Friday, May 04, 2007

Steve Heighway attacks Benitez - but makes a very interesting point...

Former Liverpool star and academy director Steve Heighway has gone on the offensive after being moved aside from his post at Liverpool, who of course beat United in the recent FA Youth Cup final on penalties.

It doesn't look good when the Merseyside Red's have just won the top youth trophy and then the club removes the man at helm of your academy set-up, but that is precisely what happened and perhaps understandably Heighway isn't happy.

The most interesting comment from Heighway is that first team managers like Benitez should not be allowed to influence their own academy. The thought of Fergie not being allowed to influence his own youth set-up seems proposterous, the same must therefore apply at Liverpool.

So is it just sour grapes on the part of Heighway? I don't know the answer to that one but I'd like to hear Heighway's reasoning. One thing I do know is that Fergie has blasted the academy system saying that they haven't worked.

This year's youth cup final was between United and Liverpool, both clubs have an excellent recent history (United more so) of producing home grown talent. The same cannot be said of the likes of Chelsea and Arsenal. English clubs need to get their youth systems right and producing top British talent for the sake of our game.

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