West Ham United’s under-18s will be hoping to lift the FA Youth Cup title for the first time since 1999 when they take on Arsenal on Tuesday night at the Emirates Stadium.
The under-18s side, managed by former West Ham defender Kevin Keen, are having a season to remember, having won the Under-18s Premier League South title for the first time ever and facing Manchester City in the coming weeks in the national final, with a qualification spot in next season’s UEFA Youth League up for grabs.
They are now in the final of the highly prestigious FA Youth Cup for the first time since 1999, a side that included the likes of Joe Cole and Michael Carrick, who won the title for the third time in their history with a 9-0 win over Coventry City in the final over two legs, with Carrick and Richard Garica (twice) scoring in a 6-0 second leg win at Upton Park.
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One man who ranks among the best and most successful players to come through West Ham’s academy is club legend, former captain and now sporting director Mark Noble, who only took up the role on January 1, little over seven months after retiring from professional football.
In his role, a big part of his remit revolves around trying to get the best out of the club’s young players coming through and he has been gifted with one of the best groups of players to come through West Ham’s ranks in the past two decades, helped by having son Lenny in the club’s under-13s.
One of Noble’s focusses is creating the right pathway and with former head of academy Ricky Martin leaving at the end of last year, Noble’s recent time around
“For me it was one of the main objectives,” said Noble. “My boy’s here (Lenny), so in the last five years with him, I was here constantly anyway.
“When I took a job, because I didn't start until January, I was like, right, we had Ricky Martin, who was the academy manager at the time, he was leaving. Because I'd been here so much, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.
“I knew the staff that I wanted to put in place, the coaches that I wanted to move up, because I think it's so important that the culture in the academy is, it's not a revolving door, these are kids. They need to know who they're working with. They need to have a relationship with their coaches, and they need to be able to walk in here and know the Under 16s coach, the Under 12s manager. So they do a bit of blending.
“But at the minute, this place is fantastic. The academy is moving in such a great direction, the players we're bringing through, the success of our teams. It's a place now that kids want to come and play because for one, they see a pathway and for two, they see a real sort of cohesion and a team spirit that all the coaches here drive.”
Speaking to football.london last month ahead of the 6-1 FA Youth Cup semi-final win over Southampton, under-18s manager Keen and head of academy Kenny Brown, a big sell of West Ham’s academy has been the pathway to the first-team, as well as having a side at that level on course for a league and cup double at under-18s level.
Noble echoed those thoughts and says that they may not have the financial resources or other clubs inside and outside of London, but the quality of young players, the staff in place to allow them succeed, pathway to the first-team and number of ex-players in the coaching staff with West Ham connections makes them a key selling point to younger players.
“Financially, financial power, we can't compete with the Man Citys, the Chelseas, even the Arsenals and even Spurs to a degree with their facilities,” Noble explains. “But you know here that every door is open.
“Yesterday I walked in here and trained with the Under 18s and five of six of the 18s players were taking penalties in the gym against Jamie, who's their education coach who they do their classes with. He’s having a laugh with them in there. Or our chef, Adam, down in the kitchen. We were sitting discussing the Southampton FA Youth Cup semi-final with the coaches and the way Kev and Gerard and Mark wanted to play, and Adam was up with us talking about players. He went to watch the semi-final with Man City and Arsenal.
“So this place is special. It always has been, but as soon as I got the job I wanted to keep that going. I always say to the staff here, “How do we keep replicating that?” How does it not get stale? How do we keep having myself, the sporting director of West Ham United, played hundreds and hundreds of games for the club, training with our Under 14s, and 16s, and 18s before their FA Youth Cup final?
“Yesterday, Bobby Zamora came in. Zavon Hines joined yesterday. Paul Konchesky is here with the women. Carlton Cole joins in. It’s a real team spirit. Whether I'm the sporting director, or Kenny is the academy manager, it doesn’t matter. When we're in that coach's room, or when we're outside, everyone's equal. The players feel a real comfort in that.
Unlike virtually all people in a similar role to Noble at the highest level of football, Noble is training with the club’s young players, regularly taking part in the full duration of training sessions with those at academy level, regularly training with Keen’s under-18s side, the under-18s side containing his son and others in between.
That is a key selling point for the club when approaching younger players and their parents, seeing Noble and other players formerly at the club involved in sessions and giving advice.
Among those is under-18s playmaker George Earthy, who has been a key player in Keen’s side this season, although Noble’s competitive spirit has certainly not faded in his retirement.
“It's part of my remit to know who's coming through,” explained Noble. “It’s alright watching a game or watching training, but if I'm actually in the middle and I'm training, you see a different point of view of the players and how good they are and what they need to work on.” “Yesterday I sat with one of our 18s players, a midfielder, for half-hour and and went through these clips of the FA Youth Cup and how he can improve. He was asking me questions like, ‘What would you do here?’ And I don’t need to do that. Do you know what I mean? But I feel like if I was a kid or if I was a youth-team player coming through, would I have liked that? Of course I would have. That's why this place has got such a special feel to it.
“They have to hold back on me, actually! I'm sure he won't mind me telling you this. George Earthy, who you've seen, a player who is really technical, both-footed player. Kevin Keen, the manager, has these really competitive skills games. Really technical, where you’ve got to clip the ball in the goal, hit the crossbar or da da.
“On Tuesday morning when I trained, I let George know who was boss. I think Kev tried to test a real technical player against me and it backfired on him and I ended up beating him 6-2! I texted him that night saying, ‘George, mate, you might wanna take a look in the mirror.’ “But that’s what’s great. It’s all part of the club and that's the way it should be. That's what we want to keep going and that's why I keep saying, how can we get better? How can we keep replicating this year on, year out? “
Facing Keen’s side in Tuesday’s FA Youth Cup final is an Arsenal side managed by former Gunners and West Ham midfielder Jack Wilshere, who was a teammate of Noble’s at the London Stadium seven times across the 2018/19 and 19/20 seasons.
In the league, West Ham’s under-18s won the south league title at a canter, but in their cup run, Arsenal have proved they will be a test, having beaten northern league champions Manchester City in the semi-finals earlier this month.
Although they will be rooting for opposite sides in Tuesday night’s final, Noble and Wilshere remain in contact with each other and West Ham’s sporting director believes it would have been a waste for Wilshere to not go into coaching after being forced retire aged 30 last year due to injury.
“I speak to him all the time,” Noble revealed. “Jack's time at West Ham didn't go the way we all wanted it to go but I can assure you that for the time he was here we had an incredible time together.
“We've got a great relationship, we speak regularly. We spoke a lot when he was thinking about retiring because he'd had enough of the injuries. He's such a great fella. He rang for my advice and I gave it to him.
“I'm so pleased Arsenal have taken him in and he's become their U18s coach, he's taken them to a Youth Cup final. When the U18s played Arsenal the other day at Rush Green, he came over before kick-off and I shook his hand but I said: 'Jack, look, I'm not going to say good luck because I don't mean it'. He called me something, obviously. But it's great, you love to see the boys you played with go on. You never know, one day he might become Arsenal's manager.
“He was technically such a good footballer, so clever. For him, retiring quite early, it would've been a waste if he didn't go back into football, and coaching was the obvious thing. To be honest, I didn't think he'd go in that early but he's taken to it. I love him to bits, but obviously I hope we beat them on Tuesday night.”
As a player, Noble’s run in the Youth Cup came shortly after the golden generation of 1999 and just before, with Noble first featuring in a Youth Cup squad at the age of 15, including a trip to Manchester City in a squad alongside Antonio Ferdinand and Graeme Carrick, with Kasper Schmeichel, Bradley Wright-Philips, Nedum Onouha and Keiren Westwood among the City squad that day.
Two seasons later, Noble’s last being eligible for the competition before becoming too old to play in it, he scored a hat-trick during a win over Gillingham in the competition.
Noble recalls those memories in this competition fondly and says that the current crop of under-18s will not forget their run in this season’s competition.
“Do you know what this is? This is how bad it is. When I was retiring, my mum brought round a box of old cuttings and programmes and stuff,” Noble recalled.
“I was reading them, one of them was an FA Youth Cup tie, I think against Nottingham Forest, and I think I'd scored and assisted the goal and I can't remember it! Can you believe it? I can't remember the game. I can't remember what goal I scored. It's mad, but then I can remember back further than that.
“I remember playing in the Under 14s at West Ham but I can't remember that game! But the FA Youth Cup was always so special. I remember scoring a hat-trick once and then playing at Upton Park under the lights, it’s so special. The boys will not forget this one.”
Despite the long traditions of this competition, it still matters a great deal to West Ham’s players, looking to etch themselves in history and be the first West Ham side since 1999 to lift the trophy.
In the previous 17 seasons of the competition, Aston Villa and Norwich City (once each) have been the only non ‘big-six’ sides to win the trophy, further outlining how much of an achievement it would be to win. All 17 of those finals have contained at least one ‘big six side,’ ten of which contained two.
For a side desperate to build on their south league trophy win, Noble has outlined how much this trophy would mean to them, with the bigger picture being aiming to get these players careers at the games at the highest level, whether that’s at West Ham or not.
“Of course, especially now they've won the league already,” Noble exclaimed. “They deserved it, they've been fantastic. Winning the league and now being able to concentrate on the Youth Cup. For West Ham, it would be fantastic.
“It just shows we're doing it right. If you're good enough and you come through the system here, you're going to get a chance. I'm not saying you're always going to have a career like me, or Declan or Ben Johnson or whatever. But the likes of Emmanuel Longelo or Josh Cullen, who go out and make a career for themselves. That doesn't mean you're a failure at West Ham, it means you've done something that a small minority of people in the country have done. You've become a footballer. You earn a living from football, which is fantastic.”
West Ham’s first-team have struggled at senior level for much of this season, but with just one defeat in their last six games, they have moved up to 13th in the Premier League, six points clear of the Premier League’s relegation zone, as well as booking their place in the semi-finals of the Europa Conference League.
Premier League survival and a potential Europa Conference League trophy, as well as the Under-18s Premier League South title, and potentially more silverware in the FA Youth Cup and national league finals could make this a very special season for the Hammers.
Noble says that having won the competition almost 25 years ago and then breaking into the first team in east London, former Hammers star Joe Cole became Noble’s hero, giving him something to aim for.
Should Keen’s side manage to recreate the achievements of Cole and co, as well as West Ham’s first-team go on to achieve their goals, it will give everyone at the club something to cheer about.
“Yeah, people still remember when Joe Cole won it years and years ago,” Noble revealed.
“I watched the game. Joe's my friend now but he was my hero at the time because he was breaking through in the first-team and I was in the academy. But it gets remembered forever, that's what things like that do.
“It'd be incredible if we go on to win the Conference, if the boys win the Youth Cup and obviously the main aim is for the first team to stay in the Premier League. If all works out, we'll be celebrating.”
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