In the abscence of a competitive Reserve League how does the Club experiment with teams?

[Personal Trainer]

Ok, they can spend all sorts of time at Colney experimenting but, being old enough to remember Friday night Football Combination matches at Carrow Rd where Mike Walker et al experimented with different formations, usually prompted by David Williams in mid-field.

It was matches like these that converted Chris Sutton from a reasonable central defender into a stunning striker and enabled work-outs for different formations in a competitive atmosphere Just don't see there being time to experiment except on match-day when the consequences of getting it wrong can be catastrophic.

 

[CJRV2014]

The reserve league is a shambles. Nobody dares put a challenge in etc. The problem i find is, where is the likes of Elliott Bennett,Cuellar, O'Neil, Rudd, Garrido getting any sort of match fitness or match practise. You can only pick 3 over 21 year olds and they are normally taken up by players returning from injury.

 

[morty]

Short answer is "I don't know".

And I really don't quite know how we got here either, and what prompted the position we are in now. I saw something about a "behind closed doors" friendly match sometime soon, maybe this combined with the odd over age player in the u21's is deemed enough.

 

[GazzaTCC]

Bottom line is, reserve team football, as us oldies knew, was dying a slow, painful death.

The Premier League had it's own two divisions, for everyone else from Championship downwards, either, the bigger teams didn't take it seriously, whilst the smaller teams often didn't have a big enough squad and ended up fielding virtual youth teams. The result was too many uncompetitive fixtures.

The answer, as far as Premier League was concerned, was EPPP, with clubs having an official status granted by, wait for it, the Premier League.

The focus shifted towards up to Under 21's, at the expense of reserve team football as we all knew it.

However, the new set up comes at significant costs, estimated in excess of £2m pa by some. As a consequence, very few teams can truly afford the new arrangement.

My biggest fear is that the current 22/23 clubs with category one status which includes Norwich, may reduce to 12-15 in a few years time when the fringe Premier League teams realise the true expense.

Of course none of this helps address the issues raised in the OP.

 

[Yellow Fever]

As one who also remembers the Football Combination reserve league, I also fail to understand the U"! Development League logic. Surely younger players will benefit from playing with senior players, so why the three senior player limit? As I said in another thread, why can't City arrange their own 'friendly' reserve matches as was done a few years back? That would be a way to enable "the likes of Elliott Bennett,Cuellar, O'Neil, Rudd, Garrido getting any sort of match fitness or match practise". i find it very frustrating.

 

[Canaryboy]

I think this is a bigger concern for Premier League clubs than it is for Championship clubs.

Due to the two very long emergency loan windows, and the ability to loan a player out for just one month, or longer with a 24 hour recall clause (but still being able to play them when they return without waiting for the next registration window), we at least have the ability to loan people out for a month to get match fitness. 

Premier League clubs can loan people out, but the player leaves their 25 if registered, and if they return they can't be registered again until 1st January, or the following season if the loan is in the second half of the season (I believe). 

Somebody on here suggested we loan Hooper out for a month. I think the club would consider that one too risky, because he's a valuable asset, but Wigan have loaned Holt out for a little over a month as an example. If Rosler gets the sack their new manager gets a match fit player to cast his eye over.

If people like Elliott Bennett and Carlos Cuellar can't even make the match day squad at the moment then we should probably think about finding them an emergency loan somewhere. 

I wonder whether there is any point in us having Declan Rudd at the club at the moment too? We are paying Mark Bunn wages to do nothing, so why don't we loan Declan Rudd out with a recall clause?

 

[CJRV2014]

I think Bunn is injured. Carlos Cuellar what a strange signing that was. Hes behind Turner, Hooiveld, Martin, Miquel, R.Bennett.

 

[Salopian]

It is a problem, without doubt. How long can a demoted player remain on the bench or not selected, before losing the edge in match fitness? I don't know the answer, but there are a few players who have either not played for the first team (Iggy) or have played a limited time or in one game (O'Neill, Bennett E., Garrido, Cuellar, etc.)

There has to be more rotation of the squad, if there no regular fixture for the over 21s. NA has spoken of this, but may be waiting until things settle down a little.

 

[eatonparkboy]

Surely this is just progress. Whether you judge that progress as good or bad is another matter.

Some of us can remember going to Carrow Road to see Football Combination matches. But we can also remember the maximum wage, standing terraces without roofs, piddling up against heaving walls, watching two old boys carry a massive board around at half time, a band marching up and down the pitch at half time, games that started at 3.00pm, went in for half time at 3,45pm, restarted at 3.55pm and finished at 4.40pm.

And as a printer at Jarrolds, the first teamers at NCFC were earning about £30 a week more than me.

But as life progresses, football has made so many dramatic changes, many good and just as many bad, that a reserve league does not appeal to clubs who do not want to send multi million pound players out on a February evening just so they can evaluate them. I for one fail to see, particularly among the top 44 clubs, why they pretend to have academies any more. How many go on to play 300 games for their parent club any more? Where are our promising youngsters going to fit in amongst our new and foreign brigade? People still talk about Rudd as if he isn't quite ready. He has represented his country more times than his club. And to get matches he has to go to Preston! 

 

[Yellow Fever]

City did arrange a friendly 'reserve' game at West Ham behind closed doors last week and Hooper, Howson and Elliot Bennett took part, among others. a step in the right direction anyway.