Quote Originally Posted by Taffy View Post
I would argue that this forces the clubs to care about the full program and put an effort in to develop all teams, got a good 15s, well focus on improving all your other teams as well. Of course this won't mean jack shit if 18s get taken out of PYL, a club could be in NPL, and doesn't matter if their PYL teams are in Div 2 and League C, they will be able to attract and recruit decent players into the U18s because their 1st grade is doing well, while an NPL club that just got relegated may see clubs now losing a whole lot of U18s that they did develop.

Worse losing a bunch of kids you've worked with for 4 years at 16 years old because of how 1st grade went.
I'm not sure a poor average has much to do with the club not caring about all the age groups in favour of the 1 or 2 successful teams...so many factors can be at play, available talent within the team, injuries, team morale, etc.

I think it's nearly impossible to grow out of a div 2 or 3 status if they can't be graded by team...(The opportunity to grow a brand of "success" out of the squads you are getting right) short of an absolutely ruthless recruitment strategy (like Richard Hartley, or Lakes has done (Lakes also using very positive messaging around their overall direction)