Wolves are hoping their academy will produce more stars in the future – but one top young talent looks to be leaving.
The volume of young players coming through at Wolves has been slightly disappointing in recent times.
Mateus Mane has been the exception, although that said, he did not spend very long in the academy after signing from AFC Rochdale, before breaking into Wolves’ first-team.
Should any of these NOT be on this list? And are there any who aren’t there who SHOULD be on? 🤔
The Athletic have claimed Wolves would like these nine players to stay after relegation…
Undoubtedly, there needs to be more focus on improving the academy so that we see more talent knocking on the door of the first-team.
It could well be more important than ever now that Wolves have slipped out of the top-flight.
If the Old Gold don’t get promoted back to the Premier League at the first time of asking, the club could face financial difficulty that may hinder the process of signing new players.
Sadly, it looks like Wolves are going to lose one of their very best young players.
Goalkeeping prospect Zach Trinder set to join Liverpool
A couple of weeks ago, there were noises that Liverpool were in for Zach Trinder, who caught the eye back in March when he kept a clean sheet playing for the U18s against the Reds, aged just 14 and 72 days.
He’s also played for Wolves’ U15 and U16 sides.
It is thought that Trinder has huge potential, and he is also capped at England youth level.
Daily Mail journalist Lewis Steele has appeared in a new video on the AnfieldIndexTV YouTube channel, and stated that Liverpool are poised to land the youngster.
He said: “They’re looking at the lad from Wolves as well, the goalkeeper, the 15-year-old that I wrote about a few weeks ago. I think that’s stepped up a bit since then, Zach Trinder.”
At the recent Fan Forum event at Molineux, Matt Jackson actually referenced a case of Wolves standing to lose a really talented young prospect.
Jackson spoke about the challenges of keeping young players, given the system is geared towards sending top talent to the biggest clubs.
He said (via BBC Wolverhampton and Black Country): “The academy system in this country is set up to channel the best players to the biggest football clubs. We can do nothing about it. I can give you a list of a dozen players that have left us in the last three years, from different ages, that walk out on us and our development that go to bigger clubs.
“Right now, we received last week demands for one of our U16 players from an agent. We have a decision to make on that agent walking that player out of our football club, that we invest about £2 million in salary and an agent’s fee of about £300,000 to retain a player we’ve had in our academy for a long time.
“That player can just walk out. We have no power to do it (keep him). We have an outstanding young goalkeeper in our academy at the moment. We resisted offers from big clubs, the biggest clubs, last summer, because we could at the stage of the cycle he’s at with us in the academy.
“We expect to lose him this summer, and we can’t prevent it. So we produce quality players, we have young internationals in our squads.
“But the system of those young players at the moment, certainly following Brexit where it’s become incredibly cut throat in having to retain those players, gives us this dilemma where millions of pounds are committed to 16-year-olds. Or they walk out on us to go to these clubs. It is a brutal system.”
It’s a shame that Trinder is leaving as clearly, he is a young player with a massive future ahead of him.
Hopefully Wolves’ treatment of the player has been so good that one day we might see him return, if it would suit all parties.
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