Steve Davis and the Myth of the Smallest Budget

[bigroof]

[quote="thnhouse" every time there's not one in the team for the past 15 years, yet there's always been another.
The reason the budget thing is a myth, and that it's a poor excuse to use, is because a large amount of his first team squad are on youth team wages, and it's his job to develop them into quality first team players. The fact of it is at least 2 of the youth players he failed with are now flourishing elsewhere. he wastes so much of the budget on loans it makes the team inconsistent and stifles our own players growth. The budget might be small but the myth is that it's an acceptable excuse.
[/quote]

I agree with your key point, thnhouse, but maybe it's not that easy to blood the youngsters? Which two former youths are you referring to? I think with decisions on releasing young players, as well as taking on loan players, it's a case of "you win some, you lose some". Has Davis done a

[alexbarmy]

[quote="thnhouse" every time there's not one in the team for the past 15 years, yet there's always been another.
The reason the budget thing is a myth, and that it's a poor excuse to use, is because a large amount of his first team squad are on youth team wages, and it's his job to develop them into quality first team players. The fact of it is at least 2 of the youth players he failed with are now flourishing elsewhere. he wastes so much of the budget on loans it makes the team inconsistent and stifles our own players growth. The budget might be small but the myth is that it's an acceptable excuse.
[/quote]

Name the 2 then.

If it's Waters and AJ, you are in a dream land. Flourishing would certainly be over egging it for those 2.

[thnhouse]

Then Dream Land I'm in!
Waters has hit double figures and 30 appearances for a team running away with the conference and AJ has been a key player for a team near the playoffs in a league we're plummeting out of. I'll give you over egging it might be a little fair, but it would also be more than fair to say Waters didn't get his chance here as much as Saunders, Cooper and Baillie aren't now. It'd also be fair to say that Vadaine and Mellor would be doing a better job than Turton and Haber.

I'd also agree that THIS season Davis is also giving youth more of a chance, but from his constant grumblings over budget and being allowed only 1 loan I'd wager that's more through lack of backing than his choice. As I've said many times before I'm not against loaning in players, I'm just against loaning in other teams prospect players when we've got talent coming through. One thing Dario was always good at was finding space in a team for players to develop and he gave them the time to do it. D

[Timmy58]

Waters was a regular starter for Cheltenham early in the season and scoring regularly. Has spent time warming the bench recently and doesn't seem to be finding the net on the same regular basis. As for Ajay, I am not sure many saw him as a prolific goal scorer and he had ample opportunity both under Davis and also previous managers. The fact that he has score 11 for the Vale this season is a credit to him, but again, hardly prolific. Oliver I think would have been worth another season and we all know how well Mellor played when he broke into the side but he fell away badly and we will see how good he is next season assuming Plymouth achieve promotion. We can ponder the merits of every player who has left the club over the last however many years but to use it as a stick to beat the current manager is as ridiculous as lambasting the manager who let Clayton Donaldson go. And lest we forget, he had one very good season where he missed more chances than he took and that season was preceded

[thnhouse]

I'm not using the fact that they left to beat the manager with, it's always going to happen that some players leave and do well and some drop away. I'm pointing out that these are all players that at one point showed an awful lot of promise at Crewe and Davis failed to develop them, which is what you have to do to be a successful Crewe Manager.

You could easily add Inman, Cooper, Saunders, Turton, Bailee, West, Atkinson, Clayton and maybe Nolan to that list and the sad thing is only 4 of those 14 can say they were given a lot of first team football to develop (and one of those was shunted out of position)

[bigroof]

I'm not using the fact that they left to beat the manager with, it's always going to happen that some players leave and do well and some drop away. I'm pointing out that these are all players that at one point showed an awful lot of promise at Crewe and Davis failed to develop them, which is what you have to do to be a successful Crewe Manager.

You could easily add Inman, Cooper, Saunders, Turton, Bailee, West, Atkinson, Clayton and maybe Nolan to that list and the sad thing is only 4 of those 14 can say they were given a lot of first team football to develop (and one of those was shunted out of position)

I'm not an apologist for Steve Davis, but I think it's harder to develop players at League One, whilst trying to maintain League One status. If he's in place next season it'll be interesting to see how he uses our better young talents. It's not too late for Saunders & Cooper (from your list). Inman's such a diffident character,

[alexbarmy]

Waters has been well covered by others but if AJ has been such a success why has he still not been offered a contract by Vale.

[Nexus_6_Replicant]

Can't recall any tears being shed when AJ was released at the time. Nobody was complaining either when he failed to pull up any trees at Yeovil - let's remember it's been two seasons since he left Crewe. Don't recall Waters release generating anything more than a tiny puddle of surprise, and he's scored a few goals for a Conference side - but also starts a lot of games on the subs bench. Is that what we want at Crewe then - Conference substitutes?

The point being, of course, that when it suits fans create their own myths. Bit like the suggestion that Davis hasn't helped out the youngsters any, despite the fact that he has consistently throughout his tenure dished out plenty of opportunities to Academy graduates - a fact grudgingly admitted, but casually dismissed as "more through lack of backing than his choice". There's plenty of areas to cry foul with SD but it only makes sense when sticking with the facts - this particular notion is perverse.

[TrinidadsNumberOne]

Not a fan of Davis at all but Waters and Ajay were nowhere near good enough for the squad and he made the right call releasing both of them. Believe Ajay only scored 2 league goals for us in his final season and looked unfit and off the pace. He's doing well at Port Vale but remember, all players can have a purple patch, just like when Shaun Miller got 19 goals in a season for us alongside Donaldson before going off the boil.

[thnhouse]

I'd say it's more perverse that in his 4 years of management the only youth players that he's developed into good first team players are Jones, Colclough and Garrett.

Powell, Westwood, Murphy, Davis were all given to him ready made.

There's a big difference between being forced to play youngsters and developing them. That's where he's failed