Who is Geoff Harrop?

I can't say its anyone I have ever heard of as well, but reading about him he seems to be a perfect choice and his appointment show how serious the club are about making the youth set up not only work well, but also giving it the best opportunely to find those young players who may one day be the stars of tomorrow.

not sure where you have got this from,i spoke to stuart henderson last sunday night,and he was still very much part of the youth set up,not sure anything has changed this week,however will be seeing stuart on monday night so will soon find out

stuart has also taking personal command of the development squad now running at ashburton,which flopped in dawlish.

there is another development centre in plymouth,and plans to open more,the point i was making elsewhere is our youth system is big and expanding all the time,so there is a need for more staff to oversee it.

There's also the development centre at Truro College. Indeed this week's West Briton (Falmouth edition) has as its back page lead: "Penryn striker joins Torquay"

It's a sixteen-year-old called Rob Wearne who has signed as a youth player: www.thisiscornwall.co.uk/sport/Penryn-striker-join-Torquay/article-2265031-detail/article.html

If he's scored twenty-eight goals for Penryn Reserves in the Cornwall Combination - technically the same level as the SDL Premier - that doesn't sound a bad effort for a player of that age.

my bad,i should have realised that it was Gibson not Henderson,that merse meant.

i have been a long standing critic of our youth system,and rightly so,firstly not having one,and as a youth coach working in the pioneer league seeing ,Plymouth/exeter scouts coming into what i would call tufc area's taking the best of the talent,which should have been going to tufc ,was frustrating to say the least.

then when the club rightly re-started the youth system,to say they were backward in coming forward,is an understatement,while Plymouth/exeter where still scouting ,the best tufc did was have open trails pretty much isolated to the torbay area,and send generic letters out to local club's asking for them to put up there better players for trials,as you can imagine most where tossed in the bin.

iam not going to pretend i know anything about Geoff harrop,however it is clear,he knows a thing or two about running and developing a proper youth system,from his achievements at Northampton.

the development centre's which i believe are directly tufc,rather than run by a private body for the club,will widen the search for players which will hopefully feed through to the centre of excellence which is currently poor in quality.

merse is right to say to keeping the search to close to the club ,is not the right way for the club to go,2 weeks ago i attended tufc development against swindon held at h.m.s Raleigh,due to low numbers at the local centre,players from the Plymouth centre were brought in to make up full squads for tufc.

the difference in the Plymouth lads was clear to see,sharper thought process,wanted the ball more,and higher controlled aggression.

not wishing to diss-respect the pioneer league there talented lads out there,and not forgetting mark Ellis/ed Palmer,also Dan gosling Plymouth-everton all former pioneer league juniors,and a team of volunteer tufc scouts will be out watching them next season.

all in all i think tufc are going the right way with the youth system,which from this could emerge as the best around the south west and rival many bigger clubs,so well done tufc.

Welton Rovers away particularly springs to mind. A little mining community near Bristol with a team of very skilful but also very physical Bristolians, backed up by a surprisingly large and intimidating crowd very close to the pitch in their small ground. Not much away support either ... in fact none

I suppose it was also the same when we played for Brixham United Merse, albeit in different seasons. Whilst the South Devon League has always been a good league with a number of good players and good teams, I think the overall strength of the Plymouth & District League was greater due to the large urban catchment area of Plymouth.

In the South Western League you could be playing as far away as Penzance, Helston, or Falmouth, and still find the teams made up of all Plymothians.

Still it's pleasing to see that our club are putting serious thought into the youth programme now and hopefully we will capture our talented Torbay and South Devon youngsters at the right age whilst also not ignoring the wider area in our search for young talent. I think I have mentioned to you before Merse probably by PM that a friend of mine here in Ivybridge is an official Torquay scout, and he is normally expected to go to games in Plymouth and East Cornwall.

Nice to see a couple of the youth team get pro contracts as well. Things do seem to be moving in the right direction, albeit limited by resources which is inevitable for a club of our size located in a football outpost.

Small club or not they have given me great pleasure over very many years and the good memories are enough to ignore the frequent heartache that is a factor of supporting The Gulls! ;D

One significant factor in the appointment of Geoff Harrop could lay in the Football League clubs agreeing to adopt the "Home Grown Rule" from this season in that squads will be capped to a maximum of 25 players over the age of 21 of which 10 will have to be "home grown".
To the unitiated that means players who have been registered in domestic football for three seasons before attaining the age of 21.

Now as I read it, however small that squad the "10" factor remains the same; so that the "10" become an even bigger percentage of the squad, the smaller the squad is.

Therefore, to be truly effective in forcing clubs to develope their own talent the rule would surely need to insist that the three season qualifying period meant that they were registered with the club with whom they are going to play; but to be perfectly honest that bit seems to be missing from the regulation.

The demise of the English National Team as a world force has largely been brought about (in my opinion) by the FACT that England has the world's highest percentage of "ex pats" in it's Premier League with an appalling 59% coming under that category and Liverpool really take the biscuit with a pathetic 90% of their squad being unavailabnle for selection by the national sides of this country.

Even Arsenal, so long criticised for denying English talent the chance to blossom at the expense of extensive recruiting from abroad included 8 English players in the starting eleven that defeated Liverpool in the Final of the FA Youth Cup at the end of season 2008~09......................I watched the first leg of that final myself and was staggered in the gulf in class between the Arsenal squad and the Liverpool one. Liverpool should have been ashamed of themselves for turning out such a a technically inferior side judging on that peformance ~ and they, after all; had reached the final!

When you see the extent to which how many members of that Arsenal Youth Squad spent last season playing in both the Premier League and the Football League as loanees from The Emirates, then you realise just how much the Gunners have turned around their policy of the early "Wenger Years" when the club's name was a byword for denying English talent it's opportunity in deference to youngsters recruited from all around the world.

But here's the fly in the ointment: the rule states that a "Home Grown" player can be of any nationality or age as long as he has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association, or the Football Association of Wales for a period (continuous or not) of three complete seasons or 36 months before his 21st birthday. or the end of the season in which he becomes 21.......................so they can still bring in the foreigners as long as they have them here for three seasons before they reach the age of 21. Doesn't that sound like a dog chasing it's tail?