‘You can’t win anything with kids is one of the most infamous statements in English football: https://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/you-cant-win-anything-with-kids-alan-hansen-infamous-man-utd-rant-aftermath/1gn0os7ix8fp418q3pequhf9j0
Can Sunderland show that relying on youth is the way to secure promotion? It is interesting that a booster article came out in the Financial Times on the day that they sacked unpopular coach Michael Beale after 12 games: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/68340952
Sunderland are now 10th in the Championship after recent defeats by Huddersfield and Birmingham.
At 26, Kyril Louis-Dreyfus is the youngest person ever to own an English
football club. So it seems fitting that this scion of the agricultural trading
dynasty is betting on youth to bring Sunderland back to the promised land of
the Premier League.
“My family’s been around sports for a very long time,”
he told the Financial Times. His late
father Robert once owned French team Olympique de Marseille. “Football isn’t
new to me,” he added, “it isn’t something where my passion came overnight.”
He took control of Sunderland in 2021, aged just 23, and now
owns a 64 per cent stake. The remaining shares are held by Juan Sartori, a
Uruguayan senator, who is also a private equity executive, and the son-in-law
of Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch who controls French club Monaco.
Championship football, notes the Pink ‘Un, can be a treacherous place for ambitious
clubs. Some, such as Derby County, have thrown money at the chase for promotion
to the Premier League, only to fall short, leaving themselves financially
stretched. Average wage bills in the Championship exceed revenues generated by
clubs, according to figures from Deloitte.
Under Louis-Dreyfus, Sunderland is attempting to chart
an alternative course, relying on young, unknown, imported players to win
matches. Many clubs in the league value Championship experience above all
else, said Louis-Dreyfus, but that can mean signing expensive players who are
“on the way down”. Instead, Sunderland hunts for overseas players, typically
aged between 19 and 21. (Although I seem to remember Mason Burstow at Charlton).
“What we’re trying to
do on the football side is invest in young talent and give them the opportunity
and the belief,” he said. As a result, Sunderland has the youngest squad
in the league this year, with an average age of 22.6, according to figures from
Transfermarkt, down from more than 29 when Louis-Dreyfus bought the club.
That compares with 25.6 at league leaders Leicester City and
27.3 for West Bromwich Albion, the team with the highest average age.
Louis-Dreyfus, whose twin brother Maurice also sits on Sunderland’s board, is
betting on this strategy to overcome the “biggest discrepancy between potential
and actual” in football, based on the club’s large and loyal fan base, modern
stadium, big online following and past success on the pitch.
Promotion to the Premier League is “an absolute
necessity”, he added. “This period we’re going through now is the longest
Sunderland has ever been outside the Premier League. So this is not something
that anyone is used to,” he said. “We think our strategy is going to get us
there.”
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