On-Loan OR Local?

[mrsenario]

Brad hubbold played brilliantly on the wing tonight mr bayliss and although several leagues below barrows, he looked sharper and hungrier than any winger in a barrow shirt so far this season

[Wilberforce Williams]

Local - otherwise we're just watching a crapper version of the premiership. Mercenaries coming for the money only. Probably the reason why the next generation is showing no real interest at this level, there's no connection for them.

[The Tomahawk Kid]

Local - otherwise we're just watching a crapper version of the premiership. Mercenaries coming for the money only. Probably the reason why the next generation is showing no real interest at this level, there's no connection for them.

Well said! And you make a very valid point.

C'mon...how many players do we have right now that 'play for the shirt'?.

Come to think about it...that disastrous run we had at the end of last season...was I the only one who thought the majority of the team just didn't want to know after our chances off the Play-Offs vanished?

Colin Appleton and Ray Wilkie both knew the score - build a great team spirit - and let it happen! :flag:

That can't be done with short term loan players or those playing for their wallets.

[barrowaberdeen]

Brad hubbold played brilliantly on the wing tonight mr bayliss and although several leagues below barrows, he looked sharper and hungrier than any winger in a barrow shirt so far this season

He had a cracking game, but the standard is light years away, it really is.

Nobody doesn't want locals to play, but the problem has always been that the decent lads go elsewhere at an early age to an academy. When they get rejected they come back, there's no halfway house between Barrow and playing with their mates at Vickerstown, Dalton, Holker etc. This is made worse because there's no reserves, which people tried hard with but struggled to work.

Left after the youngsters go to football academies are decent junior clubs at a certain level, who's players only outlet to play at a higher level is either for league representative sides or for Neil Docs development side. An improvement on years past, but fixtures are sporadic. Maybe those two 'teams' could be combined, that might give more fixtures. There's also the likes of Barrow Schools, which the clubs aren't especisally keen on. Maybe, if the same team at each age group played all these fixtures under Doc, you could make a 10 game season at a better level. But there's loads of complications doing it that way- and don't forget your 3-4 best players won;t be there because they are at academies. I watched Doc's team put in a decent performance against Airbus and lose, if he'd had the 2 or 3 who were at Blackburn currently we'd have walked that game.

Solutions? Well, Barrow could have an academy of their own, but there's no finance or facilities. The local clubs wouldn't been keen either.

Another possibility I suppose would be if Barrow had a 'feeder' club playing at a level such as Holker's with fringe players turning out with the cream of local talent. But there would be problems with registration, inter town rivalries, and why should local clubs want us to do that? What's in it for them? Have we given them enough respect and support over the years? This certainly is not a criticism of the current regime at all btw, the problem is complicated and goes way back.

Bit of a ramble, and folk will no doubt disagree, but it's just a lot more complicated than choosing 'out of town' vs 'local'

[The Tomahawk Kid]

Brad hubbold played brilliantly on the wing tonight mr bayliss and although several leagues below barrows, he looked sharper and hungrier than any winger in a barrow shirt so far this season

He had a cracking game, but the standard is light years away, it really is.

Nobody doesn't want locals to play, but the problem has always been that the decent lads go elsewhere at an early age to an academy. When they get rejected they come back, there's no halfway house between Barrow and playing with their mates at Vickerstown, Dalton, Holker etc. This is made worse because there's no reserves, which people tried hard with but struggled to work.

Left after the youngsters go to football academies are decent junior clubs at a certain level, who's players only outlet to play at a higher level is either for league representative sides or for Neil Docs development side. An improvement on years past, but fixtures are sporadic. Maybe those two 'teams' could be combined, that might give more fixtures. There's also the likes of Barrow Schools, which the clubs aren't especisally keen on. Maybe, if the same team at each age group played all these fixtures under Doc, you could make a 10 game season at a better level. But there's loads of complications doing it that way- and don't forget your 3-4 best players won;t be there because they are at academies. I watched Doc's team put in a decent performance against Airbus and lose, if he'd had the 2 or 3 who were at Blackburn currently we'd have walked that game.

Solutions? Well, Barrow could have an academy of their own, but there's no finance or facilities. The local clubs wouldn't been keen either.

Another possibility I suppose would be if Barrow had a 'feeder' club playing at a level such as Holker's with fringe players turning out with the cream of local talent. But there would be problems with registration, inter town rivalries, and why should local clubs want us to do that? What's in it for them? Have we given them enough respect and support over the years? This certainly is not a criticism of the current regime at all btw, the problem is complicated and goes way back.

Bit of a ramble, and folk will no doubt disagree, but it's just a lot more complicated than choosing 'out of town' vs 'local'

I disagree. On paper - yes - the standard does seem light years away. However, the way the current side is performing it's definately not BSP level. In fact, I think the reason why the attendances have fallen over the years is because a lot of people expected to see a higher quality of football being played at this level and it hasn't happened. I'm talking about the standard of football in general not just The Bluebirds. The die-hards will turn out in any weather to watch their team perform in any division of the Football Pyramid. However, there's a lot of that folk that like to be entertained - by both teams. But I'm diversifying...

To get back to the point, I think you're over-complicating things. This 'Them and Us' theory for example - Barrow AFC and the local leagues - you make it sound like 'Turf War'. It really isn't like that. One of the MAIN reasons why local lads don't wish to play for the club is the way they're treated when they don the shirt. Bobby Knox RIP wasa prime example - gave 100% every time he played but was berated by many on the terraces. Mike Ballantine RIP played a few games and was treated the same way (I was out with him one night and he told me how sickening it was to have to put up with the kind of verbal abuse that had been directed at him). Mark Hubbold was probably the only local player (Meaning Barrow) that didn't get such 'stick'...that's probably because his reputation went before him.

It's a different Ball game today, I know, and anyone abusing players in that manner would be ejected. And in those days Big Fish Academies didn't exist either. However, as far as I can remember, Ballantine and Hubbold went straight from playing for local league clubs to wearing the BAFC shirt. What's to stop the club from doing the same again? It doesn't have to be so complicated.

I think the club needs to market its image to the local leagues and local players. Who's responsible for this?

[Mike Wilson]

Good post BA, Asked many decent questions but lets be very honest the BAFC hierarchy have shit on any reserve/under what ever age/local amateur's etc for as long as ive been supporting them, lets stop suger coating the issue but look at the problems then resolve them FFS Only when they resolve them over the long term 10 yrs plus will the long suffering locals even begin to trust the BAFC bods & no one can blame them after decades of shoddy behaviour.

We can be strong if we come together, but divided we fall and have fallen for 40 freaking yrs...........get it changed and keep it changed then lets see what develops.

Rant over.

[Neil Doherty]

I read with interest some of the comments about youth development in the area and thought it might be useful if i provided some information about Furness Football Performance Centre including what has been achieved to date and the plans for the future. For those of you that are not aware 5 years ago i met with local stakeholders including Barrow AFC, local junior football clubs, school representatives and the Lancashire FA to discuss how we could enable the most talented young footballers in the area to reach their full potential, either at their own local clubs, semi-pro or professional level. (This was as a consequence of my long held view that we have never really been able to provide a system which achieves this). As a consequence i wrote a consulation setting out how i felt this might be achieved and enabling people to provide feedback on the proposal. As a consequence of this the Furness Football Performance Centre was developed. The idea was to select the best 16 young players from the local area to train regularly together and to play matches against teams from other areas. crucial to the success of the centre was the need for players selected to continue to play for their local junior clubs, as a i am sure you will appreciate taking 16 of the best local players out of the local league would have a negative affect on the local teams and would have created conflict with local clubs. the ulimate 6 year plan was to develop 8 squads from under 11 all the way to under 18 which would then provide a constant feeder for a reserve team, which i would see as a mixture of first team players and under 21 players (although i should stress more discussions with local clubs needs to take place about this).

we initially started with an under 13 squad four years ago and they will now be our under 16 squad this year having completed 3 years of training with the centre. in addition we have added one or two squads each year and we now have under 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 squads as well as two goalkeeping squads for under 14-16 and and under 11-13. i am currently assessing the feasibility of setting up an education/training programme for under17 and under 18 players ready for our current under 16 squad who will leave school next year. in addition we have also built up a good team of young local coaches who are all FA level 2 coaches and are workign towards their UEFA B or FA youth awards. They really enjoy being involved in the programme have regualr meetings to discuss how we can improve what we do. Each squad has played a number of matches including pro academies such as Carlisle Utd, Blackpool, Morecambe, Oldham as well matches against teams from other areas. in a recent tournament in lancashire 3 of the squads won their tournament age groups and the other two came runners up.

despite all of this we do face a number of challenges.
for the players to reach their full potential the need to be practising for at least 15-20 hours per week and we are clearly not acheiving that target. The initial reaction is to create more training sessions of an evening and weekend which we will assess but i feel we need to better utilise what is already imn place including workign with schools, local clubs and also the local authority to ensure we have both formal and informal opportunities for players to practice.
facilities need to be better but current developments at Furness college, Furness Academy and the park leisure centre will mean we will have outdoor 3g pitches in the area and i have already been knocking on doors to see if we can utilise these facilities when they become available.
regaular quality fixtures have also been an issue although every year we have increased the number of contacts we have and by working with the local junior football league and schools i am sure we can get 10-12 games per year.
finance is always a challenge but i was adamant from the start that the programme would be sustainable and as such players are charged a small fee for training and matches which helps to cover costs. we have had great support from Barrow Borough Sports Council and sponsorship from Plastic man which has enabled us to purchase kit and equipment. In addition Barrow AFC have provided in-kind support letting us use the pitch for matches, and to run a junior five a side tournament at holker street which helped us raise £1000 and also by providing every player in the performance centre (108) with a free pass to watch all first team home games, building affiliation with the club.
2 of our players have left the centre to join professional clubs (Manchester United and Burnley) but i honestly see this as a positive. if the players go on to play at the highest level i would be delighted and if they don't i am sure if they cannot find another pro club they would be more than happy to rejoin the performance centre but with all the experience of playing with some of the best players in the country.
on the flip side we have had players join the performance centre who ahve been released by pro clubs and they have really had a benefical influence ont he squads with their attitiude to training and extra yard. Of the players that are still with pro clubs i am in fairly regualr contact with most of their parents just to keep up to date with their progress and if for any reason they no longer continue at the club they are aware of the performance centre and what we are trying to achieve.

The performance centre is definately not the finished article and we are always crtitically analysing it to make improvements but i feel it has provided us with a good base to develop a youth develop programme for the area for which we can all be proud. We are 4 years into our 6 year plan and so far we have acheived everything we set out to achieve and i am sure with the energy and enthusiasm of the coaching team, parents, players, sponsors, funders and of course supporters we will achieve that aim. i hope this has provided an insight into what we are trying to achieve, thanks Neil Doherty.

[burnzio]

Great post Neil. Keep up the good work.

[DaveC]

Cheers Neil, good luck with the centre!

[GTBLUE]

Excellent post Neil and very helpful to all of us that do not realise just what goes on and how much goes into it. You don't fancy playing on the wing do you........... we've tried everyone else

That took even longer to read than Tidd's posts

[Mike Wilson]

WOW, That's a great effort which will surely improve lots of local kids abilities in both life & football, & i'm sure some will eventually make the grade as Pro's & hope some enjoy the semi-pro world with BAFC benefiting from having the now adults playing for their home town club in the not to distant future, this is another reason BAFC must stay in the this BSP league and one day be able to push on.

Well done Neil and keep up the good work.

[Wintergreen]

Great stuff Doc, didn't really know what you were up to with your organisation and it was good to read about it and the progress to date.

If there was a bucket collection or similar organised for your organisation at HS/FBSS I would glady contribute in my customary over zealous manner, as would many others for such a worthy cause I would imagine.