Project Brave rumbles on..

[Ludo*1]

Yes they were. I’ve seen the drawings.

Have ye aye?

[1320Lichtie]

Have ye aye?

Yes.

I’m not sure why you’re being sarcastic.

[1320Lichtie]

A draft only works if no other countries play the sport.

Why would a promising 16 year old go to Montrose if (say) wolves offered 5k a week?

A draft would be completely unworkable anyway. Sounds great but it’s idealistic and would never be a reality.

[parsforlife]

Do Hamilton/kilmarnock/motherwell actually have their own indoor facility? Seems a huge cost for clubs of their size.

[stumigoo]

A draft only works if no other countries play the sport.

Why would a promising 16 year old go to Montrose if (say) wolves offered 5k a week?

True, I’m just spouting alternatives that would never happen as a way of trying to deflect from reality.

[1320Lichtie]

Here's a thought: 
In Tayside, United and St Johnstone wouldn't want to be left behind if Dundee got Elite status; ditto any single team vs. the remaining two.
In Glasgow, Partick Thistle are already being left behind. You can imagine they've at least thought about what might need to be done to catch up.
Could it be we're all being played as fools and the real aim of Project Brave is to put clubs in competition with each other in an attempt to bring ALL youth systems up to scratch?

[emoji23]

What an effort that would be.

[happyaccie]

21 minutes ago, betting competition said:

Fair enough and a good enough assessment of Aberdeen failing  with youth after Alex Ferguson left which has really continued till now.

I agree that Aberdeen best prospects is in youth development although we don't have bases in Edinburgh and Glasgow like we used to and now concentrate getting those from the North East - McInnes mentioned this in an interview and although he would have liked these bases to remain but it was a financial decision.  

I hope that McInnes has sorted out our youth system and I've heard from those in the club our next batch of youth are amazing - I heard this weekend we got great results against Celtic U15 and U17. I also heard that the SFA have changed the type of football kids play and it is more on the deck so be interesting to see the Under 20's in a few years time. 

I do think Hamilton deserve to be in the elite level of youth development as they are club that is punching above its weight due to having an excellent youth system - don't like your pitch though  

I agree with your post, I wasn't aware you no longer had bases in Edinburgh & Glasgow, it is a shame as clubs like Aberdeen & Dundee Utd had a good record of discovering young talent in the 80s, both clubs youngsters contributing in a big way to their respective clubs European campaigns.

I bear you no I'll feeling with regard to your views on our pitch.

[capt_oats]

3 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

Do Hamilton/kilmarnock/motherwell actually have their own indoor facility? Seems a huge cost for clubs of their size.

I imagine Accies and Motherwell will have access to Ravenscraig (maybe even Toryglen). In the same way that neither Hearts or Hibs own Oriam but can use the facilities.

[parsforlife]

I imagine Accies and Motherwell will have access to Ravenscraig (maybe even Toryglen). In the same way that neither Hearts or Hibs own Oriam but can use the facilities.

So one of the key and costly requirements is based purely on geographical luck?

[capt_oats]

1 minute ago, parsforlife said:

So one of the key and costly requirements is based purely on geographical luck?

[Booker-T]

21 hours ago, capt_oats said:

Possibly. Maybe. Who knows?

This is the brief the SFA announced: http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottish_fa_news.cfm?page=2986&newsID=16742&newsCategoryID=1

Gordon Waddell has been good at covering it since the story broke that there was this radical re-shape happening and there's been a lot of conjecture about what's actually going on with it. The first article he did outlined some of the key points (below) however since then the focus has really just been on the whole 8 team elite and the self interest at play. The issue being that teams will be locked out the elite grouping if they don't meet the criteria. Upshot there is if a talented kid has the choice between an "elite" club and a "performance progressive" club then he'll naturally go to one of the "elite" which means the other teams will limited in their player pool.

For all Regan and the SFA have undoubtedly fucked it in so much as they seem to have railroaded this through the self-interest on the part of the clubs is an issue as well. 

In the first article I could find from Waddell on the whole thing there was a list of fairly reasonable points and it covers the whole whole thing in a pretty broad sense: http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfa-spark-civil-war-stewart-9291119

For me the SPFL Trophy thing is really just semantics, they'll call it a RESERVE league and ex-players will get all misty eyed thinking about the good old days but the reality is that the Development League as it is allows for up to 5 overage players to play, so y'know...absolutely f**k all difference.

Really, there's not a huge amount in there that is really contentious IMO. The only real issue seems to be sides having to spend shitloads to meet the necessary criteria for 'elite' status. Being a dick about it most clubs want "elite" status but only a handful have the resources to easily meet the criteria.

There have been a few articles on the whole shitshow along the way over the past year they're in the spoiler below if you can be arsed reading them.

  Hide contents

20/11/16 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/opinion/sport/project-brave-innovative-good-game-9296181
18/12/16 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfa-plan-introduce-rangers-celtic-9474428
08/01/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfas-project-brave-smash-through-9582736
08/01/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfa-draft-top-euro-performance-9582531
02/04/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/sfas-project-brave-faces-backlash-10143231
07/05/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfas-project-brave-faces-full-10372547
24/09/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/clubs-fail-last-ditch-bid-11226982
24/09/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/how-stewart-regan-enraged-top-11225188
08/10/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/roy-macgregor-slams-sfa-amid-11304165
12/11/17 http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/eight-premiership-clubs-spearhead-project-11508002

 

it's just another reserve league, although i understand the point of the overage players it wont work the way they think it will... the overage players will treat the matches like friendlies.

[happyaccie]

15 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

So one of the key and costly requirements is based purely on geographical luck?

Accies as far as I know have no plans for an indoor facility, but did have plans to put a dome roof structure behind the goal at the Sainsbury end of the ground which would cover a 5 a-side area playing surface.

ETA I don't know if this was to adhere to Project Brave requirements or was just the clubs idea to improve our current facilities.

[kennysmassiveego]

40 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

Do Hamilton/kilmarnock/motherwell actually have their own indoor facility? Seems a huge cost for clubs of their size.

Killie don’t have an indoor facility at the moment but the talk is that Billy Bowie is looking around for a site to build one on . The rumour is that if we do we will get rid of our plastic pitch which for that reason alone should be wholeheartedly supported 

[D Angelo Barksdale]

Reckon we should just give all the funding to Hamilton tbh.

Imagine, 11 JamesMcArthurs taking the 2026 World Cup by storm.

[LinkinFighter]

The singling out of Hamilton here is hilarious [emoji38].

[happyaccie]

10 hours ago, harry94 said:

It's all a bit of a mystery right now as we don't really have access to the information about the specific criteria required and what was demanded of the clubs but as far as I'm aware, Nelms and the board are absolutely seething about this and have been working on this project from a really early stage. Their talking points about money they pledged towards a new training facility (initially more than £1 million towards a shared council facility which failed in planning but they've moved on to the new stadium + training ground facility which they are aiming for planning permission at the start of next year). I also know for a fact that the posts advertised were planned a long long time before.

Now, maybe Dundee didn't have a bid that was within the eight best (and from a perspective of the record of youth development - Hamilton have been outstanding at this for the last decade and deserve plaudits), I don't know, but at this stage we don't really know anything. The arbitrary limit of eight teams seems seriously short-sighted.

I suspect though that they've maybe made a requirement for an indoor facility firm to root out the Tayside clubs in an effort to filter down to eight. There just isn't any facility like that here (in terms of a full 11aside indoor pitch) but there will be in a few years when the new regional performance centre is built.

In all honesty, if the board are sincere about their intentions and commitments towards youth development, they should just go ahead with their work and there isn't anyone in the area with superior status to handicap us. Once the new facility is built, some other new scheme will come around when Scotland get humped in qualification a few times and we'll repeat the process all over again to target 'Project Courageous'.

 

8 hours ago, Ludo*1 said:

Just to mention - for whatever reason, and like most I don't know the reason - Nelms was known to be seething when this whole Project Brave was announced and dead set against it. f**k knows what changed his mind with the posts being advertised in a late attempt to snag a place - but there's obviously some political manoeuvring going on with all the club's at the moment.

Two contrasting versions from fans of Dundee, one clearly stating that the club had been working on Project Brave from the early stages in an attempt to be considered an elite club.

The later post stating that Nelms was dead set against Project Brave, until recently, with coaching posts being advertised to meet 1 of the criteria required to be considered.

With conflicting views from 2 individuals supposedly from the same camp so as to speak, is it any wonder they currently occupy bottom spot in the Premiership table. 

The fractious element within the Dundee fans, must surely be affecting the players during matches.

This will be refuted by Dundee fans but it's clear to see from the quoted posts, even their fans sing from different song sheets.

[Smokiejohn]

Killie don’t have an indoor facility at the moment but the talk is that Billy Bowie is looking around for a site to build one on . The rumour is that if we do we will get rid of our plastic pitch which for that reason alone should be wholeheartedly supported 

Heard Killie will be using Ravenscraig in the meantime ... gonna be a busy place ! ( Airdrie’s first team use it too )

[capt_oats]

Mentioned it before in this thread but here's Alan Burrows talking about Project Brave on the MFC Podcast back in January. Covers a lot of the stuff in this thread. If you've got a spare hour and an interest in this stuff (feel free to patch it before the preview of the Rangers cup game!) then it's worth a listen.

http://www.mfc1886.com/mfc-podcast-2016-17-episode-21/

Edit: the Dundee mention is around 38 mins @Ludo*1

[LinkinFighter]

Loving it TBH.
The bitterness just oozes out of the city of Dundee.
 

Jealous of Lanarkshire imo.

[PauloPerth]

7 hours ago, DA Baracus said:

Except the aim of Hamilton's youth system is to produce players for the Hamilton first team. By that standard it's been, and continues to be, a huge success. Their youth system wasn't created to produce national players. I don't thin the youth system of any club is set up just to produce players for the national team. A quite bizarre argument.

Surely youth systems, as well as aiming to produce players for the first team, are also aiming to get as many kids involved in football as possible? If they're good enough they'll progress, if not they won't, but at least they'll be given a chance. I would imagine that participation should be a huge part of the aim of a national set up, as the SFA and SPFL have a duty as the ruling bodies to grow participation across all youth age groups. Their sole aim shouldn't just be to make Scotland better when they play Georgia or Lithuania etc. That should almost be a by product of it.

Project Brave seems to have no aims other than to benefit a select few clubs and f**k all others. A truly disgraceful scheme that really should see folk marching on Hampden and mass protests across the country. As we're a nation of shitebags though we'll sit back and accept it.

I disagree. The focus of the sfa regarding elite player development is precisely to develop top level Scottish players.  Do you think if the programme resulted in 6 players gaining caps for Ireland, 4 for Wales, a few for n.ireland but none for Scotland it will be deemed successful? 

I think you are mixing up youth programmes with community programmes. Many clubs in Scotland throughout the leagues have community programmes which offer participation for kids from toddler age right through, including women's, disabled and various other groups of society, that in many cases are part-funded by the sfa.  I think our community programme is generally good; it's at elite development, which project brave is attempting to tackle, that we've failed for a long time.

Your last paragraph I agree with.