In 2021, Leicester City opened its brand new training ground in Seagrave in the latest move by King Power to elevate it to the pinnacle of world football.
The training complex, which if you have visited, is something special. Costing £100million in the north of the county, Leicester has one of the best training facilities in England.
21 playing surfaces – including 14 full-size pitches – a 499-seater floodlit pitch, customised gym and hydrotherapy facilities are all included in the transformational investment made by the club owners.
Unlike many in the English football pyramid, Leicester have a number of academy graduates that have risen through the ranks and played first-team football. Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Harvey Barnes, who left the club for a combined fee of £68m, racked up over 22,300 minutes for Leicester.
Ben Chilwell, who was sold to Chelsea in 2020 for £45million, played over 10,000 minutes while Crystal Palace star Jeffrey Schlupp, who helped the club win the Premier League in 2016, played 150 times for the Foxes.
In Tuesday’s Carabao Cup win over Tranmere Rovers, Luke Thomas and Kasey McAteer – players with 86 and 33 first-team appearances respectively – started in the 4-0 win with Hamza Choudhury (126 games), highly-rated Will Alves and 19-year-old Chris Popov coming off the bench. Daniel Iversen, who moved from Denmark at 19, and Ben Nelson, who is highly-rated, were unused substitutes.
Right now, there are a number of exciting profiles coming through the ranks. Alves, Sammy Braybrooke and Logan Briggs are all players well-known for their cameo appearances in the first-team. Away from them, the likes of Josh King, Jake Evans, Jayden Joseph and Jeremy Monga are full of potential. In fact, there are too many to name.
On Tuesday, after Wilfred Ndidi made it 3-0, excitement built around the King Power Stadium and with fans at home when Alves and Popov came on. Cup games are prime opportunities for young footballers to break through.
As a Premier League club, giving minutes to youngsters is difficult. Looking at the Carabao Cup fixtures this week, not many Premier League clubs were able to utilise their academy as well as Leicester. The investment in the Seagrave training complex has worked and you only have to look at the Under-16s winning the Premier League Cup in May as an indication of what is to come.
Around the world, clubs make their fortunes through player sales. Benfica have raised over £300milllion through the sales of academy graduates such as Joao Felix, Ruben Dias, Goncalo Ramos, Joao Neves and Ederson. Ajax have made over £210m from Frenkie de Jong, Matthijs de Ligt, Jurrien Timber and Donny van de Beek.
In England, despite their recent criticism, Chelsea have raised £217m from Mason Mount, Ian Maatsen, Conor Gallagher, Tammy Abraham, Fikayo Tomori and Lewis Hall. In years gone by, Leicester have reaped the rewards for their fine tuning in the academy, via player sales, but as well as the promotion of youngsters into the first-team.
It’s easy to imagine the financial situation the club would find themselves in without the handful of successes. Only recently, Trey Nyoni and Tyrese Noubissie joined Liverpool and Manchester City respectively for small fees. Sometimes that can’t be helped, as Nyoni’s transfer proves, with it going to tribunal.
Among all of the criticism off-the-pitch, the academy at Leicester is a goldmine. Seeing a player progress through the ranks, become a first-team regular and then being sold to inherit millions is a difficult, but simple, method to help balance the books has been one of the club’s biggest transfer strategies.
It’s also a simple solution for Steve Cooper to answer his own complaint about having to deploy players out of position. Wilfred Ndidi is not really a long term answer at No. 10, but Will Alves just might be and just as with Dewbury-Hall and Barnes, you don’t know until you try to find out.
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