Quote Originally Posted by Bruce Foxton View Post
Spence had played a lot of U23 football by then. Bellamy came in to oversee the pathway from academy to first team. He was in charge of the U23's, but from what i can gather wasn't a fan. I think he saw it as a backwater for youngsters, journeymen and older players coming back from injury. If you remember, Andy Legg came in solely as U23 manager/coach, and Bellamy reverted to academy coach, primarily with the U18's. I suppose by then he had seen enough of the players to know they were ready for first team football.
I've been impressed with a lot of what I've read about and seen from Bellamy on here recently, but I can't see the logic in that. whenever I've seen the u23s it has been a much higher standard than the u18s, so it is always going to be riskier for a manager to promote someone straight from the 18s to the first team tha ln from the u23s.
also if he was in charge of the pathway, just being "not a fan" of the u23s so not putting players in there seems like it isn't addressing the issues he saw with the U23s.