THE Brexit brawn drain of Scotland’s top teenage talent to leading clubs in England has raised fears that youth academies in this country, many of which are now operating at a significant annual loss because of the mass exodus of leading prospects down south, could be forced to close down in future.
Yet, John Nelms, the Dundee managing director, yesterday emphasised that producing homegrown players who are capable of representing the first team will remain at the forefront of the Dens Park outfit’s business strategy for the long-term future.
Fans of the Premiership side were bitterly disappointed back in August when 16-year-old centre-half Sebastian Lochhead departed for Wolves in a £300,000 transfer without kicking a ball for them in a competitive fixture at senior level.
Clubs in England have started targeting gifted Scottish footballers at a far younger age than in the past in recent years because the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union means they can no longer sign 16 and 17-year-olds from the Shengen Area.
The alarming trend led to one senior executive to suggest in these pages that club owners, particularly foreign owners, could start to question why they are spending seven figure sums to run age-group squads every year if they are no longer making multi-million pound profits on their outstanding academy alumni.
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However, Nelms has stressed that Dundee, who are owned by his fellow American Tim Keyes, are fully committed to bringing through even more young Scots in the years ahead and expressed hope the construction of a new training ground on the Riverside site in the city will enable them to do so.
“For Dundee, or for any club of our size, I think it's paramount,” he said yesterday as he provided the media with an update on their planning application to build a new stadium at Camperdown Park. “That's something that Tim and I have always said - that we want to develop our own players.
“The first group of players that came through our academy - the likes of Lyall Cameron, Josh Mulligan, Fin Robertson – are all in the first team now. It does come in waves, but it's utterly important to us.
“We're very proud of the fact that right now we have Scotland Under-21 internationals [Cameron, Mulligan and Robertson], an Austrian Under-21 international [Burnley loanee Oluwaseun Adewumi] and an England Under-20 international [Leicester City loanee Sam Braybrooke). That's paramount to what we're doing.
“It's a fine balance to get that right. You can go too young, and you could say sometimes too naïve. But that's what we're trying to work into them, to give them the understanding of the game, the street smarts that you have to have to win games.
“You also need role models so the young players can say, ‘That's what I need to do, they're the ones that are going to drag me to the next level’. That's important and it's a very fine line to walk. If you get it right, it's fantastic. If you get it wrong, you get relegated. So it's a fine line.”
“It gives time back to the family, which is important, and time back to education, instead of driving around to places to train. That's something that we think is important.
“But this training ground facility will allow us to have a home and some place where you can aspire to be. You're there with the first team. You can see what's happening. And that goes all the way down to the four-year-olds that will be at Riverside West End. They will see that pathway. They'll see what's going on.
“This facility is going to be great, not just for the football club but for the community. Football is a great catalyst to get the community together and raise up the community. And I think we've done that over the years. So the utilisation of that site now is going to go through the roof for the local community.
“We started the work so we can get this thing moving as quickly as possible. The idea is hopefully by this summer, the teams will be utilising the pitches. The building will be there or thereabouts. It's fully designed.
“Being based at Dundee College has been fantastic. But for the football club to have our own home, a place where all the work is done, will be great. The young kids being able to see it and aspire to be there, to be at our home, will be invaluable.”
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Meanwhile, Nelms has revealed that Lochhead, who played in the Dundee first team in friendly and pre-season matches aged just 15, had moved to Wolves with their full blessing and predicted the Dens Park club will profit further financially from the transfer in the future if his development continues as expected.
“Seb had an opportunity to go to a Premier League club,” he said. “His family was quite keen on it. And we thought at the time, ‘This is the right time for him to go’.
“At a very young age, you don't know what's going to happen. So we thought it would be best for the football club, best for the player and best for everybody all around that he takes the next step. There's a load of add-ons and things that go along with that. So the club will continue to benefit.
“Seb is a wonderful young man. And as he continues to develop and his career grows, the football club will be a part of that. I think there's times that we've held on to players longer than we should have. We've learned from that.
“When is the right time to go? That's the secret sauce, having that understanding, isn’t it? There is no 100 per cent right answer. You get it right sometimes, you get it wrong sometimes.
“We make the best decision that we can at the time, and that's what we've done. The opportunity for Seb to be at a Premier League club and really take the next step? We think that's fantastic for him.”
