The Youngsters

[Wearethewhites]

With the news that Hyndman now wants to leave FFC, most are saying that this is the Clubs fault, but I beg to differ. I personally put this down to the Clubs relegation, and now being in the Championship, makes it a lot harder for the youngsters to break through. In the Championship, I feel that your investment changes, and you look for experienced players from that Division to help you get out, and in doing so, makes the window of opportunity a lot smaller for players like Hyndman. I'm pretty sure that if FFC were still in the Premiership, a lot of these players, including Pat Roberts, would have signed new contracts. Unfortunately, when it came to Roberts, if the Club had offered big wages, Rigg was right by saying that the rest would expect it as well.     

[mike_corkcity12]

When we got relegated Felix decided that he was going to use the youngsters; Roberts, Hyndman, Dembele and Williams. The club used those 4 as promoting the new season as 'The New Originals.' Think it is fair to assume that they thought they were going to get first team football. Even in our deepest struggles last year Symons refused to play Hyndman in center mid, even though Hoogland was playing there!

We only have ourselves to blame.

[Wearethewhites]

When we got relegated Felix decided that he was going to use the youngsters; Roberts, Hyndman, Dembele and Williams. The club used those 4 as promoting the new season as 'The New Originals.' Think it is fair to assume that they thought they were going to get first team football. Even in our deepest struggles last year Symons refused to play Hyndman in center mid, even though Hoogland was playing there!

We only have ourselves to blame.

Playing the kids epically failed though. We all knew that we was going to win nothing with the kids, but Magath was mad enough to think he could redesign the Championship. Our biggest downfall was flogging off players like Brede', Sidwell etc, who would have been prime, experienced players for that division. We may well have been back up by now with the odd player like Roberts breaking through.

[Nero]

watching Hyndman last year he looked good enough, seems Kit has the bit of felix about him of if you don't sign you dont want to be here so im not gong to play you, then when he leaves see we where right not to play him he wanted to leave fulfilling the prophecy.  Remember Kit thought Dembele wouldn't be good enough and didn't want to play him until his hand was forced by injuries. Bit like Mitro he wants to play at a higher level so we loan him out even though he's happy to play for us so we loan him out and weaken our team. I sometimes wonder if we want to get back to the premier league

The decision this club makes sometimes baffle me

[Lighthouse]

If he was good enough he would have played more. Playing the youngsters didn't work and sadly as we were relegated and gave them a chance. Some succeeded and some didn't. Given more time I am sure they will come good. But at clubs like Fulham we can't mess about waiting for players to come good. I am still waiting for Dembele to move up and be consistent.

[f bloke]

When we got relegated Felix decided that he was going to use the youngsters; Roberts, Hyndman, Dembele and Williams. The club used those 4 as promoting the new season as 'The New Originals.' Think it is fair to assume that they thought they were going to get first team football. Even in our deepest struggles last year Symons refused to play Hyndman in center mid, even though Hoogland was playing there!

We only have ourselves to blame.

Playing the kids epically failed though. We all knew that we was going to win nothing with the kids, but Magath was mad enough to think he could redesign the Championship. Our biggest downfall was flogging off players like Brede', Sidwell etc, who would have been prime, experienced players
for that division. We may well have been back up by now with the odd player like Roberts breaking through.

I disagree that the use of the kids by Magath was, in itself, a failure. What was a failure was rotating different kids in every game resulting in a very unsettled team. Hyndman and Roberts deserved much more game time last season than they got, particularly given the type of players who did get significant game time. Both Magath and Symonds got a lot wrong last season

[cmg]

Playing the 'Youngsters', from what was arguably he best u18 side in the country, was a reasonable idea which failed because the Youngsters proved, at the time, to be not good enough. Whichever manager was involved it was an understandable move, especially under the circumstances, to play them and another understandable move not to play them when they did not make an impact.

When we speak of the 'Youngsters' now we are really speaking only of 3 players.
Woodrow and Kavanagh are fairly settled and have their chance (as is Rodak in the u21s). Grimmer and Williams we await return from injury. Arthurworrey and Donnelly are on loan. Richards, Passley and Sambou are gone. Tankovic is still in the 'promising but not fully established' category at AZ. LVC (who was a cohort above these) shows that, frustratingly, a young players development is not usually consistent.

Hyndman, Dembele and Roberts were three of the top picks from their year.
Hyndman has seen some success at international level, but has been unable to command or even demand a place in our first team. He has become frustrated and believes he is in demand from some (as yet unidentified) big names. His transfer value is not high, the immediate prospects for him here are now not good and I wouldn't see much all round benefit in not seeing him move on at the earliest opportunity.

By contrast, Dembele, has forged a place for himself in the first team. His improvement and all-round no.9 play have, maybe, made him more difficult to retain. But again, his transfer value is not spectacular and it would be disappointing if we couldn't put forward a financial package sufficiently attractive to persuade him to stay. Hopefully PSG, where he came from, stay out of the picture.

It was a shame, but, in retrospect, we had no realistic hope of keeping Roberts. He was not just good but spectacularly good on the International stage that he shared with the top prospects of the Big Boys. Being English (no I don't really understand it) he had a sky high transfer value. Manchester City's lowest paid first team squad member was on £25k p/w last season. If they were offering Roberts anything like that we would have been asking him, if he signed a four year deal with us, to personally take a 3-and-a-half million pound gamble on his own career. I'm convinced he'll be a big star (as I am sure he is) but it is by no means certain and it is City who take that gamble now.   

[Snibbo]

Klinsmann has apparently been in his ear for a long time, telling him he needs to move to a 'big club'.

[Lighthouse]

If he was good enough he would have played more. Playing the youngsters didn't work and sadly as we were relegated and gave them a chance. Some succeeded and some didn't. Given more time I am sure they will come good. But at clubs like Fulham we can't mess about waiting for players to come good. I am still waiting for Dembele to move up and be consistent.

Astonishing. That you are quick to state that we cannot mess around waiting for youngsters to come good, bearing in mind that some of them are good prospects, and yet to bang on about giving the Fulham manager more time, despite showing and proving that he is a poor prospect and is delaying and damaging Fulhams chances to progress. I would say that is Double Standards of the highest order, and you have decided that without impartiality. In other words you are stating that Fulham haven't got time to wait for youngsters to come through. Yet the Manager can have far more time to continue to carry on his incompetence.
I find that difficult to comprehend.
Some people may even say that's hypocrisy.  You cannot have it both ways. If you genuinely want Fulham to progress at a reasonable decent pace, that's called ambition and having aspirations,  as opposed to dragging our feet which will get the club nowhere, as the club will be stranded in the second tier or below Indefinitely. That could be called apathy and lethargic.

:005: Goodness settle down. Your hatred for our manager seems to be clouding every opinion in every post. He will be gone soon enough. Then you will be able to hate something else.  Now try and concentrate on what the thread is about without this hatred and bile spilling over.

A club like ours cannot spend ages nurturing the youngsters as we once did. Seems we have done very well in bringing youngsters through the fact that some of them are not going to make it is a fact of life. Now you hate Symons, yes I understand that.

[Arthur]

But at clubs like Fulham we can't mess about waiting for players to come good. I am still waiting for Dembele to move up and be consistent.

Astonishing. That you are quick to state that we cannot mess around waiting for youngsters to come good, bearing in mind that some of them are good prospects, and yet to bang on about giving the Fulham manager more time...

Agree, WM.

A loss of credibility on the part of LH, who has chided many on here - myself included - for, in his view, expecting too much of Kit, too soon.

On the other hand, Lord forbid that, after a run of 10 games, our promising 19 year-old striker is not yet producing his best form every week.

[Lighthouse]

But at clubs like Fulham we can't mess about waiting for players to come good. I am still waiting for Dembele to move up and be consistent.

Astonishing. That you are quick to state that we cannot mess around waiting for youngsters to come good, bearing in mind that some of them are good prospects, and yet to bang on about giving the Fulham manager more time...

Agree, WM.

A loss of credibility on the part of LH, who has chided many on here - myself included - for, in his view, expecting too much of Kit, too soon.

On the other hand, Lord forbid that, after a run of 10 games, our promising 19 year-old striker is not yet producing his best form every week.

I think by 'chided' you mean not agreed with your opinion. Still I am rather proud you think I had any credibility to lose. The problem is, I have never started a 'keep the manager' thread. Only added my opinion to a few of the many calling for his head. The get 'Kit out' posts turning up in threads that were not primarily get the manager threads has overflowed into 'get the unbelievers' for not agreeing. Unlike both yourself and WM I have NEVER made it personal. You have an opinion on the manager I don't agree with. But that is as far as it goes.

[filham]

Easy question.
If you were Kit who would you drop from our centre midfield at Boro to make way for Hyndman, Tunnicliffe or O,Hara.

You wouldn't risk either for fear of getting murdered and even if one of them were injured you would bring LVC in.
Simple fact is that Hyndman is nit yet ready for Championship football.

[FPT]

Hyndman says he wants to leave Fulham, why play him then? It's a vicious circle that one - he missed the pretty much the whole of the back end of last season with the U20 World Cup and a collarbone injury, and this season he's been 'demoted' to the U21s, where I feel it's important to say he hasn't shone. Had he committed his future, would he have played more? More? Yes, but a solid member of the first team? I don't think so - with Jamie O'Hara, Lasse Vigen Christensen, Ryan Tunnicliffe, Tom Cairney, Sakari Mattila and Scott Parker coming back from injury - where is the room?

We can't have it our way all the time; you could argue that Christensen's form over the past has pushed Emerson Hyndman away from the team and thus starting his want to leave. Do you favour certain academy players over others for anything other than form? I simply think there's just not room for him in the current squad and at the current time, and I don't think it helps that he was marketed as one of the new things that'll take Fulham to the top.

It's sad to see Emerson leave, but that's his prerogative. It's just a shame that we won't get near enough cash for him as we should do with his contract situation. Talking of contracts though, I'd have hoped to have heard that Dembele had signed a long term deal in the last few weeks or so... That'd be the worrying one if he left because he's actually getting game time.

[colinwhite]

The logic of relegation to the championship means give our youngsters a chance , because the championship isn't as good a the premiership , therefor they will have good chance of succeeding is fundamentally flawed ,
and like most of the decisions made by Magath , arrogant and stupid.
The premiership sides are actually much happier to let teams play , so the likes of roberts will have an easier time playing at city against premiership teams than trying to compete and grind put results in the championship.
Sometimes professional clubs make decisions which are frankly dumbfounding in their stupidity .

[Asotosyios]

If he was good enough he would have played more. Playing the youngsters didn't work and sadly as we were relegated and gave them a chance. Some succeeded and some didn't. Given more time I am sure they will come good. But at clubs like Fulham we can't mess about waiting for players to come good. I am still waiting for Dembele to move up and be consistent.

Astonishing. That you are quick to state that we cannot mess around waiting for youngsters to come good, bearing in mind that some of them are good prospects, and yet to bang on about giving the Fulham manager more time, despite showing and proving that he is a poor prospect and is delaying and damaging Fulhams chances to progress. I would say that is Double Standards of the highest order, and you have decided that without impartiality. In other words you are stating that Fulham haven't got time to wait for youngsters to come through. Yet the Manager can have far more time to continue to carry on his incompetence.
I find that difficult to comprehend.
Some people may even say that's hypocrisy.  You cannot have it both ways. If you genuinely want Fulham to progress at a reasonable decent pace, that's called ambition and having aspirations,  as opposed to dragging our feet which will get the club nowhere, as the club will be stranded in the second tier or below Indefinitely. That could be called apathy and lethargic.

:005: Goodness settle down. Your hatred for our manager seems to be clouding every opinion in every post. He will be gone soon enough. Then you will be able to hate something else.  Now try and concentrate on what the thread is about without this hatred and bile spilling over.

A club like ours cannot spend ages nurturing the youngsters as we once did. Seems we have done very well in bringing youngsters through the fact that some of them are not going to make it is a fact of life. Now you hate Symons, yes I understand that.

I am afraid I cannot agree with that - this is exactly what clubs like Fulham should be doing: nurturing young players. We will never be able to compete financially with the "big" clubs, so building a strong academy should be one of our priorities. That could work by both bringing some players up for the first team and selling others for a nice profit like we did with Roberts.

If you mean that we cannot do that because our only target should be to get back to the Premier League, I would argue that we should/could do both if we find the right balance. Obviously, you cannot bring 10 kids up from the U21 and then claim that promotion is your target. But if you have a core of veteran or more experienced players, you can gradually introduce 2-3 youngsters in the team depending on their quality. At the same time, you should loan out others that you judge they are too good for U21 football but not quite there for Championship football.

In Hyndman's case, he was brought up last year by Maggatt and was pretty impressive or very good in most of the games he played. I was positively surprised as I was not aware of him and expected to see even more. He did feature 5 times under Kit with 11 more on the bench before we went away for the World Cup and then got injured. One would expect that he would be around the team this year and get more chances to play. He's behind Parker, Christensen and Tunnicliffe on the depth chart at the end of last season and then the club adds O'Hara and Mattila in central midfield and also Cairney and Pringle that can play as CM even though they are being used as wingers. Where does this leave Hyndman then? Probably in U21 for another year, as he has only seen the pitch for 8 minutes against Stoke so far this season.

If the club thought that he is good enough for this level, they should have given him more chances this season. As I said before, this doesn't necessarily mean a guarantee place in the first eleven, but to be more involved with the first team. Or if they thought that he is close, but not yet there they should sit down with him and his agents and explain that and try to get a new deal done and send him on loan to a League 1 team. But when nothing happens and he just continues playing for the U21, I cannot really blame him when he says he wants to move somewhere else where he will get more playing time.

[Lighthouse]

We did introduce 3 or 4 players from the youth team. Some were successful and are in the team or on the verge. Others haven't and were sold on for a huge profit or want to leave. My point about nurturing players is we cannot spend time when they are not going to make the grade we require in the time we require it. Bigger clubs can and do bring players from other youth teams in and spend time loaning them out etc. The leagues are full of good youth players that are in the mid twenties who had to move on from clubs. This wasn't the fault of their original club.

As for including Emmerson in a few more squads with so many players ahead of him. Well there was no point. I too thought he was very good on the little we have seen of him. But clearly others didn't and he wanted to leave. The two things may be connected.

[Bill2]

Klinsmann has apparently been in his ear for a long time, telling him he needs to move to a 'big club'.

For what to sit on the bench? If he wants game time he will need to move to a team in another country and a league which may appear slightly higher but will not in reality be any better than the Championship.

[HatterDon]

Two points on the previous posts:

1. Hyndman wouldn't be sitting on the bench in Holland or Germany. The only place he'd be sitting on the bench or playing in the reserves is at Fulham.

2. Transfer Hyndman's Yank ass out in January and NEVER let another American play for Fulham's first team.

I thank you.  starsnstripes

[Arthur]

I think by 'chided' you mean not agreed with your opinion.

Unlike both yourself and WM I have NEVER made it personal. You have an opinion on the manager I don't agree with. But that is as far as it goes.

No. I don't mean 'not agreed with (my) opinion'. On the contrary, in the instance I have in mind from last month, you went as far as to concur with my views to some extent, beginning your post, as you did, with the words: All of which is true...

As for your claim that you are never personal, your umbrage (that has manifested in the use of the upper case) is a poor attempt at trying to imply that I have, in some sense, overstepped the mark when, in fact, all you mean is that I quoted you and you did not quote me. As I remarked at the time, despite this, it was still clear at whom you were pointing the finger.

[Lighthouse]

I think by 'chided' you mean not agreed with your opinion.

Unlike both yourself and WM I have NEVER made it personal. You have an opinion on the manager I don't agree with. But that is as far as it goes.

No. I don't mean 'not agreed with (my) opinion'. On the contrary, in the instance I have in mind from last month, you went as far as to concur with my views to some extent, beginning your post, as you did, with the words: All of which is true...

As for your claim that you are never personal, your umbrage (that has manifested in the use of the upper case) is a poor attempt at trying to imply that I have, in some sense, overstepped the mark when, in fact, all you mean is that I quoted you and you did not quote me. As I remarked at the time, despite this, it was still clear at whom you were pointing the finger.

You have in mind a post from last month? I seem to be implying? I said I wasn't quoting you in this reply from last month but it was clear I was pointing the finger at you? Well I must apologise because I have no idea what we are now talking about. I have to admit at replying to the posts and not the posters.

But you have reminded me that it is best to 'ignore' some posters. If you remember posts of mine from last month that were pointing the finger at you. Best to add me to that 'ignore' list.