We have real quality in the youth players and frank deserves massive credit for giving them their chance this season and it’s brilliant to see them taking it with both hands.

 

It’s hard to choose as I think they’ll all have fantastic careers and reach similar high heights but for me it’s Mount - Derby fell away when he got injured last year and then pushed on again towards the end of the season with him back. He’s been a constant danger when he’s played for us & we certainly looked worse off when we lost him last night. It’ll be interesting to see how they all adapt in the next couple of seasons when they become less of an unknown quantity to other teams. But I think Mount could really be the jewel in our crown of youngsters.

On 17/09/2019 at 16:09, Argo said:

Some Wigan fans think he's the best player to ever wear their shirt.

Its very high praise to say that of a loanee, especially at a club who have got to cup finals and bren established in the PL recently.

Despite a great start I still think there will be ups and downs with Mason, Tammy, Odoi, Tomori but Reece I genuinely believe will give us consistency from the get go, he's well ahead of his years mentally.

High praise indeed considering a recent 'greatest Wigan XI of all time' survey on their official website listed the following as options for right-back:

 

Pascal Chimbonda

Ryan Taylor

James Perch

Our very own Mario Melchiot

...and Reece James

I said about a year ago I expect to see youth develop into our team. What we are seeing now is the first fruits of the academy, but its not a case of "at last" but rather instead the first time this could happen. 

Tammy, Mount, Reece James and Tomori all joined Chelsea in 2004 / 2005 (anything else happen that season?) and CHO in 2007. They've been the first graduates of our academy to join at an early age and be developed all the way through since we revamped our academy 15 years ago after RA came in.

At first, we had a lot of players we bought in from abroad (why we have our bans), but that wasn't the long term goal. It was just necessary at the time. It no longer is, our youth cup winning sides of 10 years ago were a mixed bag of nationalities, but over the last 4-5 years they have been steadily more English and featured players who have developed through the academy for longer. 

For my worth, I think its hard to compare different positions, but all 4 could be starters for the next decade (the big question though is, what about the players that come through in 2, 3, 4 years? We have an academy that is without doubt, top 3 in the world, but more excitingly its been top 3 for a decade. 

Edited September 19, 20196 yr by bisright1

On 17/09/2019 at 09:25, Andy North said:

We have so many good young players performing at a good level at the moment that we are spoilt for choice. Often teams will have the problem of having too many "kids" and there was even a manger who once said "you'll win nothing with kids." We, however, are bucking that trend and seem to be building a new team based on "kids". Will they go on to win anything? Its too early to say but because there are so many of them I was thinking there must be a really good chance that one or two or even more could go on to be top world class players.

Who do you think will go on to be top class and why?

Andy, you need to narrow this down a bit. What are you classifying as "young"? U25, U21, U18?

The way we are going we will probably see an U16 on the pitch before the end of the season!!!

Edited September 25, 20196 yr by just

11 hours ago, just said:

Andy, you need to narrow this down a bit. What are you classifying as "young"? U25, U21, U18?

The way we are going we will probably see an U16 on the pitch before the end of the season!!!

Anybody who's come through the academy in last couple of years. Maybe anybody after and including Christensen. Oh yeh, also including Ampadu. Anybody young really. You know what I mean.

1. Gilmour - magic hat
2. James
3. Hudson-Odoi (arrogance is a good thing on the pitch but he has to "earn the right" to be arrogant, if he thinks he's made it he may have reached his peak early, top players have talent and mentality)
4. Mount
5. Tomori

 

Hudson Odoi is our best youth prospect.

Reece James is a close second with Gilmour 3rd.

Mount and Tomori are good talents and will be great players.

Very difficult to tell what way youth will turn out but with the limited amount I have seen off them. First impressions would say Tomori, Ampadu, CHO, Mount, Reece James, Gilmore.

Really it’s impossible to say and I’ve changed the order a load of times. It’s a bit ridiculous that I have Gilmore last after last nights performance. Kids develop at different stages and at different speeds and although CHO looks like the greatest prospect his development may soon be at an end.

i think that it’s fantastic that we as Chelsea supporters are discussing who is going to be the best out of 6/7 academy players who have played some minutes this season in the first team.  

Its probably a better question to say who will be more successful, on that basis my thoughts are in order:

Tomori

Mount

Abraham

Gilmore

James

with CHO and Ampadu being outside chances for me.

 

16 hours ago, Strider6003 said:

 

with CHO and Ampadu being outside chances for me.

 

controversial ? 

3 hours ago, Bonzodog29 said:

controversial ? 

Yes, I'm left handed had a bad head injury as a youngster which was not identified and have had ESP experiences. 

Doesn't mean I am right though sometimes am yet will look at things differently because of life experiences and some ESP ability (the latter still a work in progress.)

I have also placed us correctly in the table twice in the last 3 seasons near the start of the season.

Last season I was trying betting with small stakes and from Oct-Jan was doing well yet after Jan it stopped working.

On 17/09/2019 at 13:03, RIP Mourinho said:

1) Reece James

2) CHO

3) Mount

4) Tammy

5) Tomori

On ability i rate them as above, not included the likes of RLC and Andreas as they're established first team players now.

Reece James looks like he's purpose built to dominate this league and has the right mentality to go alongside. CHO is the most talented academy player i've seen come thorugh, god given speed and dribbling, expect him to slot straight in when he;s back. Mount i'm surprised by how well he's done, imo RLC is still ahead of him in a CM role but looks so comfortable further up the pitch. Tammy sn't as naturally talented as the others but has the perfect mentality to succeed, luckily was blessed with height and strength too which is helping him. Tomori, still a good player, i don't believe will be a nailed on starter for us any time soon. Rudiger and Christensen are both ahead of him and i hope we're looking at adding a WC CB to the list. However, more than happy for Tomori to be 4th choice and play 30 games a season in cups and sub appearances.

Would put Tomori as 3rd choice behind Rudi and Christensen. Hes definitely ahead of Zouma for me

11 minutes ago, PlayDaYouf said:

Would put Tomori as 3rd choice behind Rudi and Christensen. Hes definitely ahead of Zouma for me

I said have Tomori as 4th choice as we should sign a world class CB to replace Zouma.

2 hours ago, RIP Mourinho said:

I said have Tomori as 4th choice as we should sign a world class CB to replace Zouma.

Lampard has tomori as our number 2 at the moment based on his presser today. Which I think is fair based on this season. 

7 hours ago, bisright1 said:

Lampard has tomori as our number 2 at the moment based on his presser today. Which I think is fair based on this season. 

Comfortable second choice for me, and can see him going beyond that by end of season.

I think CHO is the biggest talent in the group.. in the next two years he will terrorize defenders.. with his pace finishing and vision and end product... he is for me the biggest prospect in the lot

Second for me is Mount/RJ .. we havent seen the best of Mount yet in the 4231 system where he absolutely thrives. He is one of the most intelligent players ive seen and with great technical ability... he reminds me a lot of Kaka in the way scores and handles himself.. and he is also very versatile..  RJ has the lot.. given a season or two he will be competing with TAA for the crown of the best RB in the country..

For his age, tomori is a huge prospect.. pace, strength, technical ability.. I think he can only improve. CBs dont mature till 26 so i think and he will be a big player.. easily better than  AC  on current form..Because for all of AC's touted ability on the ball i dont see the same range from him.. 

 

 

15 hours ago, bisright1 said:

Lampard has tomori as our number 2 at the moment based on his presser today. Which I think is fair based on this season. 

Agreed. Remember i wrote the original post before Tomori had played though. Rightfully fourth choice back then.

CHO was outstanding last season, so far the superstars are Tammy and Mount though, and Tomori isn't far behind. Reece James looked excellent last game.

But I'm going to go with CHO, quite poor last game but he's just came back from a long injury, I'm very confident he will be one of our starting wingers this season. 

I have no idea who's the best or who will be the best but we have a seriously talented group of youngsters coming through 

Mount, Hudson-Odoi, Gilmour, James, Tammy, Tomori. Then add in Pulisic who's 21 and RLC who's still only 23 and we have probably the best group of young players on the planet right now

All of them!

My answer would be different every week.

The future is bright.

Edited September 28, 20196 yr by 2211

12 minutes ago, Sparkz said:

I have no idea who's the best or who will be the best but we have a seriously talented group of youngsters coming through 

Mount, Hudson-Odoi, Gilmour, James, Tammy, Tomori. Then add in Pulisic who's 21 and RLC who's still only 23 and we have probably the best group of young players on the planet right now

And not forgetting Maatsen, Guehi, Ampadu, Anjorin and Gallagher ! We've practically got an entire team.

Just now, Sexyfootball said:

And not forgetting Maatsen, Guehi, Ampadu, Anjorin and Gallagher ! We've practically got an entire team.

You all forgot Jamie Cummings. We need a GK!

I know he’s older but I have RLC number one. 

 

1) RLC 

2) Mount

3) Tomori/Abraham

4) Christensen

5) CHO

6) Gilmour 

 

only seen Reece James once so can’t decide yet but they would be my ratings based on what I’ve seen them do in the first team so far. 

I've only seen him once but first impressions are Gilmour is going to be golden, Scotland have a midfielder in the Strachan mould.

In all honesty i think that our strongest 11 will contain 6 or 7 young players from our academy.

Kepa

*james, rudiger, *tomori, alonso

*rlc, kante, jorginho

*mount, *cho

*abraham

With the likes of christensen getting solid mins, ake potentially coming back and gilmour, ampadu, guehi and maatsen all looking promising it really does show what an incredible academy we have!