn 21, then on to 22 you’d think it’s perfect progression for him. But he isn’t going to be a certain starter or on big money. That’s not “ruining” him that’s just having better players than him and setting high standards for him to reach which at this time, Irving, looking back to the last 2 years under 3 managers, he just hasn’t got there yet. Nowhere near. And those standards I expect to be even higher next season as my expectation is for a Djoum type athletic power house midfielder to come into the engine room as well.

 

As for Doig well to be honest, I’m not going to use him as a stick to beat Neilson and Savage with. Neither of them was at Hearts when he was let go. We have already binned the man who was responsible. Folk need to understand that Craig Levein is gone from Hearts. The first step in recovery from Levein, was to get back promoted. That’s only the starting line. So folk need to start to move on from going over every single cock up the man made, there are literally hundreds. And though Doig was let go, we did still get 7 figures for Hickey so it’s not all bad. Give Savage and Neilson their first chance in the Premiership, that’s what we will do now. And if you don’t like that cancel your dd and stay away till budge and her appointees savage and Neilson are all gone. 

 

So the short version of the above. It’s right to have high hopes for the academy. But the first team bar is high and needs to go way way up next season. 

Your post is good and very well put, but if you don't mind can I challenge it later on as I have a few things to reply to, we do have a promising centre half coming through his name is callum flatman, but we have also let go of a centre half that has won a cup this year, that would definitely add something to our team, I don't believe that the grade is that massive a step up, what it takes is belief and trust, remember when fergie was told he would never win a league with kids?. 

 

I could name 5 players right now that are playing a level above us that were quoted as not good enough, yet they are playing a division above us,I'm really passionate when it comes to youth development, if we play our cards right we won't have to worry about replacing Gordon, 

 

Infact we could potentially of had a starting 11 of youth players tbh, I'm a bit busy just now but i will reply to your post, as it's a very good post but I do disagree with it. 

 

When you really sit down and think about it, we have let go of youth players, and replaced them with crap, I think that's one of the big reasons we got relagated. 

 

I'll reply later mate Bongo1874👍. 

Edited April 11, 2021 by Bongo 1874

[A_A wehatethehibs]

10 minutes ago, Bongo 1874 said:

 

 

 

 

Your post is good and very well put, but if you don't mind can I challenge it later on as I have a few things to reply to, we do have a promising centre half coming through his name is callum flatman, but we have also let go of a centre half that has won a cup this year, that would definitely add something to our team, I don't believe that the grade is that massive a step up, what it takes is belief and trust, remember when fergie was told he would never win a league with kids?. 

 

I could name 5 players right now that are playing a level above us that were quoted as not good enough, yet they are playing a division above us,I'm really passionate when it comes to youth development, if we play our cards right we won't have to worry about replacing Gordon, 

 

Infact we could potentially of had a starting 11 of youth players tbh, I'm a bit busy just now but i will reply to your post, as it's a very good post but I do disagree with it. 

 

When you really sit down and think about it, we have let go of youth players, and replaced them with crap, I think that's one of the big reasons we got relagated. 

 

I'll reply later mate Bongo1874👍. 

Just focus on what you feel Neilson and Savage have done wrong.
 

If it was something which happened Levein era, leave it out of your reply as it is no longer relevant to the club as things stand today. 

I’ve now drawn a line under discussing Levein era decisions. 

 

I’m fed up with folk going through every last mistake he made. There’s hundreds. We could discuss Levein for a year and not get through everything. 
 

The clubs moving on now to a new structure so focus on what exactly is wrong about that new structure. Savage has been in the door for 4 months we’re only at the very beginning of his stewardship of our playing staff at all levels. 

[Bongo 1874]

2 minutes ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

Just focus on what you feel Neilson and Savage have done wrong.
 

If it was something which happened Levein era, leave it out of your reply as it is no longer relevant to the club as things stand today. 

I’ve now drawn a line under discussing Levein era decisions. 

 

I’m fed up with folk going through every last mistake he made. There’s hundreds. We could discuss Levein for a year and not get through everything. 
 

The clubs moving on now to a new structure so focus on what exactly is wrong about that new structure. Savage has been in the door for 4 months we’re only at the very beginning of his stewardship of our playing staff at all levels. 

Neilson was apart of the Levein era mate 👍. 

[Bazzas right boot]

"This is your warning"

 

 

[Tazio]

3 minutes ago, Bongo 1874 said:

Neilson was apart of the Levein era mate 👍. 

So anyone who ever played for or worked under Levein is persona non grata forever? 

[Bongo 1874]

1 minute ago, Tazio said:

So anyone who ever played for or worked under Levein is persona non grata forever? 

Well I feel Robbie should be held accountable yes, he let go off Liam Gordon etc?. 

 

Did he really get any youth playing at all, Jack Hamilton maybe but was it forced?. 

 

Nicholson, Patterson etc were all before him? So he can't take credit for that can he?. 

 

 

I feel personally until every person from the Levein era is gone, we won't do anything as a club, we need major change, and i don't care what anyone says we do have the best academy in Scotland, a sea of talent coming through. 

 

It's just how they are coached and managed, and judging on how Robbie treated Irving he's not the manager i want near my club. 

 

 

We need a manager that can put an arm around young players if they make a mistake, but that's what wrong just like Levein, Robbie is a heartless bassa!!. 

 

 

 

 

[Tazio]

2 minutes ago, Bongo 1874 said:

Well I feel Robbie should be held accountable yes, he let go off Liam Gordon etc?. 

 

Did he really get any youth playing at all, Jack Hamilton maybe but was it forced?. 

 

Nicholson, Patterson etc were all before him? So he can't take credit for that can he?. 

 

 

I feel personally until every person from the Levein era is gone, we won't do anything as a club, we need major change, and i don't care what anyone says we do have the best academy in Scotland, a sea of talent coming through. 

 

It's just how they are coached and managed, and judging on how Robbie treated Irving he's not the manager i want near my club. 

 

 

We need a manager that can put an arm around young players if they make a mistake, but that's what wrong just like Levein, Robbie is a heartless bassa!!. 

 

 

 

 

What do you mean how he treated Irving? He played him and he’s been bloody useless and slowed the team down in every game. This is just another thread for you to keep on paddling upstream with your opinions that most people don’t agree with. I’m all for playing youngsters but if it doesn’t work out you can’t keep putting them in. 

[Bongo 1874]

Just now, Tazio said:

What do you mean how he treated Irving? He played him and he’s been bloody useless and slowed the team down in every game. This is just another thread for you to keep on paddling upstream with your opinions that most people don’t agree with. I’m all for playing youngsters but if it doesn’t work out you can’t keep putting them in. 

He's been useless nah he played him in midfield with Andy Halliday, only for the system to change and Halliday to go to wingback on Friday 🤔 put Irving in the midfield with big Pedro and Aaron, then you will see a different Irving, just for a start the balance is all wrong with a midfield of Halliday and Irving how is it unbalanced? Bongo? Because they are both left footed 🤔 this is basic Robbie two left footed central midfield players cmon eh. 

 

 

 

[Tazio]

So you can’t play two left footed midfielder together but you can play two right footed ones together? Too complicated a concept for me. 

[Bongo 1874]

27 minutes ago, Smith's right boot said:

"This is your warning"

 

 

That's what I thought about your opinion on Friday about Henderson when you said he wasn't good enough 😂, only 5 mins later for him to turn into Lionel Henderson and prove you wrong, if anyone wants to have a look it's on the match day thread, Henderson was getting it tight Bongo backed him 😁 and he done the business 😉. 

 

Then you had Smith right boot saying a ken ma onions because I said Boyce is a player 😂😂 😂😂 mate just pipe it eh 😉. 

Edited April 11, 2021 by Bongo 1874

[DH1986]

Who takes credit for the sea of talent we’ve got coming through ?

[Bongo 1874]

Just now, Tazio said:

So you can’t play two left footed midfielder together but you can play two right footed ones together? Too complicated a concept for me. 

Haring dropped between the centre half's allowing McEneff to get forward 👍, also allowing Logan to get further up the park and Halliday. 

 

Still a lot of sideways passes but that's the norm 👍.