Stupid Headlines, And Does Villa's Long-Term Plan Stand A Chance?

Long-term plans are lovely, and we all like the sound of them. It seems prudent, and visionary, and smacks of deep understanding. I’ve been behind them.

However, sometimes a market isn’t really predisposed toward long-term plans. For example, you’re Randy Lerner and you think, “Hey, I’ve got some cash.” And then Manchester City happens. That tends to make you rethink things, and turns the market on its head. Prince to pauper, almost, and overnight.

And then you might think, as I’ve often done given that Lerner will understand the American college football and NFL free-agent paradigms all too well, that you’ve got to set yourself up for constant turnover. Which generally means someone in charge with an idea, and a way of getting players, that allows you to be constantly rotating your squad.

The trick here, though, is two-fold. Someone who’ll be in place long enough to transcend 2-4-year cycles, and someone with a “recruiting”/scouting/development network that can keep finding the right players to slot into a particular system.

City can create constant turnover…buy the world’s best, give them a year or two, then sell them on. They don’t lose much value, given the ridiculously dense nature of talent in the setup, and even if they do, you don’t really care. They’ve got a spigot of money, and losing £5-15m on a player’s transfer value in a couple of years means nothing. And the wages mean nothing. And players who don’t make it on £75k-£200k a week can move along and still make a lot of money.

So what do Villa do?

Of Schools and Academies

Setting up schools and academies, ie, setting up feeder systems whereby you bring in, develop, and evaluate talent, while fostering a pipeline connection to the parent club…it all sounds good.

And it is in principle.

The problem is that it’s expensive. Say you spend £10-15K per player, per year (facilities, coaching, travel, lodging, food, education, compensation, etc.). Take them at 15. Say you want results by 20. That’s £10-15k per player, each year, for five years = £50k-£75k, at a minimum (which is £5m for 100 players). For what? Guaranteed starters? You start to see what I’m saying. And I’m seriously low-balling the costs to make the math easy. Hell, you’re probably paying £50k-£100k a year just for the facilities.

While it sounds like the pinnacle of efficiency and foresight to develop your own talent, it might just be cheaper to buy it. In fact, it probably is, and that’s why the big teams do it. How many players do you need to develop to come up with City’s starting lineup? 100? 200? 1000? 10000?

And this is the dilemma. A five-year plan developing players is great. But of ours, who is really ready to be a dominant, top-four EPL player?

Not one.

Granted, this is just from the Villa Academy, and just from the way we’ve been doing things, ie, pretty half-assed. You have an academy, you see what happens. You win the reserve league year after year, and find that while the team is a great reserve-league team, it’s much more than the sum of its parts, and the individual parts aren’t really that brilliant. And the sum, while great by reserve-league standards, well, are they going to win the CL? No.

This is what’s going on in the game. Villa, Everton, Spurs…whoever. We’re the Academies for the big clubs. Feeder clubs? Yes, indeed. Because it’s cheaper, and much less risky, to buy a James Milner once he’s proved himself than it is to train up 100-1000 kids looking to grow your own James Milner. It’s better to loan a player to EPL teams that pose no threat than to loan them to Championship and League 1 teams where you get no idea how good they are. Especially if they aren’t even starting.

In the States, you have colleges and minor-league teams providing the proving grounds for thousands of players at a high level on national TV. They’re paid elsewhere, with scholarships and so on. You see them on film from 14 on up, and see them compete in front of rabid crowds of 75,000-110,000. You don’t have to pay anything to develop the basics and determine suitability. You just pay the going rate for already-developed talent. And they still crap out routinely—after playing under as much pressure from 17-21 as any pro in England—when they try and step up to the big leagues.

Given that you only need 11 starters, and 10 other players who can step in…What’s the cheaper long-term plan in a game whose ground rules can change overnight?

Again, maybe there’s money to be made in developing and selling players that offsets the expenses of Academies and the like. But it’s tough to set up something in England, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Brazil, and wherever else. It’s expensive, and there are no guaranteed pay-offs.

So, I’m not at all against the idea of establishing a much broader scouting and recruiting network. But it has to be balanced against reality.

So, Smartypants, What’s The Answer?

The biggest thing is relationships, and that’s the part where I agree most strongly with Matt. When Villa have relationships with different clubs and academies and what have you around Europe and South America, we should be able to identify and recruit talent.

If we have a stable management system and a consistent footballing philosophy, it’s easier to identify the players who fit your system and bring them in. When you change managers and systems every 3-5 years, what kind of plan do you have?

Yes, in England, root-and-branch change has to occur. Technical skills have to be put front and center in the development of all players, from schoolboy on up. No one like Gabby should be able to ascend to the ranks of starter with such limited skill on the ball. It just shouldn’t happen. Why did it? We didn’t have anyone else who was better. He dominated at an early age, probably scored for fun in training (against a defense no one from the top-six would field, and wasn’t asked to do more, to be more). Strong, fast…it was enough. Until, all of a sudden, it was woefully inadequate.

Barry Bannan? Please. Simple metrics would tell you he’s not a PL starter, never mind a true difference maker. Being “diminutive” is the only thing he shares with Messi.

We all know the incredibly skilled foreign players have learned the game under completely different circumstances, and in a context that makes them more technical and accomplished. You’re going to be better competing with hundreds of thousands looking to get out of slums when you’ve played in streets or garbage lots with rag balls your entire life.

Put those kids on a manicured pitch with a proper ball? It’s a cakewalk. Perhaps this is a bit romanticized and simplified, but it’s as close to the truth as anything. Don’t even let English kids touch a real ball until they’ve mastered playing barefoot with something like a tin can from birth to 10.

Do I exaggerate? Yes, a bit. But you know what I’m saying.

Schools and the like are great. But the bottom line is a crew who can spot talent, develop relationships, and guide that talent toward Villa. It’s cheaper to employ such scouts than it is to train up 100+ kids in several countries looking to find lightning in a bottle.

Bottom Line

The bottom line is that an average club might develop 2-4 starters on its own. After that, it’s about finding them elsewhere. How? Well, it’s going to be down to a cost-benefit analysis. Cheaper buying 15-year-old wunderkinds from around the world and watching them crap out at a 50% rate? Or training up your own army of wunderkinds only to watch 99% of them crap out?

I think that Villa should try to insinuate themselves with as many clubs in as many leagues at as many levels in as many countries as possible. Cast the widest net possible. It’s about the coaches and scouts and agents who control the pipeline of talent.

It’s going to have to be about networks and relationships. Villa’s turnover barely covers the wages of our first team, never mind developmental projects in other countries. It’s not a bad idea, but right now we don’t need to go so far.

We just need a coherent direction from the top, and the consequent commitment to a corresponding philosophy with its values, attributes and skills.

Let others do the grunt work. Just be ready and able to step in at the right time, looking for the right players to slot into the right idea.