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Anyone else picked up on this?
Apparently the old “Reserve Lague” has now been replaced by the new Under-21 “Professional Development League”.
Clubs competing in the PDL have been dicvided into 3 groups who play each other, and after December they are then divided into two groups – Elite and “Qulaification”.
Teams are:
GROUP ONE Bolton Wanderers, Norwich City, Everton, West Ham United, Blackburn Rovers, Arsenal, West Bromwich Albion, Reading
GROUP TWO: Newcastle United, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United, Watford, Sunderland, Southampton, VIilla, Stoke City
GROUP THREE: Manchester City, Crystal Palace, Middlesbrough, Chelsea, Liverpool, Fulham, Wolverhampton WanderersSo where are Latics?
Apparently there are lower divisions. And because we don’t have an Academy we are in League Two North which comprises Huddersfield Town, Nottingham Forest, Derby County, Sheffield United, Barnsley, Leeds United, Wigan Athletic, Crewe Alexandra and Leicester City.
I don’t see how this fits in with the promises of us developing our own youngsters, and makes going to reserve/development or whatever you want to call it pointless. I have no interest in watching Barnsley Resreves, thank you. Furthermore the games will be played at weekend (Friday to Monday).
I know actually this is outside Latics’ control, but we are being left behind with this. :angry:
There are specific, quite stringent, criteria that have to be met before you can earn academy status. Latics don’t meet that criteria at the moment but are actively pursuing it. The development of the training facilities that Roberto was so keen on securing in his “I won’t go to Villa if you give me…” negotiations last summer ar a part of this.
There are specific, quite stringent, criteria that have to be met before you can earn academy status. Latics don’t meet that criteria at the moment but are actively pursuing it. The development of the training facilities that Roberto was so keen on securing in his “I won’t go to Villa if you give me…” negotiations last summer ar a part of this.Did that come from a Thursday Night Football conversation by any chance?
At least the club are heading in the right direction. A few years ago we’d have been a million miles away had they brought the same rules into force.
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