The Academy - Serious Questions Need To Be Asked

[Harry]

Sorry to bump this thread but I thought it was timely considering the interview today with Tim Kirk - the new Academy Director.

As was mentioned earlier in this thread, a vast majority of fans were not previously aware of Tim Kirk's appointment as Director a few months ago, and there is very little information regarding the Academy anywhere on our official website.

Now, I don't know if this interview was planned a long time ago or if the club (and more specifically Adam Baker) have been reading this thread and have sought to put right some of the wrongs we've pointed out. I would be incredibly pleased if Adam has conducted this interview as a result of this thread, as it would make us all feel that with enough feeling and well thought out opinions, perhaps we can effect change/action within the club.

Anyway - I'm glad this has happened, and for those of you without Player, here is a synopsis of the interview :

New Categorisation is currently being applied to the Academy set-ups across the Country, and this will now be under the FA's Elite Player Performance Plan (or EPPP).

Clubs are being assessed now and to achieve a Category 1 Status you need a pass mark of 75%. For Category 2 Status a pass mark of 65% is required.

Category 1 requires a minimum annual investment of £2.5m and the games programme will involve a lot of travel and European competition.

For Category 2 status, the minimum investment is £940k per annum. City are applying for Category 2 Status, which will be a high level and will see us nurture future 1st team players, and plan to upgrade to Cat 1 eventually. The FA currently provide a grant of £180k per annum but City have always spent more than this.

Cat 2 should see us playing against other Cat 2 members which are likely to be Birmingham, Cardiff, Coventry, QPR among others. Although this is of course not confirmed yet until all assessments are finalised.

We currently have 6 full time staff employed in the Academy, but Cat 2 will require an increase in staff to 20.

Currently there are u-16 and u-18 teams, but there will be the new introduction of u-21 teams too. This will help close the gap we currently see between 16/17 year olds and progression to 1st team level. Currently we do not have any competitive fixtures at this age so we're missing the competitive edge and kids are not getting the right opportunities to progress.

The new u-21 league may possibly be televised in the future and they may also bring in a European element. Currently German u-23 teams play in the equivalent of their League 2 level.

The u-21 league will also be about instilling a winning mentality - so it is a league system and it will be competitive - although it won't be all about results and there is still always the focus on development for the 1st team level.

Players will be given a much better environment in which to progress and a much improved support network. They will also put in more hours. Foundation Level will increase training from 3 hours per week to 8 hours per week. When it gets up to Youth Development Level and Professional Development Level this increases to 14 hours per week training - actually on the pitch, as well as additional gym work, judo, player analysis.

As well as Tim's appointment as Director, Willie McStay has also joined. He has been there and done it at Academy level and comes with great experience of helping develop future 1st team players.

John Clayton is still here working in the Professional Development Phase and Dave Horseman is here in the Youth Development Phase.

As for Tim's previous employment - he's worked with City for a number of years now on a part-time basis, but his last employment was with the Premier League. His role there was to work with a small team in the Youth Department looking at the upcoming changes. So he has been part of the team putting this whole EPPP thing together. He also knows that each club will be subject to an Audit Tour / Assessment, and he basically built it - so he knows exactly what's coming and what we need to achieve to continue to secure our status.

The ultimate aim is to get more Bristol / Local players playing in the City 1st team and/or in the Premier League for other teams. Results will not be immediate but what will change immediately will be the professionalism and the organisation.

So - that was his interview. Well done Adam Baker for arranging this. It's great to have someone in charge of our Academy who knows exactly what is going to be required. This is very pleasing news.

Hopefully we can continue to hear much more about what is going on here week to week or month to month. I'd love Adam to be regularly in touch with Tim and Willie and provide us with continual updates as to how we are progressing. As I've said earlier in the thread, the information on the website has been shocking, so it would be great to see a huge change in this department (maybe one of the 20 staff we need to recruit can be in charge of communication and keep us fans informed).

Anyway - having started this thread a couple of weeks back I was seething and had continually heard terrible stories from parents & from local coaches and I really felt the need to put these points across. By the sounds of the changes occurring it looks like change is very much on the way and it looks positive. I'm excited to see how this progresses as this will be the life-blood of our club in years to come so it would be great if we can continue to build on these latest appointments, and on the recent communications. I'm much happier now that I've heard what is due to happen and I want to make sure we continue to hear much much more. Keep it up City/Adam/Tim - whoever was responsible. Keep us in the loop, we do care.