Quote Originally Posted by KITZ View Post
It has very little to do with what you are wearing (other than from a confidence and psychological standpoint), its about how hard you work, talent will only get you so far.

Here's a question though, what is the right amount of training? If we want to produce players of that calibre that what does or should the training load (and games I suppose as an extension of that) look like?
Quote Originally Posted by Aegon View Post
Stole this from here:
http://www.dunedinfootballacademy.com/training-hours

On average, European academies train as follows:

Team Training (Average volume):
U12 and below: 41-42 weeks/year, 3x per week consisting of 4-5 hours training.
U13-U15: 44 weeks/year, 5x per week consisting of more than 7 hours training.
U16+: 45 weeks/year, 5x per week consisting of about 9 hours training.

Individual Training (Average volume):
U12 and below: once per week, 30-60 minutes.
U13-U15: twice per week, 90 minutes.
U16+: at least twice per week, about 120 minutes.
Kids should have a ball at their feet everyday, whether that be organised or just individually honing their skills. Those that have the drive and ambition will do that others my just rest on their laurels.
Organised training sessions should be to develop game awareness and systems, and introduce new skills to hone at home.

The European clubs all have their own academies and in some cases kids get collected from school by the club buses, unfortunately we don't have those luxuries.