England’s league difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity
Never underestimate the expertise of England’s football authorities when it comes to horses and stable doors.
After their World Cup success against the Germans, it took the Football Association the best part of 20 years to open a centre of excellence in 1984. When they closed Lilleshall in 1999, the plans were to have a national football centre in four years, and St George’s Park was duly declared open — in October 2012.
No surprise, then, that a couple of decades on from the Sky/Premier League revolution, the FA should be seeking to reverse England’s decline as a football nation by championing B teams, just when German clubs are thinking hard about shutting them down.
The premise of the B team proposal is that the “black hole” which swallows up the 18-21 age-group in England because of lack of competitive football can be plugged by creating an additional lower league. But, as the Germans have discovered, the quality of competition at that level, while better than nothing, is insufficient to develop top players.
The B team plan is unlikely to receive widespread support. Within three hours of FA chairman Greg Dyke presenting his report yesterday afternoon, the Football League had expressed its dissent and there was an internet petition with more than 4,000 signatures against it. Not dead in the water perhaps, but seriously damaged.
The alternative of formalised twinning arrangements between lower league clubs and those in the top two tiers — so-called Strategic Loan Partnerships (SLP) — is more likely to find favour. Smaller clubs would benefit from having additional players and from the additional coaching expertise of their parents. The idea is that they would also be “incentivised” to play English footballers.
Throughout the FA report there is a curious blurring of distinctions between English and “homegrown” — which can cover players of any nationality. But as with the current Elite Player Performance Plan, the emphasis is heavily on the word ‘elite’ and in this case, English elite. So where do these various plans and proposals leave Ireland’s young players, who in the past, looked for opportunities to develop with English clubs?
Worse off than before might be the simple answer. Opportunities have diminished, with the exception of clubs such as Ipswich Town and Aston Villa that have consciously sought to recruit from Ireland. Villa notably won the NextGen European tournament last year with players such as Graham Burke, Samir Carruthers and Jack Grealish in the side. If the SLP plan is accepted, these opportunities will inevitably shrink still further. If the homegrown quota for Premier League squads is raised to 12 by 2020, as the report proposes, there will be even less scope for advancement.
But that need not mean gloom and doom for football in Ireland — on the contrary.
Ireland’s football authorities, and the national team management, have to be more proactive, developing closer relations with those English clubs that have groups of young Irish players, such as Villa or Fulham.
As it becomes harder to break through in England, there is a stronger argument for looking elsewhere, for example the Netherlands, which can arguably provide a better football education as the standard of coaching is higher, especially for young players.
Reduced opportunities to progress in England ought also to mean that more young players, and better players, stay at home. That means less money for certain clubs — and agents — in the short term. But it is arguable that some Irish footballers have suffered from moving to England far too early, turning into cannon fodder at lower league clubs. With more staying with Irish clubs, standards should rise. So as English football restructures, there is a chance for the game in Ireland to develop independently and become more competitive.
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