Why Guardiola missed a trick by not putting a kid on bench

SOME people don’t see a problem. Six substitutes? You can only use three, so what harm did Pep Guardiola do at Burnley last Saturday?

But then there is the other side of the argument. There were six substitutes but one big missed opportunity. Even now, a week on, I cannot understand why Manchester City’s manager did not fill up his bench with a seventh player from the club’s Academy.

When I heard what Guardiola had done at Turf Moor, I tried to put myself back too how I would have felt when hen I was a young lad at Tottenham, doing g all I could to try to get my first real experience of being around the first team.

Of course you want to play as early as possible but t one of the big milestones eung for a young footballer is that moment oment when you get to go into the senior dressing room or be on the coach to the stadium with the men you want to emulate. It is a huge moment.

It sticks in my mind what it was like in our particular group when players such as Ledley King, Rory Allen and Paul McVeigh all got the nod to be involved. We were all buzzing for them and they gave us inspiration that, one day, we could get there too. That is all you want at that stage of your career — hope.

So you can imagine what a day with the first team does for your confidence. Sitting on the bench for a Premier League game? Being in there, listening to team talks and tactics? The only thing better is to make your debut.

I’ve got huge admiration for Guardiola (below). I’ve written several times in my column about how his team are one of the best the Premier League has seen and they are playing a style of football we have not seen before. They are a joy to watch. But I cannot work out why he picked six substitutes. I know people who have kids at Manchester City’s Academy and they say the same things that Gareth Jennings, who is Stoke’ Academy director, has talked to me about: City have got the best youth set-up in the country. They haveh pumped a lot of money into it and some of the kids who have not kicked a ball for the first team yet are being well rewarded. I watched them play last season in the FA Youth Cup final against Chelsea and was really impressed.

So why would they not put a kid on the bench? I know Guardiola gave the reason he did not want to deprive a young lad of the chance to play 90 minutes for a development team, who played on Friday night at home to Swansea, by making them sit on the bench and do nothing.

Trust me, when you are that age you would play two games in a day if you had a chance. To be asked to travel with the first team the morning after a game the night before? I’m pretty sure every one of those lads would have bitten a hand off if they had been asked.

And imagine if City had been three or four up? I know they brought on Brahim Diaz, the 18-year- old Spanish midfielder, but what if they had been leading 3-0 or 4-0 and someone else, a young lad, had got on for the last 10 minutes? The impact of doing that is enormous.

Squads are so big these days and carry so many senior players that it is rare for kids to get this kind of promotion. And let’s be honest, it is not as if they could not find one player with the resources they have. I do not know how it is possible for them to overlook one.

City are doing so much right with their Academy players. Darren Fletcher’s kids are there and he tells me how good it is; Stephen Ireland’s son had a spell there and he raved about it. They are clearly doing such positive work and it would have been great to see a name on the bench to keep an eye on for the future.

Instead, we got a story about six substitutes. Whatever point Guardiola was trying to make, it is beyond me.