Castilla program is working tbh

The amount of talent coming through our youth ranks is pretty incredible. When you look at the players at Real Madrid or starring for other teams, it's very impressive. It would be nice to get Castilla to Segunda... but i blame our lower league position to coaching, not talent. Honestly, we should be in Segunda and competing at the top of that league.

The only difference I see with Barca is that they actually take a chance on a kid and let him develop. Even if he struggles, he keeps getting the call. Because we haven't had major trophies in a while (Madrid standards) and the pressure to win something every year is so great, our managers can't afford to take that kind of risk.

Arbeloa, Granero and Callejon are examples of players that went away, got seasoning and then came back to the club.

Casillas, Marcelo and Higuain made it directly as there was a unique opportunity that allowed them to beat the odds.

That's 6 home grown products on the roster with 4 of them starring. When you think about it, that's pretty good given that it's Real Madrid.

Not quite sure why people think our Castilla system has not produced for Real Madrid.

All good, but Marcelo and Higuain arent Castilla products.

They compare it to the youth products Barcelona has currently and thus, you would see why they think it isn't working when in truth, Castilla works as fine as it could. The club just doesn't utilizes it as they should.

Marcelo and Higuain came in very, very young and trained with Castilla a lot. May not have been developed there and participate in competition. But definitely benefited from the setup.

They actually progressed while not playing and then got their chance. Great for those two is that they got their chance very quickly.

Did Marcelo and Higgy really train with Castilla? I don't remember that.

marcelo and higuain are as good as castilla as far as i am concerned.

they came in very young and represent alot of the best aspects of being a madridista

Sportczy, you're pushing a little to include Marcelo and Higuain from Castilla just because they practiced a little with them!

The academy has and does consistently produce Lot of talent but the difference to Barcelona, who also continue to produce an abundance of talent is they have a process to mature their talent allowing some to make the jump to the 1st team, I.e. a 2nd division team plus as you stated better (consistent) coaching.

Yeah... but it's key to have bench players at Madrid that are young get proper training. If all you have is the first team, most of the attention goes to the starters and main guys off the bench. The others are left to figure things out themselves. But if you have a good youth program, they have a system to help young guys without experience remain sharp and improve, if they so use it.

Like i said Bill, expectations were completely different at Barca. They were nowhere near the winners we've always been. Now, they're getting closer to ours in terms of expectations. So far, they haven't had a dropoff of results. But as soon as they stop winning as much, it will be interesting to see if they stick with their kids or buy quick fixes. IMO, now that they have signed major sponsors etc., they will no longer be able to take as many risks on youth players.

just my opinion.

sportsczy wrote:Yeah... but it's key to have bench players at Madrid that are young get proper training. If all you have is the first team, most of the attention goes to the starters and main guys off the bench. The others are left to figure things out themselves. But if you have a good youth program, they have a system to help young guys without experience remain sharp and improve, if they so use it.

Like i said Bill, expectations were completely different at Barca. They were nowhere near the winners we've always been. Now, they're getting closer to ours in terms of expectations. So far, they haven't had a dropoff of results. But as soon as they stop winning as much, it will be interesting to see if they stick with their kids or buy quick fixes. IMO, now that they have signed major sponsors etc., they will no longer be able to take as many risks on youth players.

just my opinion.

Actually Sportsczy, I don't think we are saying much different. While Barca have been regularly bring academy players to first division, they also are losing players to other teams.This past summer alone they lost Oriel to Chelsea and at least 2 others in academy that I can't recall names right now plus Boyan and Jefferen. When they do bring players up, they usually play with 2nd level team and get occasional games with 1st team plus the practices plus the coaching methods and philosophies are the same.Thaigo and Fontas last year played with both teams and then made the jump full time to 1st. We can't do that with our 2nd team in 3rd division. That's the problem plus the consistent coaching methods and philosophy!!!!

So in sum our academy does produce an abundance of talent, probably no different than Barca, but our finished product is lacking the necessary maturity which is due to the lack of a liga adelante team and consistent coaching.

Consistent tactics from Real Madrid all the way down thru the youth teams would go a long way... and then actually hiring managers that would adopt those same tactics. This way, the effect on managerial changes on the players would be at a minimum.

I think there's a direct version of total football that we could easily adopt. It would be a modification of the spanish system to take some of the redundant unnecessary passing out... basically, the Brazil offense of yesteryear.