The development of the reserves

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

From BWFC on Twitter:

For the coming season our reserve team will now be known as the development squad. They start their season against Arsenal at the Emirates.

Semantics, eh? Anyway, their fixtures for the forthcoming season are listed at http://www.bwfc.co.uk/fixtures-results/ ... -fixtures/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; - so at least the URL's old-school...

Anyway, with promises of promotion from within I thought their adventures might deserve a (stickied?) thread...

[Leyther_Matt]

Think it's basically just an admittance that fringe players no longer get much of a run out in the reserves and it's basically just an extended academy. Somehow doubt the Arsenal game will stay at the Emirates though?!

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Think it's basically just an admittance that fringe players no longer get much of a run out in the reserves and it's basically just an extended academy.

True enough. Finishing school!

Somehow doubt the Arsenal game will stay at the Emirates though?!

Indeed - their reserves (or Development Squad, or NotQuiteYetters, or Stiffs) play at Barnet.

[Leyther_Matt]

Somehow doubt the Arsenal game will stay at the Emirates though?!

Indeed - their reserves (or Development Squad, or NotQuiteYetters, or Stiffs) play at Barnet.

Doubt they'll be there much longer unless they buy it outright as I believe Barnet are being booted out by the council at the end of the season.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Somehow doubt the Arsenal game will stay at the Emirates though?!

Indeed - their reserves (or Development Squad, or NotQuiteYetters, or Stiffs) play at Barnet.

Doubt they'll be there much longer unless they buy it outright as I believe Barnet are being booted out by the council at the end of the season.

Arsenal will find another pitch to borrow – it's a nice regular income. That new pitch may well be at The Hive, where Barnet will play from next (2013/14) season. I played there a month or two ago - weirdly, behind the main complex, there are two concrete "ends" a pitch's length apart, with nobbut weeds in between.

[Lord Kangana]

Didn't Citeh start this development squad malarky, with their "Elite Development Squad" stuff?

[Leyther_Matt]

Somehow doubt the Arsenal game will stay at the Emirates though?!

Indeed - their reserves (or Development Squad, or NotQuiteYetters, or Stiffs) play at Barnet.

Doubt they'll be there much longer unless they buy it outright as I believe Barnet are being booted out by the council at the end of the season.

Arsenal will find another pitch to borrow – it's a nice regular income. That new pitch may well be at The Hive, where Barnet will play from next (2013/14) season. I played there a month or two ago - weirdly, behind the main complex, there are two concrete "ends" a pitch's length apart, with nobbut weeds in between.

Believe it was supposed to be a new ground for Wealdstone but never got finished.

[Nicko58]

No doubt it has something to do with this.

'Category One' status, then?

Quite surprised at that to be honest.

[Nicko58]

No doubt it has something to do with this.

'Category One' status, then?

Quite surprised at that to be honest.

[Relentless09]

No doubt it has something to do with this.

'Category One' status, then?

Quite surprised at that to be honest.

It doesn't mean anything, its random. I doubt we have a better youth system than Manchester United/City, Spurs, Liverpool, Newcastle and etc

[BWFC_Insane]

Category one is just every team that submitted an application last year!

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

No doubt it has something to do with this.

'Category One' status, then?

Quite surprised at that to be honest.

It doesn't mean anything, its random. I doubt we have a better youth system than Manchester United/City, Spurs, Liverpool, Newcastle and etc

Indeed. I'm not following that link to the Mail, but reading elsewhere about the BPL U21 league, it seems we're in Group 1 – named arbitrarily rather than hierarchically, considering MUFC are in Group 2 and MCFC in Group 3.

'Category' is the phrase used for the frankly disastrous Elite Player Performance Plan, which starts this season. Allegedly designed to promote youth football, the EPPP (which abolishes the 90-minute rule so big clubs can cherry-pick) in fact further stratifies football along financial lines: the category of your youth academy is decided by how much money you spend on it (£2.5m pa and 18 full-time staff for Category 1) – and the lower your category, the less financial compensation you receive when a big club tempts away your best youngsters.

It received understandably widespread condemnation among the 72 FL clubs, to which the PL clubs simply threatened to withdraw their existing contributions to youth football if the FL didn't vote it in. Even so a third of clubs voted against it, but the motion was carried. As a result, several smaller clubs have already decided that academies simply aren't worth it. Nice work.

More here, from an impassioned but informed Rochdale fan.

[Relentless09]

So according to this Rochdale fan, category 1 is the most expensive ?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

So according to this Rochdale fan, category 1 is the most expensive ?

It is, according to him, the BBC, Wikipedia, Premier League, and Goal.com – which notes that the audits of the Newcastle, Blackburn and Palace academies placed them in Category 2, and that ours hasn't been audited yet.

Those three U21 "Groups" shake down after this year into three regular (hierarchical) divisions, it says at PremierLeague.com, where it also comes to light that at least two matches should be at the club's "main ground". As games take place at weekend rather than midweek, those occurences might represent something close to the old thing of watching the reserves (sorry!) at home while the first team are away - although it will presumably take some balancing with clubs whose second strings use other teams' home grounds (eg us at Leyland, Arsenal at Barnet).

[Leyther_Matt]

Leyland isn't anyone's home ground DSB apart from our ressies and the LFA rep sides.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Well dat's alroit den

[a1]

is this [the name thing] coyle-esque happy clappy bullshit ?

or can they not call themselves bwfc b / reserves / u23s / whatever

[Leyther_Matt]

Yoof playing at Daisy Hill tonight, half 7 kick off. Only 3 quid to get in.

[Leyther_Matt]

Yoof ended up winning 10-0 and even Super John and Gartside were there (not together).

[Wandering Willy]

Coyle out!