Academy Director, Tony Carr writes prior to the Manchester City home game.

Fri, 7 May 2010 14:58:57 -0600

Good afternoon everyone and may I start by thanking everybody who turned out to support my Testimonial match here on Wednesday evening.

I have said it many times, but the match was a celebration not just of my 37 years of work at the Academy, but also the careers of all of the players who have come through the ranks and gone on to play senior professional football. As a club, we should be proud of every single one of them.

Back to this season’s youth team, and we have contested three FA Premier Academy League fixtures since my last column, losing at Arsenal and Southampton and winning at Watford.

Jack Werndly scored three goals in those three games, including a brace in the 4-2 defeat at Southampton. However, I was disappointed with the way we defended in that particular game.

I shall start, though, with what I thought was an undeserved 1-0 loss at Arsenal, who have already wrapped up the Group A title and, as always, have a very strong squad.

It was a good game. In the first half, we had by far the better chances, and Robert Hall missed a great opportunity following good work down the flank from Dominic Vose and Matthias Fanimo.

"They then scored when Sergio Sanchez allowed a long punt down the field to bounce and their striker nodded it over Deniz Mehmet as he tried to retrieve the situation. It was disappointing, because they didn't really have to earn their goal.

We then dominated much of the second half and Paco Craig could have scored, but he couldn't get enough purchase on his header. We should have got at least a draw, to be honest, and might even have won the game.

Considering some of the players had played for the reserves in a friendly the day before, they were a credit to themselves. I thought we equipped ourselves very well.

Four days later, we returned to winning ways at Watford with a 3-2 victory, although the margin could and should have been more comfortable.

Matthias Fanimo put us ahead before Watford equalised. Sergio Sanchez netted his second Academy goal of the season to put us back in front before Jack added a third.

Watford scored very late, but I think we did more than enough to deserve our win from a game that also saw another promising schoolboy, Lamar Hurley, make his first start for the U18s.

Last Saturday, we lost 4-2 at Southampton and I must admit I was disappointed with the way we played, particularly in defensive areas. We created enough chances to have won the game ourselves, but mistakes cost us dear in the end.

Jack scored another two goals and he now has five for the season, which was a bright spot.

We went 1-0 down from a Southampton corner when we should already have been two goals up, having missed two good chances through Jack and Danny Subuola.

Matthias did some good work down the left and he crossed for Jack to equalise, but we were behind again before half-time. They had a counter-attack and our two centre-backs were very static and allowed their striker to nip in between them to score.

It was very poor defending to put us 2-1 down at half-time. We then conceded another goal shortly after the break before Jack scored again to make it 3-2 and we then put them under some pressure. Unfortunately, they then broke away again and made it 4-2 with virtually the last kick of the game.

It was a really disappointing performance. Their passing and movement caused our centre-backs Callum McNaughton and Paco Craig all sorts of problems.

We left Little Heath at 7.30 in the morning, but I am not blaming that for the result.

Maybe the trip can affect you at the beginning of the game, but you quickly get into it, so I would never use that as an excuse.

We entertained Charlton Athletic at Little Heath in our final game of the season yesterday afternoon and, hopefully, we will have secured a win that would guarantee fifth place in the league.

As I come to the end of my 37th year with the Academy, I am still enjoying it as much as ever. I would like to thank all of my staff and the players for their hard work this season.

We shall have a short break and then we will return for pre-season training in early July, complete with our new intake of 13 first-year scholars.

Before then, some of the boys are off to Hong Kong to take part in the HKFC IP Global International Soccer Sevens between 14 and 16 May. The tournament is always a good experience for them and I’m sure those who are going are already looking forward to it.

For now, all that remains for me to thank you all for your support of the U18s this season, and we’ll see you again in August!

Academy Director, Tony Carr writes prior to the Wigan Athletic home game.

Sat, 24 Apr 2010 10:31:47 -0600

As the season approaches its conclusion, we have been blooding more and more young players in the Under-18s.

As I have touched on before, the purpose of this is to prepare the schoolboys for life as full-time scholars next season, when they will be playing FA Premier Academy League football every week.

The likes of Robert Hall, Matthias Fanimo, Blair Turgott, Dominic Vose and Dylan Tombides have played on a number of occasions in recent weeks, and I have generally been pleased with their contributions.

Before Wednesday’s match at Arsenal, we had put together a run of six league matches without defeat, while we also beat LA Galaxy 5-0 in a friendly at Little Heath a fortnight ago.

We have just a handful of fixtures remaining, but it is important that we do not allow our performances to drop in the final few games. If we maintain our concentration and focus, then we can finish on a high.

I shall begin my round-up of our recent matches by talking about our victory over LA Galaxy, who spent a week in England on tour, also taking on Blackburn Rovers, Everton and Ipswich Town during their stay.

We used nine schoolboys on the day in our squad of 16, including goalkeeper Jake Larkin and defenders Jake Young and Lamar Hurley.

Our goals came from five different scorers – Blair scored the first with a penalty before Dylan, Jack Werndly, Eoin Wearen and an own goal completed the scoring.

It was a good opportunity to get a game under our belts after having a break over Easter, when we didn’t have a scheduled fixture. LA Galaxy have been on a UK tour and were in Manchester last week before coming down to London.

It has to be said, we were more or less an Under-16/17 side playing against an Under-18 team, and we won quite comprehensively in the end. It was a worthwhile exercise and a good workout.

Jack Werndly scored after a long spell out injured, so it was good for him to get his name back on the scoresheet. The goals were shared around, it was a good workout in hot and sunny conditions, and it will keep the boys fit ahead of the final few games of the season.

The Galaxy were enthusiastic and worked hard. They were a little bit tactically naive at times, and individual mistakes cost them possession, but they were quite well-organised. We pressured them a lot and it forced them into making errors.”

With so many schoolboys playing for the U18s, our weakened U16s were beaten 5-2 by the Galaxy on the same morning.

After a three-week break, we returned to league action at MK Dons last Saturday morning, where we continued our encouraging recent run with a 4-0 victory.

MK Dons are bottom of their Academy League group, but they were still determined to give us a good game, but we played well after half-time and, once we had gone ahead, there was only going to be one winner.

The only downsides of the afternoon were the sending-off of Dominic and an ankle injury that will keep Blair out for two-or-three weeks.

Dominic got sent-off for an off-the-ball confrontation when he spat in other boy’s face. It was totally unacceptable and he deserved to be sent-off. We were 4-0 up at the time and it was totally unnecessary. The game was not played that way – it was not a dirty game. It was just a moment of madness and he will now be banned for three matches.

We went in 0-0 at half-time, but we had the best chance of the first half when Dylan got on the end of a low cross from Matthias, but the goalkeeper somehow got in the way of it.

We had a lot of the ball in the first half, but they also created a couple of half-chances and could have gone ahead just before the break. They played a one-two on the edge of our penalty area, but their player took an extra touch and the ball got away from him. After that, we dominated.

Danny scored the first goal on 55 minutes following good work from Dominic, who squared the ball for Danny to make it 1-0. A short time later, we scored again in similar fashion when Matthias finished George Moncur’s low cross.

Dylan put us 3-0 up before Dominic scored a good individual goal, cutting in from the left and firing the ball in off the inside of the far post.

It was a very comprehensive victory in the end. MK Dons had a young side out too on what was a difficult pitch, but our own young players did well and it was obviously good for us to win the game.

Academy Director, Tony Carr writes prior to the Stoke City home game.

Sat, 27 Mar 2010 13:07:43 -0600

We are approaching the end of the FA Premier Academy League season and I have many reasons to be happy with the way things are going on and off the pitch.

We are at the time of the season where the youth team is getting younger and younger. We are blooding the Under-16s regularly and giving them minutes on the pitch. Three or four of them are starting for me and playing a full 90 minutes.

The presence of the younger boys in the team has made the two results we achieved against Crystal Palace and Leicester City recently extra special, because they were both good performances.

Against Palace, it was a terrific display from our boys. We stuck at it in the first half before coming out after half-time and really taking the game to them, which bodes very well for the future.

We did very well against Leicester, too, going up against a team that are unbeaten in the league all season, some 20 matches.

We had a number of schoolboys in the side again, with young Dylan Tombides scoring our goal in a 1-1 draw up there and both Jake Young and Declan Hunt doing well.

Full-back Jake was only making his second start at U18 level, while Declan was making his debut at this level and I was pleased with his contribution off the substitutes bench.

We took the lead midway through the first half and, although Leicester managed to grab an equaliser, we had chances and might well have gone on to win the game.

Conor Okus had a great chance near the end when he got clean through, but he shot straight at the goalkeeper.

We were in action again yesterday at home to Bristol City. The game was moved as we are flying out to Washington DC to take part in the Tiffany Cup youth competition next week.

We will be sending a combined U16/U17 squad to the United States for an all-expenses paid trip following an invite from the West Ham United International Academy, which is based over there.

The International Academy was also instrumental in our recent visit to the Clyde Best Invitational Tournament in Bermuda, and we are grateful for the opportunity to test ourselves on foreign soil again.

This trip has been organised through the International Academy’s development manager, Mike Kelleher, and the Tiffany Cup’s founder and organiser, Elliot Wolfe.

We will be without a few of our best players, who are away on international duty, but we still plan to give a good account of ourselves when we take on Annandale United, DC United and the Georgia national team.

Our visit will also include a sightseeing trip for the boys, taking in the likes of the White House, and a reception at the home of the British Ambassador to the United States, which promises to be an interesting and exciting occasion.

I made mention in my column on Tuesday evening that a number of our young second-year scholars have been told that they will not be offered professional contracts in the summer.

I wish the likes of Peter Loveday, Jack Lampe, Nicky Barrett and Conor all the success in continuing their careers at other clubs, and we will do all we can to help them to do so.

I have been in this job for a long time now, and it is the situation every year at this time that we have to choose between retaining players and letting them go.

One or two of the players who are being released have been here for a number of years. For example, Bondz N’Gala has been here since he was young and has done ever so well to reach the level he has got to, but he’s now going to leave the club. It’s another chapter for him, but I hope he will look back on his time here as being a great experience and a fantastic grounding for his future career as a professional footballer.

It was felt that Bondz would not be a regular in our first team and that it was time for him to move on, and it shows his worth as a player that he has already been snapped up on loan by Plymouth Argyle until the end of the season. I’m sure he’ll do well there.

Some of the other guys may have to wait a little longer for an opportunity, but it is now up to them to keep on playing well, because as one door closes, another one opens. There is life out there after West Ham.

In closing, I just wanted to thank the supporters for the reception I received when I was presented on the pitch before Tuesday’s game. It was wonderful. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time at West Ham, and long may it continue.

Academy Director, Tony Carr writes prior to the Wolves home game.

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 11:35:51 -0600

We have played three matches since my last column, but tonight I shall be concentrating on the first two – a 3-0 win over Crystal Palace and a 1-1 draw with Reading.

The youth team is getting younger and younger, as it always does at this time of the season, as we blood the young Under-16s some minutes on the pitch.

Three-or-four of them are starting for the U18s already and playing every week now – Blair Turgott, Dominic Vose and Robert Hall, in particular – and they are doing very well.

Our victory over Crystal Palace saw both Dominic, who got two goals, and Robert, who got one, get their names on the scoresheet, and I was extremely pleased.

It was even in the first half, with maybe Palace having the better chances, but in the second half we came out and really took the game to them. Once we scored our first goal, it provided a massive boost to our confidence.

Robert scored our first goal with a typical strike, clearing the ball from under his feet before shooting low to the goalkeeper’s left. With the pitch being a bit bobbly, it caught a little bump and bounced over the keeper’s hand.

From that point on, we hit top form and really pushed them back. Dominic’s goals made it an emphatic win for us.

Considering they had the best defensive record in the league going into the game, and were chasing leaders Arsenal from second place, I was really, really pleased with the performance.

With four schoolboys in the side, it was always going to be a tough call physically, but we adjusted one or two things in the midfield that weren’t quite right and we started on the front foot in the second half and, as much as we might have been grateful for being goalless at half-time, we started to dominate the game.

Dominic’s first goal came from a good move in the midfield. We had a two against one situation and Dominic was slipped in and he went round the keeper and drove it in off a defender. Our third goal, he cut in from the left and drove it high into the net from the corner of the six-yard box.

Next up came the visit of Reading to Little Heath for what was a very physical game from start to finish. They played fairly direct football and tested us. It was a battle all the way through.

They got what I thought was a very questionable penalty midway through the first half, when I thought that Callum McNaughton had clearly played the ball and the Reading player slipped and fell.

I thought it was a poor decision from the referee, but at the same time, it is an important lesson for our defenders that they should try to stay on their feet inside their own penalty area. Looking back on the DVD, because Callum was sliding in from slightly behind the player and he didn’t really need to make the challenge, because there were a couple of covering defenders there.

After that blow, as much as we dominated the second half, it didn’t look like we were going to score an equaliser. We were huffing and puffing, but not really creating anything.

Eventually, the goal came courtesy of a free-kick from Dominic, who expertly curled it around the line of defenders, and Eoin Wearen slid in to volley the ball home from about eight yards. It was a difficult volley because the ball was coming across him, but it was a very good and much-deserved equaliser.

In the dying moments, we had a stone-wall penalty which the referee, in his wisdom, did not give. Robert was just about to shoot when one of their defenders took him out. There was no reason for him to go over, and he ended up in a heap on the floor, but the referee waved play-on.

It sounds like sour grapes, but anyone who saw the incidents would agree that we felt hard done-by.

Regardless of how their goal came about, it was good that we showed the fighting qualities to get a point from the game.

It is important for the players to get the experience of playing against different types of systems and teams. They are all a great learning curve for the young players, because it is not always only skill that will win you a game – you need determination and hard work and effort to do well. They are doing a lot of growing up.

I would just like to close by saying that we have made the difficult decision to release four boys at the end of their scholarships this summer.

Peter Loveday, Jack Lampe, Nicky Barrett and Conor Okus have all worked hard and, in some cases, have been with the club for a long time.

It is a difficult time for everyone when we have to make these decisions, but it is important that they now do their very best to make a career at another club. We certainly wish them all the best in doing so.

I shall say more on this issue, as well as giving a full report on Saturday’s trip to Leicester City, in my column on Saturday.

Academy Director, Tony Carr writes prior to the Bolton Wanderers home game.

Fri, 5 Mar 2010 12:08:28 -0700

The wet weather has played havoc with both our training and our FA Premier Academy League programme, causing our away game at Southampton to be called off last Saturday.

The weekend before, however, I was very pleased with our performance in gaining a point from a 1-1 draw at Ipswich Town.

The game was played on a very heavy pitch, and we have reached the time of year when I will blood the Under-16s, so I was happy with the overall performance. I thought we were well worthy of our draw and would have been very unlucky to lose.

They had taken the lead with about five minutes remaining through a long, speculative shot that slipped through the goalkeeper Peter Loveday’s hands, and it looked like we were going to lose the game one-nil.

Then, up popped Dominic Vose after a corner had only been half-cleared, and he curled the ball expertly into the corner for a well-deserved equaliser.

The young Under-16s are starting to show their worth now and I’m looking forward to giving them chances over the final nine or ten games of the season ahead of the next campaign, when many of them will be first-year scholars.

The decisions on which Under-16s we will retain have now all been made. The final player to be offered a scholarship was defender Jake Young, as I didn’t feel I had seen enough of him. He played well against Ipswich and has been offered a scholarship.

We do feel we have got a talented squad at Under-16 level and it was more of a question of who we were not going to take on, rather than who we could take on as scholars. I think we have offered about a dozen scholarships, and with the group of first-year scholars we have this year, we will have a nice little youth team.

Having said that, our reserve team does tend to be very young. At least, with a larger squad, we can relieve the burden from many of them playing two games-a-week, and split their youth and reserve-team commitments.

We are looking forward to next season, but before that, we’ve got nine-or-ten games left of the current Academy season and we want to finish the campaign on a positive note.

In terms of the potential in the squad for next season, however, you temper that with the knowledge that, no matter how good they are, the ratios suggest that you will only produce one or two players who will go through and make it at the highest level.

The excitement for me is that there is real talent in that Under-16 and it would be wonderful if we had three or four lads knocking on the door of the first-team squad in three years time.

Back to the present and it has been difficult for us over the last three weeks. With all the rain about, we have not been able to train properly on the grass, and have had to stay inside and train on the artificial turf.

While that is OK for a day or two, it is not good for the joints if you are training on the harder surface day after day.

We want to demand a certain intensity and tempo to our training, and we cannot do that if we have to train indoors all the time. It is fine for improving technical skills, but running on that surface all the time is not beneficial.

It is the wettest weekend I can remember in all my years here.

On the flip side, we have got a tournament in the United States to look forward to, which is the International Amateur Soccer Tournament – The Challenge for the Tiffany Trophy Cup in Washington DC between 27 March and 4 April.

We will take a mixed Under-16/Under-17 squad as the tournament is for youngsters born in 1993 or later. This splits the group between two teams. I shall take the team out there and hopefully we’ll have a good experience.

The other teams taking part will be of a good standard – Pachuca CF of Mexico, Kaiser Chiefs from South Africa and the local Major League Soccer team DC United as well as a couple of other teams who have yet to be confirmed.

Most of the squad, due to the age restrictions, pick themselves, but there will be two-or-three spots up for grabs.

This invitation has come through a meeting I had with a chap called Elliott Wolf and the competition and all of our expenses are being paid for by the organisers and the sponsors.

We are very happy to have been invited and are delighted to be taking part.

I am also happy to report that tickets for my Testimonial match have gone on sale. I have invited many of the boys who have come through the Academy and gone on to great things, and I am hoping many of them will be able to play on 5 May.

For ticket information click here.