Technical Director Luke Dowling has revealed that West Brom’s training ground facilities will receive a major revamp in the summer that will see the first-team and academy players split from one another.
Speaking to The Express and Star, Dowling confirmed that first-team players will now train both on the pitch and in the gym away from academy prospects, who will now have their own separate facilities to work on rather than training alongside senior professionals.
The plan is to be installed in the summer, with Dowling believing that the split from the first-team and academy will serve as motivation to the club’s youngsters aiming to break into the senior squad.
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Dowling said about the training ground improvements: “By moving the 23s, 18s and 16s into their own gym, physio and sports science area, we will be able to create more space for the first team in the existing building and take some more pressure off the demands on space. It will be a significant step forward, we hope, in accommodating all of the groups who operate out of the training ground.”
Separating the first-team and the academy players from one-another might be seen as a backwards step, yet it is a practice that has been put in place across many clubs across the country, such as Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool, who this summer will move into a brand new training ground as reported by The Athletic.
West Brom’s conveyor belt of talent over the years has been impressive, with the likes of Nathan Ferguson, Rekeem Harper and Kyle Edwards all becoming first-team players after progressing at academy level, and this new academy upgrade could serve to be a way to not only get the best out of prospects at youth level, but to produce better quality athletes in future years to come.
