Historically West Ham United has been associated with a philosophy of nurturing our youth players and integrating them into the first team. The term ‘Academy of Football’ was first dubbed by the media as recognition for the floods of talent being produced via our youth teams which included world cup winning trio Bobby Moore, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst. We then saw a golden era in the late 1990s and early 2000s with the likes of Joe Cole, Jermaine Defoe, Michael Carrick, Frank Lampard and Rio Ferdinand all progressing through to represent our first team. But since that we have seen a decline in the number of youth players deemed good enough to be promoted to the senior squad. Can we still call ourselves the Academy of Football?
When we look back over time and compare our more recent graduates with the older ones, then there is an evident decline which can be observed. We have produced the likes of Alvin Martin, Tony Cottee, Alan Devonshire and Trevor Brooking as well as those names mentioned in the previous paragraph. Since the early 2000s, however, our academy has only managed to produce the likes of Elliott Ward, Freddie Sears, Zavon Hines and Junior Stanislas. Each of those players have shown potential but were never good enough to represent us at the highest level. Ward and Stanislas are both currently substitutes at Bournemouth, Sears has just moved to Ipswich from Colchester and Hines plies his trade at Dagenham and Redbridge following an unsuccessful spell at Bradford. There is a clear striking contrast between our more recent academy products and the graduates from the past who have helped establish our reputation as the academy of football.
It might be argued, however, that the two graduates starring in our senior team at the moment are unsung heroes. Mark Noble has been one of West Ham’s most consistent performers since his debut more than 10 years ago. He is our record appearance holder in the Premier League with 205 and tends to dominate the midfield with less recognition than he deserves, particularly from the England selectors. James Tomkins has also developed nicely into a regular for our first team after a shaky start to his Hammers career. He has built a solid partnership with Winston Reid over the past few years and is a more than competent Premier League defender. These two examples could demonstrate that our academy is still functioning and equipping some players for first team football.
We might also consider the future to be looking slightly brighter. Amongst our youth ranks is 16 year old Reece Oxford, a 6’3’’ centre back who has captained England under-17 and West Ham under-21 despite his tender years. Having been linked with Manchester United and Arsenal in the summer, he committed his future to the Hammers by signing a new contract on the pitch at Upton Park before the FA Cup game vs. Everton. He was also an unused substitute for our Capital One Cup game vs. Sheffield United earlier this season despite only being 15 at the time. He looks a talented prospect and definitely has the potential to represent the first team in the next few years. Alongside him is the highly sought after Oscar Borg who was also subject to interest from the bully boys recently. Few may know that Raheem Sterling was once on West Ham’s books; if we can prevent the ‘big’ clubs from poaching our young talent then maybe we will get back to producing more players of first team quality.
Overall, I think we can still take pride in our academy. We have recently seen the departures of the likes of Jordan Spence and George Moncur to League One clubs but every academy is going to have its successes and failures. We must concentrate on developing players to their best possible standard and trying our hardest not to act as a feeder club for the bigger clubs who are looking more and more at other clubs’ youth academies to scout the next upcoming talents. We must forget about those that do not quite live up to expectations and focus upon the next generation of potential first teamers to fully restore our reputation and philosophy as a club which benefits from its production of home-grown academy players.
