Rising to the challenge of finding United’s next homegrown star
The challenging task of finding Newcastle United’s next homegrown star falls to Ben Dawson and his team. Chief NUFC writer Lee Ryder takes a look behind the scenes at the Magpies’ Academy
IT’S the day after Newcastle United boss Rafa Benitez handed Sean Longstaff his Premier League debut at Liverpool, but the work to find the next first-team player from the club’s Academy pool has already started.
We’re a good couple of decades on since Sir John Hall declared he wanted a team of Geordies wearing the famous black-and-white stripes, and the days of signing a cheque to land another Alan Shearer for a world record fee are long gone under Mike Ashley.
But trawling the playing fields of Tyneside continues, and for Geordie coach Ben Dawson at the top of the club’s operation to discover the next homegrown star, the task has never been so challenging.
That’s because local lads don’t just need to be good footballers, they need to be able to step on to the biggest stage of all in the Premier League and compete with the best players on the planet.
It may have been missed by the Match of the Day cameras on the night, and it probably meant very little to most people, but when Longstaff glided around two Liverpool players and fired in a shot straight at the goalkeeper, he’d left £120m worth of talent in Virgil van Dijk and Fabinho on their backsides and had forced £53m goalkeeper Alisson Becker into a save!
Benitez is happy to give youngsters a chance but they must reach the required standard – which is the daily challenge of Dawson and his staff.
Dawson said: “In general across the country we have the lowest number of homegrown players playing. We know how big the task is here. I suppose it’s a catch 22 because the Premier League wants to be the most compelling and competitive league in the world.
“With the finance that is available you can just go out and buy international, ready-made superstars.
“We have the job of trying to produce those type of players.
“That makes it even more difficult.”
In recent years, only Paul Dummett has emerged from the Academy and gone on to be a Premier League regular, and at Watford this season he reached 100 top-flight appearances. Even then, Dummett was just days away from being released by the club at one stage as Alan Pardew told him he would never make it in the first team.
Another Geordie to break through in more modern times was Andy Carroll, of course. But, again, as a gangly teenager the club almost released him until former coach John Carver intervened and argued that they could have a player on their hands in the future due to the uniqueness of his powerful left foot and height.
Carroll actually arrived at the club as a left back before being sold to Liverpool for £35m in 2011 as a fullyfledged England striker.
But few have followed the path of Dummett and Carroll since.
In the Academy gym there is a painting of a young player in a Newcastle shirt that simply reads: “Who’s next?”
Down the corridors each youth player’s name is pinned on the walls with a list of their attributes and what they must improve on.
It wasn’t too long ago that the entire Under-23 squad sat side by side with the seniors at the first-team training ground.
However, Benitez quickly changed that in his first few days in charge because he wanted young players to see training alongside the senior squad as a privilege – not a given. As one young player walked past then club captain Fabricio Coloccini with barely a flicker of emotion back in 2016 it summed up the need for change.
These days there is a promotion/ relegation system in place if players do well. Good performances at the Academy will result in being pushed up to the first-team camp.
The sight of Achraf Lazaar and Rolando Aarons underlines what happens if you don’t impress Rafa.
Yet the main aim is to produce local talent at United.
With just 138 registered players at the Academy and 100 more youngsters from under-eights upwards in development centres and shadow squads, the challenge of finding another Carroll, Dummett or Longstaff is still a tough one.
Newcastle’s youth staff Ben Dawson have picked out 31 players from the last 10 years they see as first-team material – with each player’s portrait on the wall in the club gym. Aarons, signed as a kid from Bristol City, is one on that list and so are players such as Shane Ferguson, James Tavernier, Sammy Ameobi, Jak Alnwick and Adam Armstrong, to name a few. Dawson said: “We have had 31 come through in the last 10 years. “We look at the effectiveness of the loan system and whether they are better staying here and playing for the Under-23s.
“It is very much individual. “Andy Carroll had made his debut against Palermo but then didn’t start a first-team game for over two years. “He went out on loan but it is more looking at the numbers and how do they get to their debut.
“Is there anything that looks simi-
I don’t think there is a magic formula to it but you have to find a way that works