Ken Early: Big clubs no place for young talent

Last week, José Mourinho made a memorable contribution to the conversation around talent development in English football.

In recent years, Chelsea have enjoyed a remarkable run of success at youth level, winning four out of the last six FA Youth Cups and adding last season's Uefa Youth League title. In the past, such a successful youth side might have expected to provide several players to the Chelsea first-team squad.

Everyone knows that the dynastic sides at clubs like Manchester United, Barcelona and Bayern Munich were rooted in such a connection between the youth system and the senior team.

Instead, Mourinho has packed off several of the youth stars to Chelsea’s Dutch farm club, Vitesse Arnhem. History tells us that Chelsea players who go on loan to Vitesse tend not to return to Chelsea’s first team.

It seems these players have simply not done enough to impress him. They might argue that it is difficult to impress him without being given chances in the first team but, according to Mourinho, that’s just another way of making excuses.

He told us that he had talked with his staff about whether it is a young player’s responsibility to give the manager confidence that he is ready for the first team, or the manager’s responsibility to build up the young player’s confidence to the point where he feels he is ready.

Unsurprisingly, Mourinho’s staff agreed that it was the player’s responsibility to give the manager confidence.

“You don’t need five matches in a row,” Mourinho said. “You need 10 minutes. In 10 minutes you can show me if you are ready or not . . . You can show you are ready, you are mentally ready, you are physically ready, you are ready to cope with the pressure, you are not the kind of guy who trains and plays against kids his own age but not ready to play at the high level. Ten minutes can say a lot.”

With a philosophy like that, it’s not surprising that Mourinho is more famous for winning titles than for developing young players.

In fact, looking back over Mourinho's time at Porto, Chelsea, Inter and Real Madrid, it turns out that no young player has ever managed to impress him enough to become a first-team regular. But then again, Mourinho has always managed big, wealthy clubs that are aiming to win the league. In the context of a superclub like Chelsea, the 10-minute rule actually makes a lot of sense.

Stunning debut

The sort of young player who could force his way into a first-team of that standard would have to be the sort of prodigy who could show you why in 10 minutes – you think of Cristiano Ronaldo and his stunning Manchester United debut in 2003.

There is a case that the superclubs are now so wealthy and bloated with talent that their youth systems have lost all relevance to their first team. In that case why criticise Mourinho for failing to bring through young players when doing so is essentially incompatible with his job – which is to win titles.

It’s not just Chelsea who are struggling to get youth team players into the first team. The pattern is general at all of Europe’s wealthiest clubs, even those with a historic commitment to youth development. The first team squads at these clubs are now so full of internationals that there is no room for any young player who isn’t already obviously a genius.

The best player on the pitch in Chelsea’s 2-2 draw with Swansea was the Welsh side’s 23-year-old midfielder Jonjo Shelvey. He ran the game with a brilliant passing display, crowned by the chip that sent Bafetimbi Gomis through for the collision with Thibaut Courtois that led to Swansea’s second equaliser.

Shelvey would never have made it under Mourinho's 10-minute rule. In fact he spent three years at Liverpool without managing to convince anyone that he would one day be capable of going to Chelsea and dominating opponents like Nemanja Matic and Cesc Fabregas.

He might be good enough to play for Chelsea now. But he would never have been good enough at 20 or 21, whether he had 10 minutes, five matches or three years to show it. He had to go and play a lot of games for a team like Swansea first to find himself as a player.

Rescued career

Players all want to play for the biggest clubs, which is why Shelvey left Charlton for Liverpool aged 18, but the process that turned him into the player he has become could not have happened at one of the big clubs. When Shelvey joined Liverpool he probably thought he’d made it, but in fact it was by leaving Liverpool that he rescued his career.

The big clubs will continue to pretend they are interested in youth development, and sign up young players in their droves, largely as a financial hedge. But it’s more and more obvious that the young players themselves should stay away from them, unless they are tempted by the prospect of disillusion, stagnation and irrelevance.