Huddersfield Town have been the Premier League’s fairy-tale story in the infant stages of the new season. Three games, two wins and a draw and a brief stint at the summit.
The Terriers are expected to further rock the boat by taking steps towards closing their academy. Divisive as chairman Dean Hoyle’s decision may be, it is one that’s ultimately about pragmatism and above all, saving money.
Despite their promising start, last season’s playoff winners are not taking it for granted that they will be reaping the financial rewards of top flight football for years to come. Hoyle’s priority has to be running the club responsibly and from a business standpoint, the few million pounds expenditure that goes towards developing starlets could be very useful elsewhere.
A quick glance at David Wagner’s first team shows only Philip Billing has graduated from the academy and even he arrived from Denmark as a 16-year-old.
So, Wagner has not been too disheartened, telling a press conference ahead of the trip to West Ham:
“It’s a problem for a club our size to produce Premier League players as it is with other clubs. Billing shows it’s possible but very, very difficult.”
They are unlikely to produce a Marcus Rashford or a Harry Kane, though they do have plenty of success stories in the Championship, such as Jack Hunt of Sheffield Wednesday or Alex Smithies of QPR.
Perhaps something clicked when they were promoted thanks in part to the efforts of Izzy Brown, who was being borrowed from Chelsea.
For the elite clubs, academies are almost fool proof. The reputation of having Arsenal, Liverpool, or Manchester United as their parent club will virtually guarantee a loan spell somewhere down the lower leagues, the fee from which will go towards the running of the academy.
At Chelsea, it’s quite patently a business model. Tammy Abraham and Nathaniel Chalobah have finally clocked onto the fact that there is very little chance of regular first team football, especially as they have 24 loanees and last year had as many as 38. Graduates will, however, be given the opportunity to move on at a remarkably high price. Patrick Bamford cost Middlesbrough £10million despite his poor record in the Premier League – and the bulk of what he has learned came not at Stamford Bridge, but at MK Dons, Derby, and ‘Boro.
When the Huddersfields of the football world do develop a promising player, they are too often snapped up just before they sign professional terms and the club are left with nothing more than a paltry amount of compensation for the resources and hard work they have invested in their future.
It’s easy to understand the frustrations, and this is the reaction. What’s disappointing is that ideally, nurturing homegrown talent should be a state of mind in English football. A philosophy, even if that’s increasingly a dirty word. Yet, we are torn between praising managers like Mauricio Pochettino for bringing Harry Winks to the fore and berating Tottenham for weighing up whether they should be forking out for more high-profile newcomers.
From local lad to home hero. 🙌 @HarryWinks on a breakthrough season and making his footballing dreams a reality... #OneOfOurOwn pic.twitter.com/1S9Gzf0wui
— Tottenham Hotspur (@SpursOfficial) June 9, 2017
If Huddersfield’s academy does go, it remains to be seen what will happen to its teenagers. They are already without a manager, whose lack of a replacement suggests this closure has been in the pipeline for some time.
Academies are supposedly one of the game’s sacred elements, but their necessity is starting to be questioned. It’s the accepted route, and in the book of the same name, The Secret Footballer admits it’s tough for former non-leaguers like Jamie Vardy to first step into a professional dressing room because they haven’t ‘worked their way up’.
It’s likely that other clubs will follow suit. Brentford were the first to set the example, now operating with a ‘B’ team. Like Huddersfield, they realised that it’s hard to justify their facilities if they’re not going to be used to benefit the first team.
Downgrading the academy’s status is the other option, but the call has already been made. Perhaps Huddersfield are onto something, but it’s a sad state of affairs nonetheless and will only raise more questions about the role clubs could, and should, be playing in developing their own.
