‘United’s backing gave me belief to succeed’
Marcus Rashford says the support he got from his club helped him to win place for England
Rashford. “Anyone who is a proper fan of football does that naturally but it’s always an exciting moment when players come through.”
As promising as silverware is at youth level, it counts for a lot less if players fail to get a chance at club level and, certainly by comparison to Europe’s other leading leagues in Spain, Germany and Italy, England continue to lag behind. The 23 players who went to the Under-21 European Championship with England have made a total of 90 Premier League appearances this season.
By contrast, their Spanish counterparts have gone on to play 181 top-flight games this term – 156 in La Liga and 25 in the Premier League – plus another 14 in the Champions League. And of those 156 La Liga appearances, well over half – 85 – were for the country’s current top five clubs, Barcelona, Valencia, Real Madrid, Atletico Madrid and Villarreal. England’s Under-20 World Cup heroes have not had much of a look in at Premier League level either. Of the 27 top-flight appearances between that squad this season, Everton’s Dominic Calvert-lewin accounts for 11 of them. Similarly, while the average age of England and Germany’s teams at Wembley last Friday was 24½, Germany’s players had won 301 senior caps between them compared to England’s 112 and made 1,725 top-flight club appearances compared to England’s 1,022.
“There’s always room for improvement,” Rashford says. “It’s a matter of how well the players are doing and how often they’re getting the opportunity. I think we’re improving as a nation in terms of promoting younger players. If we keep doing that then hopefully it will only be a success story. You hope players get a chance because everyone is a young player at some time. Everyone needs to be given the opportunity to show what they’ve got to offer their club and country.”
Rashford returned to his old amateur club, Fletcher Moss Rangers, this week to spend time talking to and playing with youngsters who hope to follow in his footsteps and he remains grateful that he joined a club like
‘I think as a nation we’re improving in terms of promoting younger players’
United with a long history of blooding youth. United have had a home-grown player in every match day squad for the past 3,885 games stretching back 80 years.
“It just shows that they’re constantly trying to produce players from the academy and for those players it gives them massive belief,” Rashford said. “At some other academies they don’t get that type of support and belief from the coaching staff and I think United do that very well. It’s important you go to a club where they believe in youth development. The more clubs that are like that, the better it is for each individual.”
Marcus Rashford was celebrating the Mcdonald’s Kit Scheme giving away 250,000 free kits to grassroots football teams.
Visit: www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ betterplay