Under-18s v Cheltenham (A) | Preview

For many first-team squads preparing for their first game of the season this weekend, they will welcome a number of players into the squad.

This number, naturally, is at the first-team manager’s discretion. However, for an under-18s boss, it is par for the course that approximately 50% of your squad will turnover each summer.

Last year’s second-year apprentices have either stepped up or moved on, and now a new tranche of players are up from the under-16 ranks, ready to show their worth.

Darren Way, Argyle’s Under-18s manager, will take his freshened-up squad to Cheltenham Town this Saturday morning (11am), to begin their EFL Youth Alliance South West campaign, and he has been buoyed by the integration of his new faces, on and off the field.  

“We've been really pleased with the new cohort that's come in,” said Darren. “I think they've formed really well with the second years. We've had four or five members of staff in their first season. We've got new player welfare, new safeguarding, new education - and every single one of us have worked really well together.

“The team's starting to form and we've had a really, really competitive [pre-season] games programme. We've played Watford, we've played Rotherham, we've played Sheffield Wednesday and we've played Hull: all teams that we wouldn't have normally played, so the players are up against different faces.

“We've faced different challenges, and the group have stood up to that challenge really well. When players are going up against familiar faces, sometimes that challenge can be less, because they know their strengths, they know their weaknesses. We've played a games programme this year, which has been challenging for the staff and challenging for the players.”

For much of the Under-18s pre-season, Darren’s numbers have been a little depleted, as several of his side have been training and playing with Steven Schumacher’s first-team squad. Naturally, though, this has been excellent experience for those players, and in turn it give some younger members of the Academy squad a chance to step up and shine.

“The first years that have been involved have played eight games now,” said Darren. “You've got to be able to trust yourself when you're going into a season that you've played a good amount of games, you can hit the ground running.

“We've had on average, five second-years with the first team. You are always going to look at your squad at the start of the season and get a feel for how it deals with adversity; how it welcomes the younger players; how robust the squad has been able to be. We're probably going in a direction where we're getting closer now to the manager being able to be in a position where he can trust our players.

“Physically, the players have come back really fit and really strong. It's good when the first-team players see that. You have to start the season strong physically, and that certainly helps mentally.”