Town chief executive Simon Clegg has hinted that the Blues could initially opt for Academy Category Two status as a stepping stone towards moving to Category One after promotion to the Premier League. The Blues have to decide which level of youth set-up they are going to commit to for next season before the end of this month.

Clegg says that while Town ultimately aim for Category One, they may choose Category Two in the short-term while they are in the Championship, although stresses that no final decision has yet been made: “I think it is right and proper to aspire to Category One, but at the moment if that is the long-term goal I don’t know whether we are in a position to get there before we go in the Premier League.

“We haven’t made that decision but [initially going for Category Two and then moving to Category One] is a possibility.”

He says even making sure Playford Road is at Category Two standard — which will cost clubs at least £960,000 per annum including a Premier League grant of £480,000 with Category One at £2.3 million, including a grant of £750,000, and rising by £50,000 a season - will require additional funding and further staff.

“As we are at this moment in time, we are probably an Academy Category Three or Four status, as most people would probably be,” he said.

“The world is changing, let’s be very clear. Change is being forced on us. What we have to do is to produce the right model for Ipswich Town Football Club, recognising that we can’t keep existing as we are at the moment.

“There are three areas of additional cost. One is staffing, one is facilities and one is the games programme.

“The games programme, which will be agreed exclusively by Premier League clubs, will not be decided until March 30th and we have to make a decision on Category One by March 31st.”

Clegg says the lack of detail on the proposed games programme is typical of the situation the club is having to deal with: “It is fair to say that I am incredibly frustrated the way that this process has been managed and the lack of timely information that has been provided to clubs outside the Premier League to properly prepare for these changes.

“Something as fundamental as the games programme, which potentially for Category One could be nationwide, for example. We’d potentially be playing every other Category One club around the country, whereas at the moment with the Academy structure we play on a regional basis with the odd game further afield. The cost implications of playing on a nationwide basis are huge.”

Similarly, the number of additional staff required is still up in the air — “I can’t tell you because they keep moving the goalposts” — with the matter making up much of the chief executive’s current workload: “I am probably spending about 20% of my time on Academy matters, and that’s quite a lot of time every day.

“In fact, I’ve just come down from an hour and a half briefing the Academy staff. The other day I was at Wembley talking to an Academy consultant.

“This is work in progress. There is a huge amount of work which is being undertaken at the moment to evaluate where we as a club need to get to.”

In October, Town were amongst 22 Football League clubs to vote against the Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP) which has led to the Academy restructuring with Clegg feeling the changes are far from in the best interests of sides outside the top flight: “It is my belief that effectively the Premier League is trying to create a category of super-academies which are exclusive to their core members, ie the 10-12 who are up in the Premier League all the time.”

Further frustrations are caused by the sheer volume of material to be waded through — four bulging lever-arch files — which at times appear to contain information which is contradictory.

He cites an example: “The whole document is peppered with mandatory posts - posts that you’ve got to fill full-time. But Rule 44 says, ‘The functions covered by the mandatory posts must be delivered by all clubs operating an Academy.

“’However, the League acknowledges that the clubs should have flexibility in the organisation of their staffing structures, providing that the structure that is adopted delivers the same outputs and results as if the mandatory posts were filled.

“’By way of example, instead of appointing a specific coach-developer, a club may instead decide to appoint extra coaches above the mandatory minimum and task more than one coach to appoint or spend a certain portion of their time carrying out the functions of the coach-developer’. So, mandatory posts aren’t mandatory. That’s the type of thing I find frustrating.”

Once the new style Academy is up and running the club will have to keep maintain an extensive audit tool which requires documents to be uploaded into 213 separate ‘Entry Conditions’ which will be carefully monitored: “On the audit tool we’re going to have to tell them how we’re going to operate and we have to meet all sorts of conditions.

“Then the ISO is going to come in and inspect us and ensure that we’re delivering against that plan. So, it’s not just a question of ticking the boxes and saying ‘Fine, we’re going to this’, it goes in and the money comes out, they are actually going to come in and inspect us for three or four days.

“They’re going to speak to parents, speak to players and speak to coaches. So, I’ve got to make sure that whatever we say we’re going to do we can deliver in terms of the way we operate as a club going forward.

“We are seeing a civil service-type mentality approach to bureaucracy being imposed on what is a fairly straightforward issue of developing players through better coaching.

“I’ve been saying to all the coaches at the Academy, whether you like it or not, what you do today, you will not be doing it in the same way in 12 months’ time because you’ll have a much greater level of bureaucracy imposed on you.”

Clegg, who says he has taken note of the Supporters’ Trust’s 5,000-signature petition, although taking issue with its ‘Save our Academy’ approach, says there is one piece of good news with it likely that Academy funding will sit outside the Financial Fair Play restrictions which are also being introduced next season: “It looks as though it is going to be outside, which is a good thing. But we haven’t got the definitive answer yet.

“There was a meeting of the Football League and the Championship clubs in particularly up in Derby last month where we got some more clarity, but the final documentation will not be delivered until June.”

Story syndicated from TWTD.co.uk

Photo: Action Images

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