Youth & Reserves

You might have seen that earlier this week, news of the revamped structure for youth football in England was finally announced. Chief amongst the changes is the introduction of the Professional Development League; a three-tiered Under-21 competition ranked on academy grading designed at improving the quality of football between the ages of 18 and 21. Little more needs to be said about the failings of the old reserve system at…

The Elite Player Performance Plan and the associated restructuring of English youth football has been a subject hot on the agenda this summer. After a protracted negotiating and organising period, details have emerged today of the path forward from 2012-13 onwards. The old 40-team academy league, split into ten groups of four based roughly on locale has gone. In its place at the top level is a three-group, 23-team setup…

Todd Kane has been named Chelsea’s Under-21 team captain for the 2012-13 season, according to the club’s official website. The 18 year-old full-back was named as the man in possession of the armband in a piece published earlier this afternoon and follows him doing so away to Northampton Town last Saturday afternoon. It’s a positive reward for a player who has made huge strides of progress in the past two…

Chelsea’s Under-21 side continued their preparation for the new season with their first win of the summer over Northampton Town. A largely impressive performance against some very capable football league players was capped by a second half brace from 16 year-old forward Alex Kiwomya. Having returned from their annual training camp in Austria, the squad welcomed Todd Kane, George Saville and Patrick Bamford back into the fold following a brief…

According to reports from Sam Wallace in the Independent, Chelsea have agreed a deal for Slovenian centre-back Emir Dautovic to join Michael Emenalo’s youth revolution at Stamford Bridge. The Blues are believed to have struck a €1.3m deal with NK Maribor for the 17 year-old defender, who they have been tracking for some time and are now set to bring to London. Back in 2010, stories emerged from Slovenia claiming…

Chelsea’s Under-18 pre-season continued on Saturday morning with a 4-0 win over Bristol City. A second-half brace from Jeremie Boga – including a delightful free-kick – was sandwiched by efforts from Walter Figueira and George Cole as Adi Viveash’s boys bounced back from a 3-2 loss to Arsenal 24 hours earlier. Almost two dozen boys saw upwards of an hour of playing time across the two games as they work…

Friday morning saw the Chelsea Under-18 side back in pre-season action, as the first of their two visitors in two days to Cobham arrived in the form of London rivals Arsenal. Adi Viveash once again used the bulk of his squad as the focus remained on the players’ fitness at this early stage of pre-season. In a closely-fought and entertaining contest at Cobham the Blues went down 3-2, both Chelsea…

Following the summer’s highest-profile transfer in Eden Hazard taking his talents to SW6, his younger brother Thorgan will be joining him after RC Lens confirmed the move this evening. Antoine Sibierski, the club’s director of football, told his official website that the move should be official tomorrow, and that despite being offered a new contract (with his current deal expiring next summer), the younger Hazard was determined to join his…

Milan Lalkovic and Matej Delac have been loaned to Portuguese side Vitoria Guimaraes, according to reports in Portugal. Record have reported that the pair have this afternoon agreed their moves and will join up with the squad officially tomorrow. Lalkovic had kept his legion of Twitter followers in the dark as to whether his jaunt to Portugal was temporary or something more permanent, and with only a year left on…

In re-watching some of last season’s reserve team fixtures, one thing became abundantly clear. Throughout the season, on a consistent basis, Billy Clifford was the best player in a Chelsea shirt (although Jacob Mellis ran him close for a long time). Statistically, of course, he was the leading appearance maker and chief creator with a team-high seven assists, but above and beyond pure numbers, the footage spoke loud and clear….