AZ Alkmaar’s sporting director Marcel Brands has slammed both Arsenal and Liverpool for ‘stealing’ the clubs brightest young prospects, despite the Dutch outfit previously doing the same thing.
Speaking with Netherlands daily Algemeen Dagblad, Brands raged at the manner foreign clubs can come and simply poach their prize assets, and in return leave them with only minimal compensation
“We are completely powerless against it here” “But we know how things stand. We just sit here, unable to do anything,”
Arsenal recently completed the signing of right midfielder Oguzhan Özyakup, whilst Liverpool are on the verge of snapping up winger Vincent Weijl. Brands claims both players had agreed terms with AZ on new contracts, but the chance to play aboard has proven too lucrative to turn down.
You could understand the club preaching about losing the players, but their protests are will fall on the deaf ears of the Gunners staff, as Alkmaar have previously snatched young prospects of their own. Last summer long-term Arsenal target Kolbennin Sigthorsson agreed a deal with the club, and while he was still in his native Iceland, AZ moved in and offered him regular first team football, if he chose to spur the Gunners advances.
He quickly penned terms with them, leaving Arsene Wenger no doubt furious he had missed out on one of the hottest prospects in World football. But Wenger kept himself to himself, and moved in for other targets.
The final decision on a move is down to the player and of course his parents, and the Özyakup family clearly felt the move suited them. Arsenal have since found them housing, as well as both his mother and father well paid jobs in London. Oguzhan will be attending college on a regular basis, meaning we have all aspects of his development taken care of.
We are well known for going about our business in a respectful manner, with various sides issuing statements praising our conduct. The opposite can be said for Manchester United and Chelsea, who have both been criticised in recent weeks for signing young players in a disrespectful way.
Article By – J.Sanderson
Good Article
The above qutoes from AZ don’t mention Arsenal or Liverpool, they merely state a fact of football life, which is that things aren’t always within your control.
We know how to nick those kids properly don’t we!
He was asked about those clubs taking the prospects in the interview, he didnt mention them in the answer, but he was referring to them
Good Article JSandy
Do you also think Senna would fit perfectly into Arsenal’s DM role, given his pace and grit?
Hey daymee! This is young guns, Old uns!
That should be NOT old uns! Bollox!
we know how to lure these kids to Arsenal, but dnt know how to lure big/well known names to our first team!! i’m tired of signing kids. some1 NAME me 5 players who have come thru the academy to the first and play regular first team football?!
The youth development is completly seperate to first team Mike, different people work on the signings. The transfer window is not even open yet, and we have two players. I dont see what more Wenger can do whilst he is not even in the country.
Clichy,Fabregas,Bendtner,Troare and Senderos. Imagine how much the first three would cost a team to buy?
Also muppet “dnt know how to lure big/well known names to our first team!!” Well they may not be well known names but Sagna and Eduardo were quality players and werent young either and are you saying we shouldnt get Ramsey whos rated so highly cause hes young? Also Nasri will join and he is a big name aswell so all you said is BS!
@ J. Sanderson.
i get wot u mean, but we poach these youths for around the world, only to lose them to other teams or leave them in the reserves to rot. How many of these youths will ever progress to the first team? how many have progressed to the first team in the last five years??
Clichy and Fabregas? That’ll do me fine.
@ Jammathon.
thats only two u can name
If we get a Clichy and a Fabregas from every 10 young players we bring in that will make it all worth while.
Mike//
I saw JohnV say five names?
Do you guys think that with the departure of Flamini we will see the rising of Diaby and Denilson?
Any vids of Oguzhan Özyakup?
Hi i am a toon fan. Just wanted to say that you guys are class at finding them diamonds in the rough aren’t you, fabregas is the best play maker in the world right now regardless of his age, and he cost you next to nothing. Same with Clichy, the best LB in the premiership and he cost you next to nothing. great buys both of them. Too bad for you lot concerning Aaron Spear though, i am ecstatic we got him over you as it doesn’t happen often
Mike if you don’t like reading news about the kids, then why the fuck are you on a youth team blog?
also, i read a comment mentioning Senna. why the hell would you want a player who is about to turn 32 and has MAXIMUM one premiership season in him?
You guys should instead put Song or Diaby at DM as i am sure both would be superb there in a few years
True, we do things professionally at Arsenal. The club doesn’t say anything until the deal is done.
A few clubs (i.e Barca, Real Madrid, Chelsea, Man U, and of course Milan – AC and Inter) could learn from our example.
Well said Cesc by the way, for criticising his hometown club, the club he was raised to support for doing just that.
soz Millwallfan, didnt see JohnV’s post.
First of all JohnV, dnt know who u calling a ‘muppett’, u twat!!
yes u named me five players, give urself a round of applause.
when i said big names, i mean proven stars. Sagna wasn’t a big name N Eduardo wasn’t to big either (i’m sure many doubted when we were linked with them last summer), but they settled to the Arsenal way of play and developed to become better players. Ramsey isn’t a big name player n is still to prove himself (he’s a big name because of the media hype). I’m talking about luring big/proven names to the club, look at the Nasri situation. we been linked with him for about 6 wks n he still aint signed for us yet.
One other thing, Mike. I don’t know how much the academy has cost because I’m not so much into Arsenal, but your club have sold players like Bentley, Muamba, Pennant, Sidwell, Cole etc., those money must have been payed back, right?
And then I was talking about players raised in the academy.
Mike,
Look at it this way. How much did Arsenal pay for Anelka?
How much did he go to Real for? Thierry Henry from Juve to Barca?
Vieira to Italy? Ashley Cole to Chelsea?
My point is this. Football is a game that comes with its economics. What is the future of football in the next 25 years. How is the world economy going to affect the game? It is simply a case of demand and supply. Right now, big clubs are surviving on “sugardads” who bankroll them. Some long the way jump into the bandwagon. Mike you need to understand the team you are supporting. There is an Arsenal way of things. It is the ‘prudent way’. The footballing circus are focussed on ready-made players who cannot last more than 4 years max. How long ago was everyone shouting about the awesomeness of Ronaldinho and even Shevchencko. It wasn’t long ago was it? The transfer fees of these players outstrip any other football clubs in the business.
Arsenal are number 1 in the world in scouting and acquiring young talent. Even if they do not all make it here, they move on to other clubs with a transfer fee.
You know what? A lot of those transfer fees paid to Arsenal are termed: “undisclosed fees”. That’s why a lo of young players come to Arsenal for undisclosed fees and when they leave, we would have made at least a 800% if not more on them.
Imagine Alex Song being sold now? or Cesc Fabregas? The financial might of a club is not how many players they have acquired on credit. A sugardaddy like Moratti, Shinawatra, Glazers, Hicks & Gillet, Abramovich,etc are investors. They own the club and can do anything they want with it. Most of these clubs do not have assets owned by the club, they have assets owned by an investor who can decide to gamble his investment one day and lose everything. Arsenal is run in a “clean” way. The financial muscle is in the Youth Academy. Players move on from Arsenal for transfer fees which they didn’t command when they sneaked in through the back and when no one knew them.
This part of AFC is totally different from the main team. If some of those youngsters make it into the main team is a bonus. The idea is to nurture them and bring out the best in what they already have and what they already have are almost the best you can get in the world. The money is made through loan agreements, which then become permanent moves. But do you hear of how much they go for? You hardly do! So there.
@ Millwallfan.
thank you. that is my point. the names in which you mentioned, how many of them cut it at Arsenal?
Bentley had a short spell, then sold.
Pennant, sold.
Muamba didnt make it.
Sidwell didnt
Larson didnt
The point of the youth system is its there incase we find another Cesc or whatever. There is no pressure to sign players, its just nice when we do.
We sign players like this in the off chance they turn out to be world beaters. If they dont, then what have we lost? a little bit of money, which we probably make back by selling them on.
Not all the players will make it, so we sell them on and make a profit? whats wrong with that.
Lol, football can be alot like politics at times. Every1 is being hypacritical and every1 is pointing the finger at every1 except themselves. Its the same as Barca getting pissed over Fabregas and Merida, i meen id hate to know how many players they pinched off other clubs. One things for sure, Messi and Dos Santos definatley were’nt found playing footy on the local Barcelona street corner.
nothing wrong wit it J. maybe i’m jst pissed off with the lack of action to our first. soz peeps
i heard from somewhere that Bentley has one of those sell on clauses where we get 30% or something from the fee Blackburn get, like Muamba had.
Does anyone know if this is true??
if so it be a hefty figure, bentley will go for 15 mil.
think how many Özyakup,s we could sign with that!
“First of all JohnV, dnt know who u calling a ‘muppett’, u twat!!
yes u named me five players, give urself a round of applause.
when i said big names, i mean proven stars. Sagna wasn’t a big name N Eduardo wasn’t to big either (i’m sure many doubted when we were linked with them last summer), but they settled to the Arsenal way of play and developed to become better players. Ramsey isn’t a big name player n is still to prove himself (he’s a big name because of the media hype). I’m talking about luring big/proven names to the club, look at the Nasri situation. we been linked with him for about 6 wks n he still aint signed for us yet.”
Wow…ok, Nasri situation is complicated, basically we’ve got him, we just had a bit of trouble with his Agent, hes been bated but the agent dug his heels in for a while trying to squeeze money from the deal, now Marseille want the money transfered onto next years accounts so we have to wait until July the 1st, but hes basically coming.
Ok, kids who have come through the academy in the last 5 years, well you have:
Hoyte, Clichy, Fabregas, Bendtner and Djourou, yea so i can name 5 players who came through the Academy in the last 5 years and now player first team football for the club, 2 of which of 2 of our star players and 2 of the most highly rated players in the world for their position, worth atleast 20mil each (probably alot more, especially Fabregas). Thats atleast 3 more than alot of premiership clubs. The academy has only just really been finished in Wengers eyes aswell, so it should now be starting to produce alot more, which is evidant when you look at the quality of alot of the players we have coming through now like Traore, Barazite, Merida, Gibbs, Randall, Landsbury, and there are and will be more.
Also, why would we want to sign big stars? Was Henry a big star when he joined us? Was Bergkamp? Was Vieira? Was Wright? Did we not produce players like Charlie George, Martin Keown and Tony Adams? Ever since the end of the big spending, star studded Chapman Era (long before you or I were born), we’ve bought small, nurtured and created, and made big, and Wenger does that better than any1. Why would we want to stop now?
Ever since the 50s, when we blow the bank it tends to not pay off, ok you have a few exceptions but largly that is the case. I meen look at our side now, the only big name signings we have are Hleb, Rosicky and Gallas (since according to you Sagna wasnt, even though he was one of the most talked about and appreciated players in France when we bought him, which is hardly an obscure footballing country with a miniture and low quality league).
Well ok, Gilberto was a big name signing as well, unless you dont count winning the world cup with Brazil meriting being called a big player either. Lehman could also have been considered big but hes not an Arsenal player now so thats irrelivant.
But my point is, our best players were’nt big when we got them, and its alot safer to spend 2-6mil on a player that you think is good and for it not to come off than to spend 25mil on a player every thinks is good and for it not to come off.
Nasri is a big name but thats not why we’re getting him, and i dont want Arsenal to ever become the type of club that uses media hype as a scouting tool.
As the old saying goes what goes around comes around or here is another old saying, people in glass houses should not throw stones AZ Alkmaar take note Lol
coughliverpoolchelseacough
Exactly Kent Paul.
jim – i believe you are spot on mate.
Regarding Kolbeinn Sigþórsson as I have a big interest in my fellow Icelander. I would have loved another Icelander to be on the record with Arsenal (Siggi Jónsson and Ólafur Ingi Skúlason previously) but I am in a way glad that we didn´t get him. The thing is that his career will be risky and might well get cut short through injuries. He has been injury prone and missed a lot of last season because of it. His brother, Andri Sigþórsson, was really highly rated but never became the star he should have been because of injuries. Andri still became a pro for few years. There is no doubt though that Kolbeinn is a bigger talent then his brother. I played on the U-10 national championship in Iceland when Kolbeinn was 8, so playing 2 years above his age. Kolbeinn´s team smashed the tournament and he scored 10 goals in 4 games. He was absolutely sensational youngster but then started to decline. But in the recent years his star has been brighter then ever. His biggest moment was probably when he scored 4 goals in a 6-5 victory against Russia U-17 to put Iceland into the European Championship in that age group.
Speaking about Icelandic talents. Björn Bergmann plays for Akranes in Iceland and is a striker born in 1991. He has been watched by Liverpool for a while and they tried to sign him. He, however, was adviced by his 3 brothers that all have been pros to stay in Iceland. His brothers include Bjarni Guðjónsson that played for Newcastle and Joey Guðjónsson that played with Mark Randall at Burnley.
Sorry about how off topic that was, I just felt the need to write.
like the article said, final decisions will be made by the player and their parents. arsenal simply offer them the best possible deal. but i’m sure surprise but impress that apart from house and education, arsenal even found ozyakun parents well paid job in london. no wonder many youngster hard to refuse arsenal offer. we not only only offer them the best in term of football education but also take care of their whole life as well.
btw, many said that arsenal academy yet to produce anyone. maybe they don’t realized that these policy only started a few years ago. fabregas, senderos and clichy are among the first foreign import to our academy and make it to first team. so i says this is a success. home grown talent only just about to emerge. im sure in 2 or 3 seasons the likes of randall, landsbury and wilshere will be in the first team. others that not make it will surely find a new club like bentley and could be a success as well. in the last few years we seen youngster from arsenal academy have good foundation and can play in prem league. such example is sidwell, harper, larsson, muamba, pennent. i heard connolly will play in prem league next season with hull, so another 1 choose different path way but end up at top level. my point is, arsenal academy won’t quarantee u will make it to arsenal 1st team, u must force ur way into it but if u didn’t make it, u will make it somewhere else because arsenal always give young player the best education to make it at top level.
Whilst not agreeing with everything Mike said I can actually see his point of view. Also just to point out he asked for someone to name 5 players from the reserves/youths that actually play regularly for Arsenal. Clichy & Cesc are obviously two & debateable Senderos is a 3rd, but nobody can include Bendtner & Traore as players that play regular first team football for Arsenal.
I think a lot of you kid yourselves with regards these youngsters. Firstly we pay a lot more than you’d think when fees are involved & secondly we are paying them ridiculous amounts in wages that no other club including Chelski or Man Utd would be prepared to do, (even Barca said they couldn’t & wouldn’t compete with the wages we offer). Considering those facts the returns over the past 10 years has been woeful.
I’d rather Arsenal offered these kids the same wages that any other team would. It would mean missing out on several targets but it would significantly reduce the wage bill (which is way too high for a team with such a small first team squad, which is packed with inexperienced youngsters).
Maybe if that happened we could afford to invest more into the first team & we wouldn’t lose so many players that we really need to keep hold of. If Arsenal don’t seriously challenge for both the major trophies this coming season then we can all wave goodbye to Cesc as he made it clear he wants to play in a ‘competitive team’!!
Knocked out the CL Quarters by a diabolical referee and the decisions in the EPL weren’t much better and we finished 4 points behind the winners.
Unfortunately there’s not much a manager can do when his two title rivals have bottomless pits of money to delve into to buy stars. It always seems that the loud-mouthed Arsenal/Arsene critics don’t fully get this. We do not have the money to compete in the transfer market with United/Chelsea (or City/Liverpool for that matter).
Wenger is doing things the best and only way to get competitive. But you can’t blame him for our horrendous luck.
Just thinking aloud here of the players we have produced/introduced to top flight football and how many have actually passed through our ranks and are doing well for themselves in the EPL and championship.
I believe we are the producer of English players for example we can field a team of EPL players who came through our ranks and are plying their trades at other clubs.
GK; S.Taylor (Villa)
Def; J.Hoyte,M.Upson,A.Cole,M.Volz,
Mid; J.Harper,S.Sidwell,J.Pennant,D.Bentley,F.Mumba,S.Larrson,J.Thomas (Charlton)
Forwards; A.Stokes,J.Bothroyd,J.Aliadiere
All of whom are doing quiet well for themselves
Can any other team boast such a production line?
GMR, I agree that we are spending an unnecessarily high amount of money on youngsters’ wages. Yes, it’s nice to treat them well, but that may not stop them jumping ship when the 120K offers elsewhere start rolling in, and it would be enough to pay them 50% more than Liverpool would, not 500% more.
GMR: The wage bill declared involves everyone that works at the club, not just the players, that is why it’s so high. Whereas Utd stated a number and it was a basic ‘ok Ronaldo, Rio and Rooney earn half of this, ok’ number, you look at ours and think ‘but Ade, our top striker, only earns 20k’ its because the figure includes everyone.
It’s attitudes like this that kill academies. Hell, its attitudes like this that screw clubs over. “It’s not creating 400 amazing players, what’s the point?” Well, something that hasn’t been mentioned is patience. AW said it would take 10 years for the academy to really start producing real local talents and which we are seeing with this bunch of kids. And you should be glad Mike, we could have gone the root of Keegan and dismantled our academy but we got Cesc out of it! And then also consider that the money we made on Muamba and Larsson and co paid for it last year, the academy is supposedly not having a penny spent on it because transfers of previous acedmy failures pay for it. Just like Muamba to Bolton money, Simpson, Hoyte, Bentley sell on fees, will all keep it more than a float. If we can get players that played as well as Cesc did last night out of the system then, it’s worth trying isn’t it?
I can’t believe people actually take such a stance on academies. Players need to come from somewhere! Why shouldn’t we assemble the best youth facilities and coaches to teach the best kids around London to play the Arsenal way? Look at Barcalona, no-one’s going ‘Fuck that academy, never produces anything for us’ now do they? Iniesta, Xavi and Messi would cost 80+m to buy and yet they got them for the pittance of keeping the grass mowed at their academy and the coaches paid.
Of course the Barca system has been working it’s magic since Cryuff started it and our modern system is only 8/9 years old. But if it can carry on producing the odd star (Cesc, Clichy, Cole, Bentley, Bendtner, Traore, Djorou, Senderos, the many, many kids who AW has stated will be involved in the future first team) while we learn from our mistakes and start to develop a production line closer to Barca’s, we’ll be laughing. But like I said: Patience is key.
rockypires: it’s not a very good team though! I guess it would make mid-table. You missed obvious Premiership players out though! One’s that still play for us!
The exciting thing about it for me is seeing Cesc and Clichy and knowing that everyday Bould and Brady et al are getting closer to knowing how to make players like these. It all comes with experience and the modern academy is only 8 or 9 years old, so while those who were 9 when they joined will be pretty much the first batch. So sure they are the most exciting batch of kids we have created, but it’s those who are 9 now that are the ones to look out for (I tried re-phrasing this many times so it didn’t sound dodgy and it’s hard to do :D but you know what i mean, in football terms). Because they would have learnt from their mistakes (hell, we had a great conversation on why the academy isn’t producing great cb’s the other day, so it shouldn’t be hard to recognise problems and learn from them) and will put that experience into helping more fully formed players come off the production role.
It’s just annoying to see someone go: “Yeah, but what’s it produced?” when it’s still a very new system that hasn’t had the time to show what it can produce.
But it has produced Sam, see the list of players above minus our own stars. Clichy and Cesc named in team of season.
Will be a big year for Nic Bendtner plus the potentials in Song,Djororu,Deni,Randall,Lansbury,Gibbs,Simpson etc its a great system which is improving all the time.
Its a system which reapes rewards
A the plyer is good enough and makes the grade at Arsenal
B Not good enough sold off for 2-3 million plus further selling on fee.
Sounds good to me especially with the demise of the transfer market whereby players are begining to dictate transfers.
You’ll always have resources and occasionaly,yes occasionallly find a Cesc or a Clichy.
Our system is what 10 years in place and thus far has worked a treat with signs of it further improving means Arsenal are ahead of the other clubs and even now some of them are trying to jump on the band wagon ala Newcastle with Spears as the transfer market is no longer competable as if your not in the champions league you have no hope of signing a quality International player.
http://pl.youtube.com/watch?v=YQJTZSWf5AE Hopefully this season will be even better than previous one. Can’t wait for Barnet game…
J.Sanderson or anyone els:
Are we still talking with Nasri or is there not gonna be a deal?
Everything has gotten quiet, and I don’t like it.
I suggest Arsenal fans do a little research on the club they follow. A lot of pple don’t know much about Arsenal but talk about this player and that player. What goes on behind the curtains? Not many know. It will give you some relief if you get some deeper information about AFC and the personality of Wenger.
Anyway, I believe this is another lie but check it out:
http://www.tribalfootball.com/article.php?id=100065
“Was Bergkamp? ” by Johnny Maverik
Erm yes, a very very big star. So much so I couldnt actually believe he had joined us. For scale, Arsenal signing Bergkamp back in the day would be the equivalent of a big medium club say Man City signing Ronaldinho. Mind blowing when it happened.
DB10 forever a Legend
You may say I’m stupid here but I strongly think Arsenal are secretly courting Eto’o. Just about 12 days ago, information came through in good faith that Eto’o was seen at the Highbury building (some say board room) with Gary Lewin (ex-physio). As much as I understand, this story was not a rumour. It was a question of making of it what we may. The fact is Eto’o was definately there. Why, no one knows.
Did Otto Pfister say what he was quoted to have said about Arsenal courting Eto’o?
It may well be a rumour but it could also be true!
One thing is clear. Milan and Barcelona are fighting over themselves to land Adebayor and are using all their tools in the box to make it happen. I doubt whether Arsene wants Adebayor to go. I gravitate taowards Arsene unwilling to let him go for any price. But I feel he would like to have Adebayor and Eto’o play together.
The problem there is Barca want rid of Eto’o and want Ade as a replacement. Arsenal want a decent replacement for Ade if he decides to leave but deep down Arsenal are not keen to sell Adebayor. Barca’s interest in Hleb has cooled since the courting of Arshavin and while they have Iniesta, Xavi, Yaya, Bojan and Messi (not including Arshavin), they have developed cold feet on Hleb. So Hleb is stuck and his agent is now a prick he truly is, despite his whoring Hleb around. The key to this is if Barca buy Arshavin, then Hleb can forget it. If Arsenal want Eto’o, Arsenal will have to pay the fee (which I doubt we can afford + salary). It is also possible that Arsenal may sell Adebayor to Barca and include Eto’o in the deal but I doubt that very much.
Cesc was the star for all eyes to see last night. I can imagine how Barca and Real would be drooling over him. We need quality signings now to keep Cesc. Seeing him yesterday, it felt like a dishonour on his talent, playing him alongside Eboue and Senderos.
I really do hope we keep Adebayor. That is vital but we also need to bring in a CB or DM and Danny Guiza or Podolski
Cesc will be off next season unless our manager stops buying 15yo’s and sudenly wises up. AW seems so out of touch that before he knows it he’ll lose his best players through lack of ambition at AFC. While all this speculation and unrest is going on what is he doing? Well he’s supplementing his misely Arsenal salary of 4.5m by spending the last 3 weeks commentating at Euro08. He hasn’t commented on Arsenal since he gave us a load of lies about new signings arriving before the Euros. Also this whole Nasri farce is pathetic. He obviously aint signing.
Dave you obviously no sod all about Arsenal, last seasons buys were they 17? as i distinctly remember the players for the first team were 21, 24 and 24 respectively if you hadnt realised Arsenals youth transfers and first team transfers are a completely different thing.
“Cesc will be off next season unless our manager stops buying 15yo’s ” by Dave.
Unlike you, Im sure Cesc can remember that HE arrived as a promising 15 year old. You underestimate his intelligence and his faith in what Wenger is doing, which he has spoken about many times.
I accept that Fabregas will leave in a few years. But it will not be for love of money, or lack of ambition at Arsenal. He is a Barca boy, and who wouldnt want to play in their homeland?
Wenger knows. He has the finest scouting network in the world, and when players arrive (whether 15 or 30) you know that it is because Wenger believes they will improve the team. “big players, not necessarily big names”.
Big name right back that moved last summer? Zambrotta. Who did we get? Sagna. Are we upset at Sagnas signing? Not now we arent. Have faith. Wenger knows.
In the next year or two some of these big spending clubs spending big money will do a Leeds.
Fabregas is our new Henry, the best player, the one every1 claims we cant play with out, and the one whos guna give his best years to Arsenal, i may be wrong but thats what i believe.
We wont get Eto either, he says he’ll go to the highest bidder in terms of wages that plays champions league football, and we wont be the highest bidder, plus do we really want a player with that kind of mentality? I know i dont.
It’s not stealing! Sounds like those guys are a good fit.
The suspicion I have about Nasri is that he has signed but Marseille is holding him back as they have confirmed having medical for Ben Arfa. This seem logical to me in combination with the previous mentioned pictures on Arsenal.com, his own webpage and all the talking from Pape Diouf. In this they hold him back to make sure that Arsenal for example don’t run off with him, or just to please the fans when selling a great player
otherwise I am also a fan of my small club back in Norway Molde, (city of 25 000 has played in champions league just to brag) that was “poached” by prospect Magnus Wolf Eikrem by Man Utd as local player Solskjaer scouted him. The club lost a great prospect for just about 700 k pounds, which man utd payed more than they had to. All though small clubs have to accept that large clubs has larger potential to develop the players, it is important that both the player and club come back to contribute to the small club so they still can develop players for the local and international football. One of those who have come back and contributed a lot is Solskjaer through talent development and etc., and I hope others can do the same as for example Nortveit who was happy to see his local club Vard get money to buy a clubhouse
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