Post by QPR Report on Feb 8, 2009 7:44:52 GMT
Just look at QPR!
David James/The Observer
How do we keep the homegrown keeper? Without proper development the future of English goalkeeping hangs in the balance
It's not his fault, but Shay Given's transfer to Manchester City is bad news for the future of English goalkeeping. It is great, for me personally, to see an older keeper making a high-profile move to as ambitious a club as Man City. However, it begs the question: what will happen to Joe Hart?
I've already backed Joe to be a key part of England's success at 2010 and beyond, but if he isn't getting games in the top flight his future could hang in the balance. It will be tough for him. All season long Joe was number one at City, so what happens now? Will he be shifted to the bench, or farmed out on loan? In either case Joe looks likely to add to the grim statistics on numbers of first-choice English goalkeepers in our top two divisions. It is surprising just how grim those stats are.
Only seven of the Premier League's 20 first-choice keepers are English, and five of those are at clubs stuck in the bottom six – including mine of course. The majority of Premier League clubs don't even have an English number two keeper, while Arsenal, Chelsea and Sunderland have no English keepers on their senior books at all – though technically we'll be one up if Manuel Almunia becomes English this summer. The statistics in the Championship are even less encouraging: nine of the 24 clubs have an English keeper in their starting line-up.
Even clubs with a great history of English goalkeepers seem to be drafting in foreigners. Look at Tottenham: after selling Paul Robinson and Ian Walker they have just one Englishman left on their books – Ben Alnwick – and after two years at the club he has still only played twice for the first team.
What puzzles me is how this ever happened. At the inauguration of the Premier League nearly every club appointed goalkeeping coaches, most of whom were English and charged with the task of overseeing the youth team. So, 17 years down the line why haven't we reaped the rewards? It makes me wonder where our future generations of keepers are going to come from.
Some people may dismiss my concerns as part of a wider problem regarding a lack of English footballers generally, but I would argue that in goalkeeping the challenges faced are specific and acute.
For a start there has always been a tendency for goalkeeping to be overlooked. It is often the last thing on anyone's list. I started my coaching badges two weeks ago, and I have to say it was a fair flick through to the back of the manual before there was anything on goalkeeping. I know there is a separate qualification for goalkeeping coaches but it seems indicative, to me, of a prevailing attitude toward the role.
The frustrating paradox is that coaching goalkeeping actually requires more resources than outfield positions. Unlike David Beckham and Wayne Rooney, who can practise at targets for hours on their own, for a keeper to practise anything other than kicking or throwing he needs other players. And not just any old player, either. To practise saving free-kicks you want a great free-kick taker. It is no coincidence that my best practise session comes at the end of the week when the rest of the team have a shooting competition. That one session always gets me in tune for a match.
wondering if football has become a bit lazy in its attitude toward goalkeeping. It never was entirely proactive, I must admit. When I left Watford – where I had several goalkeeping coaches – to join Liverpool, I had to ask Graeme Souness to bring in a coach for me as they didn't have one. On my first day of pre-season training I asked Ronnie Moran (the first-team coach) where my new goalkeeping coach was. Ronnie said, "Goalkeeping coach? Ray Clemence never had a goalkeeping coach!"
Has that attitude ever changed? It seems to me that some clubs, rather than develop young goalkeepers decide to buy in talent instead. It's easier. The role of goalkeeping coach is pretty labour-intensive. They have a huge amount of responsibility – most of them oversee the development of everyone from the first-team keeper to the youngest players at their club. Colesy [David Coles, Portsmouth's goalkeeping coach] often brings in kids from the Under-10s to watch my training.
So our goalkeeping coaches are overstretched. Perhaps some of them are also not up to scratch. It stands to reason that since most of them have been around forever and not made much progress, perhaps they are not very good. Bar a few great exceptions many of my former goalkeeping coaches were completely unreceptive to new techniques or research. They were very poor communicators; to my mind they epitomised the gulf in quality between a 'trainer' and a 'coach'.
Some people may ask if it even matters if we have no English keepers. If we have top-quality players like Almunia willing to change their nationality then perhaps it's all just an inevitable part of the globalisation of football. Still, in this economic climate the importance of producing your own seems more significant than ever. When I was a kid English goalkeepers were said to be the best in the world. That tradition is being challenged and if we continue to limit opportunities for the next generation of English keepers we could damage the potential of our national team.
David James has donated his fee for this column to charity.
www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/feb/07/david-james-english-goalkeepers-development
David James/The Observer
How do we keep the homegrown keeper? Without proper development the future of English goalkeeping hangs in the balance
It's not his fault, but Shay Given's transfer to Manchester City is bad news for the future of English goalkeeping. It is great, for me personally, to see an older keeper making a high-profile move to as ambitious a club as Man City. However, it begs the question: what will happen to Joe Hart?
I've already backed Joe to be a key part of England's success at 2010 and beyond, but if he isn't getting games in the top flight his future could hang in the balance. It will be tough for him. All season long Joe was number one at City, so what happens now? Will he be shifted to the bench, or farmed out on loan? In either case Joe looks likely to add to the grim statistics on numbers of first-choice English goalkeepers in our top two divisions. It is surprising just how grim those stats are.
Only seven of the Premier League's 20 first-choice keepers are English, and five of those are at clubs stuck in the bottom six – including mine of course. The majority of Premier League clubs don't even have an English number two keeper, while Arsenal, Chelsea and Sunderland have no English keepers on their senior books at all – though technically we'll be one up if Manuel Almunia becomes English this summer. The statistics in the Championship are even less encouraging: nine of the 24 clubs have an English keeper in their starting line-up.
Even clubs with a great history of English goalkeepers seem to be drafting in foreigners. Look at Tottenham: after selling Paul Robinson and Ian Walker they have just one Englishman left on their books – Ben Alnwick – and after two years at the club he has still only played twice for the first team.
What puzzles me is how this ever happened. At the inauguration of the Premier League nearly every club appointed goalkeeping coaches, most of whom were English and charged with the task of overseeing the youth team. So, 17 years down the line why haven't we reaped the rewards? It makes me wonder where our future generations of keepers are going to come from.
Some people may dismiss my concerns as part of a wider problem regarding a lack of English footballers generally, but I would argue that in goalkeeping the challenges faced are specific and acute.
For a start there has always been a tendency for goalkeeping to be overlooked. It is often the last thing on anyone's list. I started my coaching badges two weeks ago, and I have to say it was a fair flick through to the back of the manual before there was anything on goalkeeping. I know there is a separate qualification for goalkeeping coaches but it seems indicative, to me, of a prevailing attitude toward the role.
The frustrating paradox is that coaching goalkeeping actually requires more resources than outfield positions. Unlike David Beckham and Wayne Rooney, who can practise at targets for hours on their own, for a keeper to practise anything other than kicking or throwing he needs other players. And not just any old player, either. To practise saving free-kicks you want a great free-kick taker. It is no coincidence that my best practise session comes at the end of the week when the rest of the team have a shooting competition. That one session always gets me in tune for a match.
wondering if football has become a bit lazy in its attitude toward goalkeeping. It never was entirely proactive, I must admit. When I left Watford – where I had several goalkeeping coaches – to join Liverpool, I had to ask Graeme Souness to bring in a coach for me as they didn't have one. On my first day of pre-season training I asked Ronnie Moran (the first-team coach) where my new goalkeeping coach was. Ronnie said, "Goalkeeping coach? Ray Clemence never had a goalkeeping coach!"
Has that attitude ever changed? It seems to me that some clubs, rather than develop young goalkeepers decide to buy in talent instead. It's easier. The role of goalkeeping coach is pretty labour-intensive. They have a huge amount of responsibility – most of them oversee the development of everyone from the first-team keeper to the youngest players at their club. Colesy [David Coles, Portsmouth's goalkeeping coach] often brings in kids from the Under-10s to watch my training.
So our goalkeeping coaches are overstretched. Perhaps some of them are also not up to scratch. It stands to reason that since most of them have been around forever and not made much progress, perhaps they are not very good. Bar a few great exceptions many of my former goalkeeping coaches were completely unreceptive to new techniques or research. They were very poor communicators; to my mind they epitomised the gulf in quality between a 'trainer' and a 'coach'.
Some people may ask if it even matters if we have no English keepers. If we have top-quality players like Almunia willing to change their nationality then perhaps it's all just an inevitable part of the globalisation of football. Still, in this economic climate the importance of producing your own seems more significant than ever. When I was a kid English goalkeepers were said to be the best in the world. That tradition is being challenged and if we continue to limit opportunities for the next generation of English keepers we could damage the potential of our national team.
David James has donated his fee for this column to charity.
www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/feb/07/david-james-english-goalkeepers-development