I've just read a report regarding how much money each Bundesliga team invested in their youth academy. An average of 11mil Euro on average for each team, and thats a record high in the history of Bundesliga If u look at teams like Dortmund, Bayern Munich, Freibrug, Nuernberg, Leverkusen, Mainz and Bremen, they actually have many players in their First Team who were developed from their youth/reserve teams. Looks like Dortmund have a very good youth system but in fact, Hummels and Bender were products of Bayern Munich and 1860 Munich respectively, but Schmelzer, Goetze and Grosskreutz are all from their youth teams; Stuttgart also have produced many good players, Mario Gomez, Khedira, Rudy n Schieber are few good recent examples, but records tell us that they're way better at developing attackers; Bayern Munich.......i dunno man. Thomas Mueller is obviously a GREAT prospect and i think he is among the best at his position (probably as a SS) and what he's good at in the entire league, but Badstuber's talent is not even close to Mueller's. Not sure about Kraft yet, Contento is just ok and Kroos is actually a product of Rostock. Hopefully Emre Can and Patrick Weihrauch will give the Bayern's fans some surprise in the next few years Other teams such as Werder Bremen, Mainz, Hertha Berlin, Frankfurt, Gladbach, 1860 Munich (!), Leverkusen and Schalke also have very good products from their youth system. I personally think 1860 Munich are rather low profile, but they've produced the Bender bros, Gebhart, Traesch, Marcel Schaefer, Mlapa, Volland and many others in recent years. Schalke's products such as Oezil, Neuer and Howedes will be the integral parts of the DFB nationalmannschaft. And Pierre-Michel Lasogga (now with Hertha Berlin, a clinical goalscorer) and Draxler do look promising, they're both from Schalke's youth system So overall, which team have the best youth academy in the country and famous of that? A Bundesliga version of "Ajax"? Whats your opinion? Lets discuss
Those teams don't have more players developed by their youth academy than diverse other teams of the league (you should actually know that). But there's surely a few teams (Golfsburg, HSV) who really don't care about developing talents but rather prefer spending the big money to buy them from other clubs. Even a team like Leverkusen gets almost all young players from other clubs (lending or selling many of their own youth players to 2nd league clubs).
Without a doubt Gladbach and Schalke(although I haven't really heard much about their newely "promoted" players). And As much as people like to insult everything Bayern, Bayern's academy is probably one of the best historically and its coming back to life now that it has been able to showcase its talent internally thanks to Van Gaal. I would also mention Leverkusen, but they buy many of their youth players. Not to say they don't produce any.
Well, that's a wrong perception. Leverkusen have produced Reinartz, Adler, Castro, Oczipka and Marcel Risse who are all regular starters for their clubs. They have brought in Schwaab, Kiessling, Lars Bender, Sam, Schuerrle and Bellarbi(spelling?). Looks like they do have a decent youth academy and certainly producing some good talents in the last few years as well as buying from other teams. On the other hand, bayern Munich haven't done much other than Ekici n Thomas Mueller. I don't rate Badstuber at all, Kroos is a product of Rostock and Contento is just alright, nothing exciting in fact. I don't see why people are saying they have one of te best youth system in the country at all! Especially when u look at their a-junior and b-junior standing,it tells u something. But Emre Can(U17 nationalmannschaft captain) is certainly a great talent, while another wonderkid Weihrauch is a product of 1860 Munich. 1860 Munich, I believe have a great youth system; Schalke, Gladbach, Mainz and Stuttgart too I think. Stuttgart worth mentioning becoz they have Tasci, Khedira, Gomez, Rudy, Schieber and now they've just sold one of the Most exciting young players in the country, Serge Gnabry, to Arsenal; and C-Junior League and U15 NT topscorer Timo Werner is Being highly rated in the country. But interesting fact is that they're mostly attackers. Gladbach, I dun think so. Reus is from Dortmund youth team; Herrmann n Neustaedter are ok, but not special; Fabian Baecker was a talent but he never seems to have the chance to play there for their first team. Their overall performance in the A-Junior n B-Junior is ok, but I think Mortiz Goettel from Wolfsburg youth team is their biggest hope, not Kachunga.
Well, I didn't really mean the immediate present. I really just meant historically Gladbach, Schalke, and Bayern have been the best considering the players they've produced.
Dude, have you ever learned of players like Jansen, Marin, Polanski etc. ? Not to mention plenties of other great players developed by the club in the past (Netzer, Bonhof, Stielike, Vogts, Heynckes, Matthäus, Deisler, Effenberg etc.)... And the current squad consists of more self-produced players than teams like Mainz & Nuremberg (Levels, Jantschke, Herrmann, Ter Stegen, Bäcker, Kachunga, Dorda, Janeczek etc.), even though most of them don't get much playing time due to the serious situation. Btw: If you had a clue about the club, you'd know that Neustädter came from Mainz. And you'd also know that clubs like Nuremberg & Mainz are far away from having such a good & expensive youth academy like i.e. Gladbach (Nuremberg have just started building one and still got their most youth players from other clubs - many on loan - except for Wollscheidt, Wolf & Mendler)! Same with Mainz. You always pretend to be a youth expert of German football ... but it seems you still have to learn! And it's not just about Gladbach and your above mentioned clubs. There's many other clubs from the 1st & 2nd league who regularly produce great talents. Wolfsburg, Hoffenheim (although they started investing in their youth academy lately) & HSV surely aren't among them.
I am pretty sure that Matthäus (FC Herzogenaurach), Bonhof (SuS Emmerich), Vogts (VfR Büttgen) and Effenberg (SC Victoria Hamburg) didn't move to Gladbach until they were 18 or 19, meaning they were adults when they made the move. And Marin didn't move there form Eintracht Frankfurt until he was 16. Of course, they were put into a position to succeed once they arrived but there were hardly Gladbach youth players.
Ah, I see you love to be very correct! Ok, those guys were 18 when they joined the club ... but that was quite usual for all clubs at that time (other BMG idols like Laumen, Heynckes, Netzer, Wimmer, Kleff, Rahn, Borowka, Frontzeck etc. joined the club only at that age either, although they didn't play in any small village club before ... and Beckenbauer was also 19 when he joined Bayern), since the type of today's typical youth academies where you get your youth players at the age of 12-16, hasn't been existing for so long time. Fact is that today there's many clubs in the Bundesliga (and also the lower leagues, who mustn't be forgotten) with good youth work! Thankfully.
Bayern has a good youth academy but over years they had trouble integrating young players in to their first team. Lahm i.e. had his breakthrough in Stuttgart. Trochowski, Hummels and Kroos also had to leave Bayern in order to get some playing time However with van Gaal , who is willing to take a risk with young players, this situation has been improved
Well, to be honest, I think the best years are behind 1860 and their academy. The man behind the success, Ernst Tanner, is now at Hoffenheim...who themselves have been producing decent talent that has been under the radar screen. Much of the remaining 1860 talent still owe their "discovery" to Tanner's magic touch. Once the current crop -- Volland, Leitner, Wood, Zeireis, etc., -- leave the club there are very few coming up the ranks with the same excitement once generated by the likes of Gebhart, Leitner, Mlapa or the others you have mentioned. I would look to Hoffenheim to see what Tanner does there.
I think that Kirsten19 falls into the same trap others fall into at times. Small town or small club bias. There are lots of players who came from different clubs. Usually player development is cyclical. Meaning that a you have a good crop that feeds of each other and develops together and than there may be a drought. Few spaces to break into the Top IX will have talents look for room elsewhere. Today in soccer almost all youth players came from somewhere else at one point. And btw, how could you forget Schweinsteiger! Likewise, Barca claims players who have gone through their academy but they have a national recruiting base. Maybe even international. Many of their youth players came and were partially formed somewhere else. Last example Pedro, from Teneriffa. The good thing about the BL is that many clubs are able to develop youth players and that there many attractive clubs for them. Not like in Spain where you basically have only two who attract top talent.
Good point. When does the right to claim you "discovered" or "developed" a player come into play? Many of the 1860 prospects came from decent clubs anywhere from U9-U16. At what point do they become "a product of the 1860 system" versus a good player that 1860 helped further along? BTW, one of 1860's most famous young talents of all time? Anyone?
BTW, one of the fan favorites from the 80's was also a 60 product. He later also played for Stuttgart and he scored the only Bayern goal in the Final's defeat against Porto in 87. Anyone, I know I made this one too easy.
Is it just a coincidence that arguably the 4 most technically gifted and biggest stars in recent years all come from the Ruhr area ? I am talking about Oezil,Sahin,Goetze and Reus. Yes, I know about Kroos and Mueller but let's just forget about them in this case. Oezil,Sahin,Goetze and Reus are all born in the space of 4 years.Also, Gundogan has been brilliant in the last 7-8 games. He is born in Gelsenkirchen. If he keeps it up, he could be a big star too. Neuer,Draxler,Holtby,Howedes and Matip have great talent too. So what is it about that area? They really love their football there, dont they ? Or Schalke's and Dortmund's academies are great ?
The region has (in its center) the highest density in Germany (and is one of Europe biggest agglomerations). There are lot of clubs with tradition, the people love football and the youth leagues are very competitive. Additionally the clubs make additionally to the league games many test matches with other high profile clubs from the region (this includes the clubs from the Rheinland such as Düsseldorf, Collogne, Mönchengladbach, Aachen, ...).
I don't really know how many games they play in total but I just looked up how many league matchs some of Schalke's youth teams play. U15, 17 and 19 all have 26 league games this year. The U23, which isn't technically a youth team but Schalke's second team playing in the Regionalliga (4th division), plays 38 matches. I don't know about any additional tournaments or competitions but I'm sure there are some.
The U-19 Bundesliga always has 26 games. Then there is the championship play-off, which has up to 3 games. The U-19 German cup adds up to 5 games, although Bundesliga teams don't qualify automatically. Then there are the U-19 state cups (the winners qualify for the German cup), with about 6 games per team if they reach the final. Those are the main official competitions, there are also local and invitational tournaments of course.
They love their football there, but the greater region has 18 million inhabitants (more than the Netherlands!, or any other German region), so it makes sense that a lot of talent comes from there.
What the hell ..... I wrote this post 3 days ago and today this article comes out http://www.goal.com/en/news/1717/ed...in-more-the-top-talents-to-come-from-dortmund '' The top talent to come from the Ruhr area'' ''Ahead of Saturday's derby between Schalke and Dortmund,Goal.com examines Germany's eternal fountain of star-power, honouring the best players it has produced.'' Wow... coincidence ? They need to pay me for this.