Premiership's discarded youth face pain of 'exit trial'

Elite's record number of Academy cast-offs given opportunity to attract new clubs at Lilleshall

Wayne Rooney has enough on his plate right now – a difficult Premiership game with Everton at home specialists Middlesbrough today, for a start.

What with the ink drying on a lucrative new contract and a positive reaction to his recent England debut, the pressure on his young shoulders is not something that many 17-year-olds could handle.

But, were he allowed out to venture beyond the protective cloak thrown over him by his Goodison Park manager, David Moyes, he would no doubt admit that he has the dream end of the teenage footballers' deal. The nightmare end belongs to the 81 youngsters – all of them 18 and 19-year-olds on their way out of Premiership clubs – who have this week been on parade and on trial for their futures in the game.

This is the part of the crop that, for whatever reason, failed to properly ripen.

"Exit trial" is an ominous term for the shop-window opportunity the young players have just been given at the National Sports Centre at Lilleshall, no matter how the FA Premier League tries to soften the blow.

From Manchester United or Liverpool or Aston Villa, they will head downwards. But the Academy movement is doing its utmost to ensure that they will at least be caught in the safety net of a Nationwide League existence and not disappear from the game.

Close on 100 observers – scouts, coaches, managers like Coventry's Gary McAllister, Oldham's Iain Dowie and Kidderminster's Ian Britton, and even possibly the odd unwelcome agent – filled the touchline as two days of training and togetherness prepared these anonymous casualties of the game for 90 minutes that could decide whether they maintain a toehold in the only profession they know.

The discards are reaching record levels this year as youth football prepares to revert from Under-17 and Under-19 to old-fashioned Under-18 competition at the start of 2004-05.

Clubs are streamlining now and, with coaching casualties likely as well in the medium-term future, 81 youngsters, compared to 64 last winter, came under the gaze of the talent-spotters on a mild morning in Shropshire.

"Football is more caring now than it has ever been, but telling a young lad he is no longer wanted is the worst thing any of us has to do," said the Leeds United assistant Academy director, Clive Richards, who was keeping a paternal eye on three soon-to-be-released Elland Road players.

"There are often tears, although it is worse for schoolboys of 16 than scholars two or three years older.

"When young players come into our clubs, we promise them and their parents that we will look after them properly. That has to be seen through right down the line, which is why we retain an interest even in boys who are about to leave us.

"It's a very tough time for them, so football is doing all it can to help." Liverpool's Chris McGrath was one of those on view this week. A central defender with the gait of his famous father, Paul, he was a colossus in his earlier teens, then his contemporaries caught up with his physical growth and he no longer stood out so impressively.

The son of the ex-Blackburn Rovers and Wolverhampton Wanderers striker Norman Bell was another on show at this cattle market in athletic human flesh. When it was all over, they went back to their clubs, no doubt hoping that the mountain of notebooks being filled on the sidelines contained a complimentary line or two about them.

There are success stories for the youngsters to cling to. "David Platt was released by Manchester United as a teenager and went on to captain England and play for Juventus and Arsenal," Richards added. "But he had to do it via Crewe Alexandra, which is the sort of route these lads might now have to follow.

"We just hope that the demand for instant success in the game doesn't affect them because some managers, under pressure from chairmen or fans, might ask themselves whether it's worth waiting a few years for a kid to develop rather than go out and sign a 25-year-old foreigner as the finished article."

While the Lilleshall 81 were attempting to salvage their big-time ambitions, James Milner was playing for Leeds; not in the Premiership or the FA Cup, but in an FA Youth Cup defeat against Charlton Athletic.

He and Rooney will be back on the grand stage this weekend. For many of their contemporaries, Saturday and Sunday will be considerably less appealing – spent waiting for the phone to ring with news that, behind one closing door, another may open.