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MTC5: The Academy Players
By Prof July 28 2006
In this fifth report from the Quinssa Meet the Coaches Evening Andy Friend and John Kingston talk about the selection policy and how well the Academy players are coming on.


Question: There have been lots more Academy players playing this season: is this a policy or just a natural progression?

Andy Friend (AF): When we came in we had a squad of thirty-eight players and we said we would judge them all on what we saw. So we based our judgement on the trials and what we saw in training and the young Academy boys have shown a lot of enthusiasm. I think, as John has touched on before, that there was some nervousness and a lack of confidence in some of the boys who were involved last year - so to have these fresh young faces coming in saying ‘I wasn’t here last year, I couldn’t give two hoots about it , I just want to play some good football’ was just what we wanted to hear. They earned their right to play and I think the youngsters who have come on and played have really played very well. One good thing is the amount of very good young talent that is coming through here at Quins, so Tony Russ and Collin Osborne, who select these boys, have got some good ones.

John Kingston (JK): One of the interesting things for me on that side of it for me is that it is one of the best things that has come out of being in National Division 1. If we hadn’t been relegated I think we would have signed five of six more senior players, we didn’t lose players we didn’t want to lose but we didn’t strengthen the squad further so we are dependent on those players. One thing is that, from the start, Dean made it clear that it was a blank sheet of paper and, with respect, from Andy’s point of view it had to be because he hadn’t seen the players and Dean was in France for a year and hadn’t been around the Premiership for a year and a half. It was amusing from my perspective because it was almost having to say ‘hang on you guys, this guy can play’ and if A played better than B and A was 18 it was like ‘well shall we pick him?’ and because of the information that was in my head you sometimes thought ‘hang on, don’t throw them out with the dish water’; but it was so refreshing that there really was a level playing field. And that’s no disrespect to what has happened before but sometimes there is a natural reaction to rely on people who you have seen in a better arena a while ago, but it really was about who was performing at the time.

Alex Rogers has come in and performed, Chris Robshaw has performed, Mike Brown’s come in, Jordan Turner-Hall, Tosh Masson, and others too - it’s fantastic.

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