Quote Originally Posted by HaveringBluebird View Post
OK and I'll accept Blake and Earnie but it still seems a poor show. Nathan joined us 30 years ago and Earnie 23 years ago. Maybe I exaggerated a little by saying nothing since Toshack but you have to agree it's not a good record. And the keepers record is worse.

Someone mentioned Cameron Jerome. We got him from Middlesbrough at 18 so I would say he couldn't be classed as part of a youth development programme.
Blake ended up at the club after leaving Chelsea after his first year for whatever reason, so he was going on 18 when he joined the club, ernie was the very last apprentice taken on for his year because the club thought he may be to small, Jerome had been bombed by Middlesbrough. We didn't have an academy during the Blake and eanie years and I'm not sure if we had one when Jerome came to the club. What there would've been was schoolboy level training that would've taken place three times per week. Decent schoolboys would've been fast tracked into the youth team.

None of the players I've mentioned came through the schoolboy system. When nathan blake turned up he was head and shoulders above anything at the club in his age range, intact, he was better than some of the first team. As for ernie, he couldn't have been coached anyway, he was doing exactly what he'd been doing previously for a junior side called GE Wales. Those three players were good enough anyway, boro developed Jerome and Chelsea developed blake, ernie did what he wanted