Like you say: success means different things to different clubs

For us I would say a successful academy is one that firstly produces players that enhance the first team squad and secondly produces players that can be sold for £££.
The stat about percentage of minutes played doesn’t mean much on its own. For example we could have a match day squad of entirely academy players for every game and get a 100% minutes played but would it be deemed successful if we got relegated every season? Percentage of minutes played is only an indicator of success if the standard of season is maintained or bettered.
For Man City I think anything that gets them within touching distance (or 1000 miles of!!!) FFP compliance is deemed successful!!
It would be interesting to know the season by season stats on academy player sales over the last 15 years. It’s been publicly stated that it is part of our business model and I know it will take several years for the recruitment, coaching and training ground ‘improvements’ to show in the academy player sales stats but to gauge where we are now and in 5 years time we need to know where we were before

Posted By: Thas Royt Intut, May 22, 19:40:21