From what I've read it seems like everybody is wanting change to happen to some degree at the moment and I want to see where the majority stands on Wenger's youth policy. (hopefully someone able can add a poll).
I'm guessing that most people see it as a failure due to the lack of trophies it has yielded, but what are the alternatives? Fans are aggrieved that we don't spend money on established stars and instead persist to play what they see as failures of Wenger's project. However, if we went the way of buying quality rather than nurturing it ourselves, would we do better, or even as good? Personally, I doubt it.
How could we compete with the likes of Man City, Chelsea and the other big spending European teams if we tried matching their fees in the transfer market? Quite simply, we couldn't, certainly not consistently over a number of years.
I don't think the youth project has been a failure, it just hasn't had enough time to reap the reward yet. I can imagine some of you shaking your head, internally screaming "It's been 6 years!" but this is a long term project with the aim of making us consistently successful for a long time and as such, I think deserves patience on our behalf to be given the proper opportunity to succeed.
When I say long term I mean many generations of squads and so far, we've barely gone through half of one (Cesc is still 23 and he was the start of this). People's problem seems to be the lack of leaders, experienced players, winners, all leading this set of young players but it's not hard to envisage the next generation of youth having this to learn from with our current set then being the experienced players. This is a cycle I would like to see continue many times, and once it is running properly, it would only be the very best youth players breaking into the first squad every couple of years. This would mean we wouldn't just be starting from scratch again when the current team retires but would consistently have players of all ages throughout the team (as we can see by the break through of Szczesny and Wilshere this year).
The youth policy doesn't mean we can't buy any stars, just not rely on it, and only do it when it is obviously needed so that we don't break the bank.
This thread is not to look back and point out failures of the project so far, it's a forward looking thread on how you would like Arsenal to be run regarding the squad/transfers and if you're not in favour of the youth policy, please explain your alternative and why you think it would be better.
I'm guessing that most people see it as a failure due to the lack of trophies it has yielded, but what are the alternatives? Fans are aggrieved that we don't spend money on established stars and instead persist to play what they see as failures of Wenger's project. However, if we went the way of buying quality rather than nurturing it ourselves, would we do better, or even as good? Personally, I doubt it.
How could we compete with the likes of Man City, Chelsea and the other big spending European teams if we tried matching their fees in the transfer market? Quite simply, we couldn't, certainly not consistently over a number of years.
I don't think the youth project has been a failure, it just hasn't had enough time to reap the reward yet. I can imagine some of you shaking your head, internally screaming "It's been 6 years!" but this is a long term project with the aim of making us consistently successful for a long time and as such, I think deserves patience on our behalf to be given the proper opportunity to succeed.
When I say long term I mean many generations of squads and so far, we've barely gone through half of one (Cesc is still 23 and he was the start of this). People's problem seems to be the lack of leaders, experienced players, winners, all leading this set of young players but it's not hard to envisage the next generation of youth having this to learn from with our current set then being the experienced players. This is a cycle I would like to see continue many times, and once it is running properly, it would only be the very best youth players breaking into the first squad every couple of years. This would mean we wouldn't just be starting from scratch again when the current team retires but would consistently have players of all ages throughout the team (as we can see by the break through of Szczesny and Wilshere this year).
The youth policy doesn't mean we can't buy any stars, just not rely on it, and only do it when it is obviously needed so that we don't break the bank.
This thread is not to look back and point out failures of the project so far, it's a forward looking thread on how you would like Arsenal to be run regarding the squad/transfers and if you're not in favour of the youth policy, please explain your alternative and why you think it would be better.