Everton U21s 1 - 4 Burnley XI

The club is short of quality from top to bottom, and it will do our youngsters no good to be battered week in, week out. Only reasonable way to change that is to bring better players in and drop some of the underutilised bench-warmers to the U21s.

Problem is we need to raise player numbers somehow. Selling fringe players will not raise enough money to do that.

Over the years Everton has invested an enormous amount in its development yet there is little evidence of it in our first team. We have seen a number of youngsters that showed early promise only to fade out of the picture. Davy has some claims to fame but a thriving productive development program is not one of them.

If 80% of our income is going there as suggested by the hierarchy then it would appear to be a waste of money.

Dick, you're up early mate. I think that you, like me and a few others have doubts about the value for money in the whole academy thing. I know teams have off days and teams, like Burnley can have good days, but nobody gets FOUR jammy goals. Added to which the U21 / Reserves or what ever they are have, I think been losing more than they win by a fair margin.

You (and others no doubt of a certain age) will have tucked away under the stairs or what ever the Perth equivalent is a box of old programs. Go in there dig out one at random look at the youth A or B or what ever and see how many 'Names' you can spot.

Value for money or keeping up with the Jones extravagance.

* Waggles hand in a horizontal manner *

I know people always say "I've got a mate who's aunt is the tea lady in Finch Farm" but I've heard only glowing things from some dads who have their kids in that place. One of them even made a claim that we're one of the few academies in the country with Category 1 status (no idea how to verify this or not). Apparently one of the generations of kids in that group is absolutely unbelievable.

As ever, it will take time to come to fruition and some of them just won't turn out good enough. Everyone else is usually glowing about our academy turning out players like Rodwell and Barkley but I guess not our fans.

I think (have you done the old program exercise yet) the academy is at best like fire insurance (someone can give me a better example??): you don't like paying it every year, I mean when was the last time your house burned down, but you have to have it.

I bet the youth set up costs considerably less, and excludes a number of other players on the books or who have been sold. With the team doing well, we really are looking at things to moan about it would seem.

Whether it means anything in the long term, I've not a clue but if we eventually churn out players with the footballing skills of our European and South America cousins then the future could be bright.

Now if only Moyes would give them a chance...

The wealth of the EPL masks the dismal state of football in this country including the decline in participation.

Shite coaching doesn't help mind.

Derek T, here in Perth we are just about surviving a fortnight long heat wave, no time to search the back shed for old programmes. Anyway most of the good ones are etched on my brain. Our house, like most in O,z would be called a Bungalow in the UK.

Like many people I think our first choice eleven is a match for just about anyone, but more than a couple of injuries or key players not on form and we rapidly lose that ability to sweep all before us. I know the good results over the Christmas period have swept it from some peoples minds, but we have drawn a lot of matches that we would have won if we had been playing at the top of our game.

When other clubs have benches full of players who would very likely be first choices at our club whilst ours is populated by a group that the manager seems afraid to use above an absolute minimum, then I am confident that our senior squad would benefit from an influx a top quality players, and I see that as being short of the necessary quality.

Below first team level, the U21 and U18 teams seem to be having trouble with sides from clubs you would normally not put in our bracket, which is why it looks like a top to bottom problem to me.

I haven't disparaged any of our players in the way some people have and expressing surprise that we don't have to pay other clubs to take some of our players or similar is both condescending and a failure to grasp the unfortunate realities that our club is currently facing.

Very difficult to read too much into that. Youth development isn't necessarily about results and, if we were playing a team of 16-18 year olds against a more experienced Burnley team including some more experienced players then the result really isn't the issue. Particularly given that the U-21s haven't had a game for a month.

In general, our U-21 team has done OK-ish in the U-21 league – finishing 4th (of 8) in our division with a record of W6 D2 L6 (and arguably a pickup after losing the first 3 games). That puts us into Qualification Group 1 (not the "Elite Group") for the second phase of the U-21 competition.

Sorry Dick, but this fallacy that Moyes somehow held Rooney back is a real pet hate of mine. Rooney played 33 Premier League matches in 2002/03 - a season he began as a 16 year old, and then 34 the following year. That's 67 Premier League appearances before he left Everton as an 18 year old.

To put that into context Jack Wilshire, now 20, and probably England's best young product since Rooney, has only ever featured in 44 Premier League matches for Arsenal (yes he had a bad injury, but he still couldn't have come close to Rooney's 67 while still just 18 years old). Theo Walcott also had less than 60 Premiership appearances before he turned the grand age of 20.

Rooney was given every chance, and he responded by making the England first team as an 18 year old, and starting every game of Euro 2004. He'd become a 'world renowned' 'fixture for England' while still at Everton. Don't pretend that Ferguson discovered this ill-used gem amongst the Everton subs bench. Why else did he have to pay close to £30m for him? And finally Fergie didn't play him any more than Moyes did either - he featured in less than 30 Premiership games in his first United season.

How would he have ended up under Moyes you wonder? Probably better.

That's why it is better to scout for players in lower leagues and leave them there 'till they are good enough instead of playing in academy which is not preparing them for first team football with Everton. Judging by the ineffective result against a put together young team from Burnley.

The problem as I see it is that Moyes declared to the world 4-5 years ago or maybe earlier, that he was going to reduce the average age of the 1st team and he would be pushing to get the youngsters in - well he hasn't on both accounts .
He could well be right that we just haven't developed any good enough to allow him to reduce the age. Obviously Bidwell and Garbutt have come up against Baines - but he then buys Oviedo to cover - so clearly no faith in either of the youngsters. Rodwell came and went (too injury prone and lost his way to sideways passing - ie Ray Wilkins for those who remember), Barkley - lack of development with massive injuries. Mc Aleny - too many injuries, Duffy - cant pass to a colleague, and finally Baxter, Wallace - just at best Championship level.

So clearly we aren't producing Premiership players from the youth system and even from buying 16-19yr olds - well not as good as Utd (Wellbeck, Cleverley,and buy good 16-19 yr olds and develop them, Rooney, Smalling, Chico,etc), not as good as Southampton ( Bale, Walcott, Oxlade Chamberlne ?, and now Luke Shaw). I personally think our scouting and youth coaching isn't up to scratch , particularly as we need "cheap" players - its our sole strategy. Moyes is attempting to change wholesale with the likes of Irvine, Weir, Ferguson, Sheedy etc - but only time will tell if we produce again the next Rooney, Osman, Hibbert etc