THE ACADEMY: Proud Potters eye rosy homegrown future

When you think of Stoke City these days, your mind inevitably conjures up a fascinating mix of foreign imports or honest grafters who didn’t quite fit in at other Premier League clubs.

What of the youth system Potteries way? Where are the next generation of local lads to cheer the raucous home fans at the Britannia?

Well, looking at the first-team squad presently they are few and far between.

Defender Andy Wilkinson is the only current first-team squad member who has succeeded in chalking up a decent amount of appearances under six different managers.

Wilkinson has been part of the Stoke furniture since 2001 outside of five loan spells at the likes of Telford, Partick Thistle, Shrewsbury, Blackpool and Millwall.

After suffering a head injury, Wilkinson was given a non-playing six-month contract in July as reward for his service as he rehabilitates and searches for a new club - a lovely gesture we see less and less these days from big clubs.

The fact that such a well travelled player is the only truly homegrown player is not a great reflection on the Stoke system, but you have to dig deeper to realise why this has occurred and what the future holds.

Catchment area is a fundamental building block for any academy and this is where Stoke have been hamstrung compared to other top-flight clubs.

With both Manchester City and Manchester United to the north and a swathe of Midlands clubs to the south, Stoke have historically been up against it when it comes to persuading talented youngsters that they are the best bet.

The irony being that former City and United youth players such as skipper Ryan Shawcross, Stephen Ireland, Phil Bardsley and Marc Wilson have ended up at the club, while England keeper Jack Butland started out at Birmingham City.

When you have English legends in the vein of Sir Stanley Matthews (highlights below), Gordon Banks and Jimmy Greenhoff as club heroes from years past, supporters would surely take another homegrown player to their hearts.

Do Stoke now have a better chance of producing these types of players from the outset and will boss Mark Hughes be bold enough to give them a chance?

Looking first at the former, the answer would appear to be yes due mainly to the new Clayton Wood training complex.

Starved of first-rate facilities at academy level to help produce players for the first team, Academy Director Dave Wright can now boast a classy set-up and put the Hughes philosophy properly into effect.

Wright’s young charges can now train on a full-sized indoor pitch, while there are more changing rooms as well as a treatment room.

The fact that these improvements have shepherded in Elite Player Performance Plan Category One status for the Potters is also another hugely encouraging sign for fans of this proud club.

Current club favourites Marko Arnautović (skills video below), Bojan Krkić and Mame Biram Diouf are undoubtedly deserving of their cult tags, but the chance to see a young talent rise through the ranks to represent England again would be a massive boon.

This is where the manager also comes in. Historically, Stoke have always had to battle hard to retain their Premier League status.

They were castigated during the Tony Pulis era for the long throws of Rory Delap and bruising, physical play that often pummelled opponents into submission.

It wasn’t often pretty but it helped them stay up and Pulis deserves big credit for laying the foundations towards the end of his second spell at the club that allows Stoke to mix slick passing with their traditional aerial threat.

Under Hughes, their physical streak is still very much intact but their approach also makes best use of prodigious talents like Austrian international Arnautović, former Barca boy Bojan and Swiss summer signing Xherdan Shaqiri.

Hopefully Hughes will be persuaded to blood more academy players now who learn on the training pitch from these foreign stars instead of thinking about attractive alternatives from abroad first.

What of the next generation then? Are any of the current crop poised to follow former academy graduates Ben Foster and Kris Commons into the international arena?

Promising midfielder Ollie Shenton (video below) made his Premier League debut back in February after starting out in the Potteries aged seven, his Young Player of the Season 2014/15 award testament to his progress.

Attacking left-back Bobby Moseley could also find himself used more after getting first-team action in pre-season against the likes of Porto.

Whoever makes the grade, Stoke City are now far better set than before to bring young talent through to the first team and that can only be a good thing for a club steeped in illustrious English folklore.

This is a regular academy column for Yahoo Sport UK.

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