Bundesliga – The Youth Revolution
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Bundesliga – The Youth Revolution

Posted by on Nov 18, 2011

Whilst most top European clubs have been relying on money-rich owners to build their team, German clubs have taken an altogether different approach – youth development.

In 2000 a Bundesliga report highlighted the major problems within its league. Since then the Deutscher Fußball-Bund, the German FA, has worked very hard, along with other governing bodies to improve the quality of players. In the past decade there have been major changes to the structure of German football.

Clubs must now meet certain requirements in order to receive a licence to play in either of the first two divisions. For the Bundesliga, clubs must have development groups at all ages and a written development programme. This ensures that the clubs are providing their youngsters with a specific and effective football education.

Vast amounts of money have been pumped into the development of stadiums and infrastructure, with many new football facilities having been made available across the country. There are currently 121 football centres around Germany, and at one stage €70m was being spent on youth development per year. This outlines how serious the Germans were about getting back to the pinnacle of International and club football.

One of the biggest changes though, in my opinion was how clubs changed the training routines of youngsters. They noted how kids playing 11 a side were suffering due to a lack of touches (especially) in the midfield area, and how goals came, predominantly, from long kicks from the defence.

This lead to German clubs adopting the “4v4” method, in which kids under the age of 14 were not exposed to the more tiring version of the game. This saw players play on smaller pitches allowing them the freedom to use their skill, giving them more touches and more shots on goal. Tactics and positioning were thrown out of the window, and kids had the opportunity to develop and perfect the technical side to their game.

When you look at the Germany U’21 European Championship winning team from 2009, it really is a stark reminder of how successful they have been. The likes of Neuer, Boateng, Beck, Ozil, Khedira, Hummels, Marin and Schmelzer all participated. 2 years on, and all of them are now regular members of the national first team. One common factor among those listed – they were already playing first team football at club level in the Bundesliga.

A year later, and many people had written off Germany’s chances of doing well at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa due to their “young” and “inexperienced” squad. Oh how wrong they were! All of the hard work from the past decade finally began to bear fruit. Ozil, Neuer, Boateng and Marin all firmly stamped their authority on the world stage. There is no question that playing regular first team football, and participation with the U21’s helped them fit seamlessly with Die Mannschaft (the team).

Thanks to all of this German football is now thriving, with some of the most exciting talents on the planet currently plying their trade in the Bundesliga. Gotze, Lasogga, Muller, Schürrle, Draxler, Leitner, Heung-Min, Usami, Leno, Papadopoulos … just to name a few (and there are a HECK of a lot more!)

The big question is – Will the Bundesliga be able to keep a hold of these diamonds?

Of course it is natural for the superstars of tomorrow to attract interest from the biggest clubs around Europe – but in my opinion, yes. Of course there will be a few that will get lured away. For instance it will be hard for Borrusia Dortmund to keep hold of Mario Gotze, who is arguably one of the most talented players in his age bracket. Also some of the foreign talent would be easier for elite clubs to take away for themselves.

But generally German players don’t tend to want to move away from their home nation. They’re a bit like the English in that sense. We’ve seen it already this year with Neuer, rejecting the advances of Manchester United and opting for a move to Munich. Whilst clubs like Bayern Munich, Leverkusen and co are around I think German players will prefer to stay closer to home.

Anyway, even if a few decided to jump ship and move on, the array of talent is so deep that it wouldn’t even be noticed.

As for German fans, club football is on the up. In a year or two it will be considered as one of the two best leagues in the world in my opinion – both in terms of competitiveness and quality of football. The national team is also going from strength to strength. We saw in the world cup what the current bunch are capable of, and the quality of squad can only increase as more talent are given a shot at the big time. I fully expect Germany to be favourites for the up and coming European championships, along with Spain. This is definitely a golden generation.

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