‘MADNESS’ OF THE TOT ACADEMIES
RUTHLESS CLUBS DISCARD BOYS AGED JUST SIX
RICHARD DUNNE has laid bare the extraordinary lengths ruthless Premier League academies are going to in order to produce their next star. The former Republic of Ireland international reveals how children as young as six are taking yoga, strength and conditioning and hand co-ordination classes, as much as four times a week.
Dunne admitted he was gobsmacked by what he witnessed when his own son spent six weeks training with a top flight English outfit — and despaired at seeing 36 kids on one team discarded because they didn’t show enough signs of improvement over a two-week period.
‘It’s mad. I don’t see them coming through academies at all anymore. You’ve literally got from the age of five or six individuals doing the same training. They’re trying to find just one; it’s like a factory,’ Dunne began.
‘I’ve gone around to a few academies and there’s no desire to build a team and let the kids enjoy themselves. It doesn’t like look it’s changing. They’re just keeping going. There’s a club in England that my son went to when we were over there. They had a turnover of 36 kids on one team in six weeks. It was a case of “you might be good but you’ve not improved in two weeks”.
‘My son was six and they were kicking him out. Not that they weren’t good enough, it was because they hadn’t improved in two weeks. Because they saw small progress in him each week, they kept him but the other kids were told they could stop now. They’ll keep the names on their books.
‘They (academies) tick boxes, don’t they. If players fail at least they can say they’ve done everything. I was at a tournament last week, speaking to the academy directors or recruitment people at Everton.
‘They were saying their kids train four days per week, including one-onone sessions, yoga, strength, hand coordination sessions and the game on a Saturday. That’s five days per week. This was an Under-9 tournament.’
Dunne and his family moved to the south of France after he retired from the game and his 11-year-old son, Tayo, is now on the books at Monaco. Rather than spend almost every day of the week under the guidance of the French giants’ coaches, he trains once — on a Wednesday — with a game on a Saturday.
‘It’s great and classed as this big club which must have a great academy but they’re not an academy,’ he explained.
‘For them, it’s a case of them deciding whether to spend millions and millions on an academy, maybe get one player per generation from it, or let the kids enjoy it and at 13 or 14, we’ll give them more training.
‘A lot of their current first-team players were released from other clubs. They’ve had all the academy training and just took them on for free. For my son, he’s enjoying it and still wants to go out on the road every day to play with his friends.
‘Whereas I could imagine if your son is training for two hours every day, four days per week, then there’s not much room for him to enjoy it.
‘I wouldn’t do it or recommend it but it’s the way football is going and people might say if you’re not in, then you’re never going to make it. I’ve heard Robbie [Keane] and Damien [Duff] speak before about being a street footballer.
‘It’s what people want. That’s where you get the freedom to express yourself but also the hardness from playing against older kids of 15. You get battered and you’re falling, getting balls buried at you, but you just keep going. You lose and lose whereas in these academies it’s all winning.
‘If you look at the England team, they’re all pretty similar in terms of how they play. There’s no standout players or character about the side. It’s just another team, like a factoryproduced side.
‘They say: “this is how we do it, pass it two yards without having to move”. You would look at them and think “who is going to roll their sleeves up and fight?”.’
Apart from TV punditry work, Dunne has taken a step back from the game since calling time on his career with Queens Park Rangers in 2015. The 37year-old has expressed an interest in starting his coaching badges later this year but admitted that other than taking an interest when his son is playing, he has no strong desire to get involved in a professional capacity.
‘I think there are enough people who do it,’ he said with a laugh... ‘Maybe I could just tell them [the kids] all to go home and go down to the park to play.’
Richard Dunne was in Dublin to announce that eir broadband customers can now cast the eir Sport app to their TV and that eir Sport will show Ireland versus Uruguay exclusively live
They had a turnover of 36 kids in one team in six weeks