Newcastle plan for the future, but please don’t forget the present!
Posted on May 9th, 2010 | 185 Comments |
Now we have another two youngsters that could potentially end up at the academy in the shape of Frenchman Martin Mimoun and Swedish goalkeeper Sulejmen Sarajlic, the latter spent the last week on trial with us in fact. You need to only look back a short while and see we reached the semi-final of the FA Youth Cup, something that hasn’t done for quite a while on Tyneside, and you have to admit that with the players coming through the academy the future looks bright.
The likes of Tim Krul, Tamas Kadar, Haris Vuckic and Nile Ranger are being touted as the next generation of Toon superstars, which they may well turn out to be. It’s an awfully risky strategy though, and focusing purely on youth is a potential disaster waiting to happen. I’m not rubbishing the strategy as it’s a sound, common sense and long-term plan for the future which should have been sorted out many years ago but wasn’t. What we need is sound investment in players for the future, and sound investment in players for next season.
Let’s not kid ourselves, some of our prospects look potentially very very good with Tim Krul and Haris Vuckic in particular are being tipped to shine. But can we rely on them to be chucked in at the deep end of what will more than likely be a relegation battle? I would say no. Some ex-Liverpool player that I detest once famously said that you don’t win anything with kids. He was of course wrong, but he was only wrong once when Alex Ferguson took a team pretty much full of ‘kids’ to the Premier League title. We don’t need to win the title next season, that isn’t our aim and wont be for some time. Our minimum objective is simply to survive.
Would it be fair to expect the younger players, who will undoubtedly play a part next season, to be lumbered with the pressure of being the ones who can ‘change a game’? No. Would it be fair on Chris Hughton to allow him to struggle on with a threadbare squad knowing that a younger player maybe physically ready but not mentally prepared? No.
Understandably, if these youngsters are good enough then they are old enough to play and they will make an impact, but they still need experienced players to guide them along. I’m not just talking about the players we have in our senior squad, I mean new faces who will also be able to add something to the team and take a bit of what is fast becoming reliance on our youngsters to get through some tough games next season.
By all means, sign these two newest youngsters that are being touted around, but signing them means zip if it’s at the expense of the first team. As I mentioned earlier, we should plan for the future whilst not forgetting what we need now.
I like the youth project, good for the club.