After much speculation, Arsenal have confirmed that the club’s Academy stars will take part in next season’s NextGen Series having received positive feedback from representatives of last year’s competition winners Inter Milan.
Billed as an under-19 version of the Champions League, even though three players over that age can be fielded, the competition pits 24 of Europe’s best academy sides against each other in a league and cup format.
The 2011/12 season represented the format’s inaugural year with Inter Milan being crowned champions after beating Ajax in a penalty shootout at Leyton Orient’s ground (nowhere more glamorous available?).
Starting again in August, Arsenal – along with fellow new boys Paris Saint Germain, Olympiakos and Chelsea – will join the likes of Barcelona, Inter Milan, Ajax, Sporting Lisbon, Olympique Marseille and Celtic, as well as English clubs Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Aston Villa and Tottenham Hotspur.
Speaking to Arsenal.com about the decision to enter the NextGen Series, Arsene Wenger said:
“We are excited about joining the NextGen Series next season. It’s a very good challenge to confront yourselves with the best young players in Europe.
“We have spoken to Inter Milan, who practiced at our training ground ahead of a NextGen match, and they said their players improved tremendously through the season because of the quality of the competition.
“You play against the best players of your age and it will be a very interesting experience for us. It’s also a good way to assess your players and to give you an idea of the future potential of the Club.”
Liam Brady, Head of Youth Development, added: “We are delighted to be involved in the NextGen Series and are looking forward to participating in the competition. It will provide our young players with fantastic experience against high-quality opposition from around Europe.
“We always try to give our young players wider experience through participating in international tournaments, but NextGen takes this to the next level. We watched NextGen this season with great interest and the standard of competition was very high and will therefore offer a good challenge to our young players.”
Seeing as the competition is not UEFA regulated, there’s a good chance our players may escape being sent off for nothing and Steve Bould might actually be allowed to give his pre-game team talk. Who knows, we might even win…
Turned it down this season, by all accounts. Be interesting to see how we get on next season.
anyone know why we turned it down this year?
I *think* it was something to do with not wanting other clubs to swoop in on our best talents.
wish we had the benefit of having an “arsenal B” team like the cuntalans do, tie our best talents down on long term contracts, give a them chance to play week in week out and gain experience above reserve team level too,
Ajax and barcelonas academys are historically revered as the best, wonder if hale end’s youngsters can match up?
SHUT UP YOU IDIOT, THE BEST YOUTH SYSTEM IN THE WORLD IS OF THE MIGHTY TOTTENAMH
WHO HAVE YOU MADe? WILSHERE IS FAT AND SLOW AND CRAP AND BAD AT PASSING AND SHAGGED WAYNE BRIDGES GIRLFRIEND
THE MIGHTY TOTENHAM HAVE PORDUCED YOUNGSTAS LYK VAN DER VART, BALE, CUDACHINI, AND MODRICH
SHIT ARSE-HOLE-NOTROPHYIN10YEARS ENAL
Obvious troll is obvious. I doubt you’re even a spud
http://implied.facepalm.de/images/facepalm.jpg
no more need be said
this is actually pretty funny
From the Arry school of literacy.Some very odd youth system players I.e. None of them are.
They don’t have a youth system just buy mercenaries.
“John Terry” is not spelled W-I-L-S-H-E-R-E you pillock.
NURSE!! We have a code red!
Hahaha u shud leave comments to people who know about football. Go watch your pig racing contest or whatever it is u really do.
YaaaaY more football!! More Arsenal!
This is fantastic for the younger players. It will do them well to match up agains Ajax and the media’s darling Barcelona’s youth products that somehow don’t enable them to stop spending money on senior players.
Aston Villa?
Eh?
Aston Villa’s youth system is one of the best in England. Just look at the number of players they’ve produced in recent years.
Tottenham Hotsp*rs?
Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
‘3 players over 19 can be fielded’?Hmmm,I can see a little run out for Bendtner & Squillaci…hell,even Park might get a game!
Is there some sort on non poaching agreement in place? Maybe that’s why we didn’t join last year.
it’s a shame arsenal didn’t join this tournament a few years ago when the entire golden generation (who won the fa youth cup) could’ve played
Yes. It’s a shame Arsenal didn’t play in a tournament several years ago when the tournament didn’t exist. Definitely. I 100% agree. So much so I’m going to add a smiley face 🙂
if we weren’t playing in a competition that didn’t exist
then nobody can prove we didn’t win it
so, effectively, we did win it
chew on that, merchants of doom
Haha..asshole
The “golden generation” has hardly shaken the world.
IMO the current batch of youngsters – Toral, Gnabry, Aneke etc – will be our first real “golden generation”.
Lol…golden generation is a bit of an overstatement. Isn’t it just Wilshere and Gibbs at this point, thats done anything good for us from that squad
How dare you put the word ‘just’ before Wilshere. I know it’s been ages and we all frustrated. but come on…. Oh and Gibbs…
reading between the lines abit here but could this not be a kind of ‘prove the theory’ exercise for a potential breakaway “super league”…
i see what you’re thinking. interesting……
It’ll be a good assessment of how our youngsters match up against the very best in Europe and I dare say it’ll accelerate the promotion of some of the youngsters into the first team
What do you guys think…..5 biggest youth talents at Arsenal as of right now in descending order (not counting the ones who are basically in 1st team squad this year like AOC, Coq, etc)———–
1) Campbell
2) Gnabry
3) Ryo
4) Ozzy
5) Not sure….maybe Miquel or Yennaris? The youth keeper Martinez looked decent the few times I’ve seen him
in no particular order ; conor henderson, ryo, ozyakup, toral and eisfeld is reportedly proving to be quite a capable player when not injured…
of the youngsters I do know henderson was mooted to be the pick of the lot last season only for injuries to scupper his chances at first team involvement this year. We may we see him towards the last few league mind you with Arteta’s injury reportedly being serious enough to end his season …
Hey, Brisbane Road is a very classy place!
It should help keep a few of the antsy ones a bit calmer about getting first team playing time if they have this to look forward to prior to stepping up. I wonder, too, how it will compare with going on loan to Hull for someone like Mannone. Surely better in some ways to be on loan. But Hull City not nearly as glamorous as playing in European-wide televised matches against top clubs for a trophy. It will be interesting to see how AW advises and how Liam B and Stevie B balance the youngsters’ development between the two options… Read more »
I love Burt Reynolds
You forgot the * in T*ttenham!
oh nice, so we have a realistic chance of winning a trophy next year 😉
Great news.. COYG..!
College (american) football in America is massively popular and successful as a sport in its own right, wonder if the youth game here can follow suit?
It’s a bloody good way to keep our second string (well, some of them) match fit. We can play three of our squad players in the team regularly for the same reason. One of our problems is that people believe we have no decent backup for many positions. I happen to think that a lot of it stems from players being called on infrequently and not being quite match fit. Reserve games are pretty useless in my opinion. This competition should help to ensure that when we do call on squad or young players that they will have better match… Read more »