[graka]

One thing to note is we finished above villa in PL2 so if their is academy is so good how did that happen?
Obviously money related if he wants to go so take the cash
You never know that million could pay for 2 loans for players more likely to influence our first team , alternatively that million pays for Grants wages for a year
Here’s hoping the former

[Baggie79]

They are a much bigger club so you can't blame him really, even if it doesn't work he will be loaded.

[baggiejohn]

Where the club is at the moment it is a sale we can make without it impacting the first team squad. However the fee is a drop in the ocean. It might cover the wages of Jed Wallace for a year.

In an ideal world I'd rather keep the player and reap the benefit if he does develop. We keep losing players to the Vile and sooner or later one will develop and that is going to hurt.

You could argue that the fee for Jamal will make a 30% contribution to the cost of running the academy, which has been a decent source for the first team squad over the recent past.
Alternatively, we could close the academy & create a global scouting network, as things stand, I'm not sure we can do both.
Personally, my strategy would be a self sustaining academy.

[Standaman]

I have just read that we have a 10% sell on clause so if Jamal could hurry up and become the next Jack Grealish ideally without becoming a complete dick it would be much appreciated.

My earlier point was that the fee although welcome was far from job done as far as player sales this summer.

Unfortunately our position is such is it won't be a question of an academy or something else. It will be no academy and the money saved will just disappear on routine operating expenses.

[gazberg]

Turning something into nothing. Classic Lai

[Albertbaggie]

It's a good move for us. Most of these kids never make it, Izzy Brown, Louie Barry, Tim Iregbuunum a few examples.

How many people have heard of this kid? Never been mentioned alongside the likes of Harry Whitwell for example. Not spied in the PL2 team. OK he's young, but he's hardly had the dogs barking. The likes of Cleary, much more spoken about.

1 mil for this kid. Snap hands off.

They are still only teenagers!

[gazberg]

Tim is already Champo quality. Of course remains to be seen if he can make it to PL. Probably won't. Most don't.

[overseas baggie]

to be fair, my understanding is that he told the club he wouldn’t sign anything and was going, part of the reason he wasn’t bumped up to the under 21’s.

We keep producing players for the England age group sides and as soon as they are in that environment agents (via players at the big clubs) advise them not to sign a new contract with us so that they can pick up a big signing-on fee.  Once their heads are turned, that’s them gone.

Sadly it’s where we now are in the law of the jungle. 

[Hunnington Baggie]

They are still only teenagers!

correct, Louie Barry is still a teenager… for 8 more days.

[sing on our own]

We keep producing players for the England age group sides and as soon as they are in that environment agents (via players at the big clubs) advise them not to sign a new contract with us so that they can pick up a big signing-on fee.  Once their heads are turned, that’s them gone.

Sadly it’s where we now are in the law of the jungle.

We poach young players from ‘smaller’ clubs. They get poached off us then if they are any good they will move again. It’s the way it’s always been. As long as we make a bit of money and there’s a sell on clause that’s the business.

[overseas baggie]

We poach young players from ‘smaller’ clubs. They get poached off us then if they are any good they will move again. It’s the way it’s always been. As long as we make a bit of money and there’s a sell on clause that’s the business.

That’s correct although the youth players that we poach from other clubs are typically not ones exposed to the England age group squads which attracts the agents and influencers and the money being talked about will turn any youngster’s head (and those of their parents).

[SmethDan]

to be fair, my understanding is that he told the club he wouldn’t sign anything and was going, part of the reason he wasn’t bumped up to the under 21’s.

To be fair I remember reading Blandy's post as well. Equally it's worth keeping in mind that he'd gone on to agree pre contract terms which suggests a shift in the sands before we accepted the Vile's bid.

No doubt there'll be posts before long lamenting our inability to develop our own (again) followed by yet more  navel gazing about whether we should scrap the academy (again).

Weirdly enough while I am vexed that he's gone to the Vile that isn't my biggest problem with this. My biggest problem is that we've sent a signal that everything's up for sale including academy player futures.

I realise it's the lie of the land in professional football and our current predicament in particular that players move on. But it boils my urine that it's accepted and almost embraced because we're owned by incompetent kufchwtihs who have led us to this place.

[graka]

To be fair I remember reading Blandy's post as well. Equally it's worth keeping in mind that he'd gone on to agree pre contract terms which suggests a shift in the sands before we accepted the Vile's bid.

No doubt there'll be posts before long lamenting our inability to develop our own (again) followed by yet more  navel gazing about whether we should scrap the academy (again).

Weirdly enough while I am vexed that he's gone to the Vile that isn't my biggest problem with this. My biggest problem is that we've sent a signal that everything's up for sale including academy player futures.

I realise it's the lie of the land in professional football and our current predicament in particular that players move on. But it boils my urine that it's accepted and almost embraced because we're owned by incompetent kufchwtihs who have led us to this place.

I think the fact our owners want out for has much has possible as soon as possible means we are very much in the future doesn’t matter.
Short term we need to be promoted regardless of any forward squad planning and giving youth a chance
CC took over a team destined for relegation and did remarkably to get us in with a shout, I’m hoping with a full season he may be more inclined to give some of our youngsters more minutes when literally every game is a must win
He’s obviously gone for more money we can offer and if it sets him up for life and he doesn’t make it big you can’t blame the kid
There should however be something put in place bu the FA regarding compensation or minimum sell on fees but we all know they are not interested in anything that doesn’t include the greed league

[Albionfan1983]

We need to sell players £1million plus 10% is a great deal.

[Atomic]

We've sold a kid that statistically "probably" won't make the grade for more money than we spent on BTA or would get for the likes of Adam Reach.

Let that sink in for a second! Bearing in mind we are in pooh Street, need to sell and need every penny we can get.

How can anyone argue that's a bad deal for us in the present climate? Crazy.

We've done really well here.

There's always the tiny chance he could turn out to be this generations Messi but if Vile sell him to City for £100 mil, we get £10 mil of it.

It's the right deal for us at this time, given the current climate 150%.

[johnny Cash]

Whilst I understand why some are comfortable with why we have done it. I'm not, and I cannot agree we have done well. £1m is nothing. We got £4m for Rogers in a similar situation.

Whilst it may not always be worth taking the chance, I think when you have an England youth international on a pre-contract we should have done so IMO.

Losing these good prospects always annoys me though. I've always accepted we aren't likely to win big prizes, so one of the things I would love to see from us is bringing through young talent who play 100 games from us before moving to play at the top level. That's not going to happen either though, as anytime we have someone who might have the potential, we lose them. 

Meanwhile, our peers Bristol City will make £20m for Alex Scott and Blues the best part of £40m for Bellingham.   

[Blandy]

The one they are worried about losing is a year under but will play 18s minimum & probably 23s - Jamal Jimoh (CM). Apparently Albion have knocked back 2m+ bids from Chelsea, Man Utd & Southampton.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing of course but the deal could have been an awful lot better. I know it's fashionable to lay the fault at the Boardroom door but I'll place it firmly in Richard Stevens' lap. He does like to play hardball with these young players & all it does is engender more resentment. He did it with Lino Sousa, effectively banning the lad from playing or training for 7 months whilst the Premier League investigated a tapping up claim against Villa. Nothing was proven (as it so often isn't) and Sousa signed for Arsenal anyway, so all that was achieved was depriving a 16 year old boy the opportunity to play football for the best part of a year.

It was a little less severe with Jamal but keeping him in the 16s when he's 21s ready was just a bit spiteful, so when it came to it, Jamal contemplated signing for Rangers, which would have been classed as "abroad" and Albion would have received something like 200k in compensation. So they took Villa's money instead.

And on the "pre contract agreement", I would imagine that was just for his scholarship, and has been in place since he was 13 or 14. He certainly won't have signed anything in the last year or so.

[Baggie79]

Its all well and good selling our most promising youngsters but I would argue that we need them now more than ever before with us selling lots of players and having no money to sign any replacements.

[baggiebof]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing of course but the deal could have been an awful lot better. I know it's fashionable to lay the fault at the Boardroom door but I'll place it firmly in Richard Stevens' lap. He does like to play hardball with these young players & all it does is engender more resentment. He did it with Lino Sousa, effectively banning the lad from playing or training for 7 months whilst the Premier League investigated a tapping up claim against Villa. Nothing was proven (as it so often isn't) and Sousa signed for Arsenal anyway, so all that was achieved was depriving a 16 year old boy the opportunity to play football for the best part of a year.

It was a little less severe with Jamal but keeping him in the 16s when he's 21s ready was just a bit spiteful, so when it came to it, Jamal contemplated signing for Rangers, which would have been classed as "abroad" and Albion would have received something like 200k in compensation. So they took Villa's money instead.

And on the "pre contract agreement", I would imagine that was just for his scholarship, and has been in place since he was 13 or 14. He certainly won't have signed anything in the last year or so.

Concerning to read about Stevens, I've heard lots of good things about him from his Coventry days but perhaps that doesn't translate as well with us as we don't have that pathway  they they had (granted it was through necessity as they tumbled down the leagues). Maybe this kind of thing will be a strength if worst comes to worse and that happens to us!

[gazberg]

Who appointed Stevens? He sounds fairly similar to Dowling in his Academy approach.

[johnny Cash]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing of course but the deal could have been an awful lot better. I know it's fashionable to lay the fault at the Boardroom door but I'll place it firmly in Richard Stevens' lap. He does like to play hardball with these young players & all it does is engender more resentment. He did it with Lino Sousa, effectively banning the lad from playing or training for 7 months whilst the Premier League investigated a tapping up claim against Villa. Nothing was proven (as it so often isn't) and Sousa signed for Arsenal anyway, so all that was achieved was depriving a 16 year old boy the opportunity to play football for the best part of a year.

It was a little less severe with Jamal but keeping him in the 16s when he's 21s ready was just a bit spiteful, so when it came to it, Jamal contemplated signing for Rangers, which would have been classed as "abroad" and Albion would have received something like 200k in compensation. So they took Villa's money instead.

And on the "pre contract agreement", I would imagine that was just for his scholarship, and has been in place since he was 13 or 14. He certainly won't have signed anything in the last year or so.

Do the pre-set compensation amounts for moving between academies end at 16?

[Blandy]

Do the pre-set compensation amounts for moving between academies end at 16?

It's a bit of a grey area but it appears so. The basic comp for someone like Jamal would be around the 200k that Rangers would have to pay, but as he's an England Age Group International it essentially makes the value rocket (for English clubs), and is then open to negotiation. I think as long as a contract is offered, the club losing the player has a right to the compensation.

That's how I understand it anyway.

[overseas baggie]

Whilst I understand why some are comfortable with why we have done it. I'm not, and I cannot agree we have done well. £1m is nothing. We got £4m for Rogers in a similar situation.

Whilst it may not always be worth taking the chance, I think when you have an England youth international on a pre-contract we should have done so IMO.

Losing these good prospects always annoys me though. I've always accepted we aren't likely to win big prizes, so one of the things I would love to see from us is bringing through young talent who play 100 games from us before moving to play at the top level. That's not going to happen either though, as anytime we have someone who might have the potential, we lose them. 

Meanwhile, our peers Bristol City will make £20m for Alex Scott and Blues the best part of £40m for Bellingham.

Alex Scott is 3 years older, with two seasons of Championship football behind him, and an established England U20 international.  They didn’t sign him till he was 17. Bellingham is also now around 20 with numerous England caps and European experience.  Not exactly chalk and cheese.

[johnny Cash]

Alex Scott is 3 years older, with two seasons of Championship football behind him, and an established England U20 international.  They didn’t sign him till he was 17. Bellingham is also now around 20 with numerous England caps and European experience.  Not exactly chalk and cheese.

Blues sold Bellingham practically on his 17 birthday. It doesn’t matter how much older Alex Scott is either. The point was if we keep losing them go this young we never have any chance of seeing those sort of returns.

[OhBilics]

There's always the tiny chance he could turn out to be this generations Messi but if Vile sell him to City for £100 mil, we get £10 mil of it.

Who cares? The current amount will pay Grant's wages for the next year. That's it.

Selling the kid, any kid, because they're afraid they won't reach their potential, is nuts, and typical of the short term thinking that has prevailed at the Albion since... well, since I can remember. It's the same thinking that has us signing hasbeens and paying them over the odds just because they had a decent PL season once. It's the same thinking that has got us into the mess that we're in.

A long term plan, improving the squad from its roots (i.e. the youth squads), supplemented with players from lower down the pyramid and abroad found through good scouting is the only way we're going to improve.