We have earlier highlighted the problem or challenge, to see young players being blocked by more senior players as it looks more like hitting a wall and never really getting a chance to develope, being overlooked. Will Alves and Jeremy Monga are two young players who are seen as exceptional talents.
Trey Nyoni is a fresh example of a player that has taken his route to Liverpool and at this time being played in and around the first team, hardly one Leicester would have used in the same amount of games. There are great talent at the club, playing at international youth level, but seen as to light and of course blocked from getting a look in, with so many fringe men on high salaries and proven professionals.
Harvey Barnes, Ben Chilwell, Luke Thomas, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Hamza Choudhury are all players coming up from the youth academy at the club, but there should have been much more. Ivan Toney and Calvin Bassey, both proven internationals for England and Nigeria at this point, are two that the club overlooked.
Over the years the club have been great in spotting local talent and the academy is a good place to be, but surely much more players should have been given opportunities instead of buiying fringe players for higher fees and inflated prices.
So far we have seen no indication from Ruud van Nistelrooy regarding a chance in strategy, but hopefully he will understand the lesson fast, as Leicester need to recruit from their own home base to get back on track in all areas of club structure.
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Leicester have in recent years been obsessed by filling their squad with 25 players in some way or another, sometimes also even more players has been at the club, but being left out and sidelined from playing over a half season, one that happened with was Nampalys Mendy.
In the idea world, you should just have 22 players in your squad, 11 you decide will play, 4 to 5 challengers and the rest of them so called squad members, who all must be of a young age and from your own range.
If you are not able to progress from the squad member position in a year or two, you should be able to leave either for a transfer fee or for free, giving opportunities for new and young players to come through. This would give the club a chance to make a fluent path from developemenet to the full squad.
This would of course have given players such as Will Alves, Sammy Braybrooke and Ben Nelson a chance to be in and around the first team, instead of either being in no mans land between the two teams or send out on loan to a lower league club, or abroad.
Tim is running out for players who at the age of 23 need at least to be a challenger in a squad or a full team member, to just stay on and be a squad member is no idea.
You must honour your academy and build with that in mind, if not it will be a bit of a problematic situation inside your own camp, as there will be gaps and closes doors between the different teams.
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