West Ham United is famous for its Academy but the club has lost that identity in recent years with a lack of youngsters graduating to the first team.
West Ham are not called the Academy of Football for nothing but the Hammers‘ reputation is in real danger.
Yes the East Londoners may be the self-styled Academy of Football, but it is with good reason.
The club has a long and proud history of producing top professional footballers who have gone on to represent their country, none more famous than World Cup winning trio Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters.
The pathway to the first team has been blocked by imported players ever since David Sullivan and David Gold took over the club.
A prime example of the failings of West Ham’s famous academy is England U17 World Cup winning hero, tournament top scorer and Liverpool starlet Rhian Brewster.
Brewster was born and raised literally right on West Ham’s doorstep in Chadwell Heath but was snapped up by the Reds.
Under Slaven Bilic things looked to be changing with Reece Oxford becoming the club’s youngest ever player when he put in a man of the match performance in a 2-0 win over Arsenal on his and Bilic’s Premier League debut back in 2015.
Bilic – famous for ushering in Croatia’s golden generation so brilliantly – rarely used Oxford or any other young players in the following two and a half years, though, much to the disappointment of fans.
That could all be about to change, though, after the appointment of Alan Irvine to David Moyes’ coaching team.
Irvine, who has managed Preston North End, West Bromwich Albion and Norwich City has nurtured three top Premier League stars from academy to first team.
Under Moyes, Irvine was appointed director of the Everton academy in 2011 where he helped bring through players such as Ross Barkley and Seamus Coleman into the first team.
He also helped establish former Chelsea winger Damien Duff as a Premier League star when he was coming through at then champions Blackburn Rovers.
It bodes well for West Ham’s young players and their fans who identify so much with their academy roots.
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