Quote Originally Posted by MOZZER2 View Post
i have read this thread with great interest .My lad was taken on at 7 years old and like those in the report signed for a year .

Just to point out don't mix an academy with a development centre like one or two are doing here .

Yes kids do get spotted at 6 and 7 years old and get invited to trials and they pick a squad of 16 at the start of the season . Not all kids make it the full season either even at that age . The debate is , is it too young to sign for a pro club at that age . I say an emphatic YES .


The kids get taken out of local football and expected to train at least twice a week with games on Sunday .I,m all for pro clubs taking on kids that age but not taken out of local clubs as the figure is now less than 1 per cent with actually go on to make it at pro level

out of the 16 kids at my lads age not 1 made it to pro level , and only looking at some photos last week only 4 of them still play football at some kind of level . when you look at thousands upon thousands of kids go through this process in the UK I have come to the conclusion it's a mugs game
It makes perfect sense, a few of my mates had boys in the Cardiff academies, one got kicked out at about 12, the other who was tipped for great things at about 15 or 16 before the chance to sign the first Dad was not too bad, but the second one was gutted!