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Manchester City academy director Thomas Krucken speaks to the Manchester Evening News
Manchester City academy director Thomas Krucken speaks to the Manchester Evening News
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Manchester City had another season to remember in their academy. Their Under-18s beat Manchester United in the FA Youth Cup final as well as besting them in the northern league, there were eight first-team debuts and homegrown star Nico O'Reilly was recognised as the best young player in the Premier League.
O'Reilly has been a big factor in minutes for academy graduates increasing by 75 per cent at the Etihad over the last three years to 12,500, but not the only one. It has been a collective effort and under Enzo Maresca the challenge is to keep getting better; the promotion of Ryan McAidoo, Floyd Samba and Kaden Braithwaite to the first team this summer is a promising start.
The work can never stop, and academy director Thomas Krucken is ploughing on with his project of developing the 'future player' with the ambition of producing a Ballon d'Or winner from within the City Football Academy. As much as City aim for their youth teams to win trophies every season, the focus in the last three years under Krucken has increasingly been on individuals.
Two sessions a week were introduced for youngsters in the academy to work on specific training for their position and their development. Braithwaite, for example, identified acceleration as an area for improvement and was able to strengthen that with coaches before bringing it into group training and matches.
The Individual Development Programme (IDP) has expanded only because Ferran Soriano saw the results and gave the go-ahead for more staff to be recruited and for the existing staff to get the specialist training so that there was more support for players. The next phase of the programme - the 'Future Player 2.0' - involves working with a company that uses AI to be able to show players exactly how far away they are from the City first team.
"We have a clear picture of what we want to develop for the future," Krucken told the Manchester Evening News. "What is needed for the winger of the future, and what does Ryan McAidoo need to increase his levels? When he came he was outstanding already, but it's about the last, let's say, five, ten per cent, and to prepare the player then for the demands of what we believe comes next.
"And now we have the staff in place, we have the environment in total that we have grass pitches we are allowed to use. We start to implement technologies. It means we have a huge three-by-five-by-three metre - pitch five, that the EDS are using - that we will look at it tactically in the Netherlands currently just for us.
"It was a kind of joint venture to develop this vehicle for us, and it's it's exciting now to start using AI in position-specific data we collect to compare our players with first team players to show them the gap. So where's the gap between McAidoo and [Jeremy] Doku? And what is it in detail to use the training time we have in a most effective way, because we can't just train, let's say, five, six, seven sessions, but for us, it's how we use the time.
"And it's not just about the play out or for me, about the stuff. So when I talk about the last five per cent, we need the best talent developers. And I think we have a great group. I think we have the best talent developers together. But for me, it's also about giving them the opportunity to learn and grow.
"And this is an environment where we need fast learners because the market is so competitive. The game changes and to stay at the level we are to produce players for our first team, for the Premier League, for the Championship. It's needed that we think forward, that what we do now should have an impact on what the player needs in the future. So this is exciting to have so many great people around who have the same vision."
Krucken is determined to make the most of the resources that the City Football Group have, and as of last season the teams can get instant feedback on training with a big screen on one of the pitches recording them live with footage immediately available to review. There has been a push to scientifically calculate the gap to senior football; everyone says that first-team training is much faster, but how much faster?
That is in part where the AI scheme comes in, with City sending data across to a company that is able to compare how well the young players fare with different skills with the first-team stars. Not only can McAidoo see his strengths and weaknesses in every area then, but he can see how far off Doku or Antoine Semenyo he is.
"We have a game model and their position-specific profiles and needs of a profile to be able to play the kind of beautiful football we try to play," said Krucken. "And we created KPIs [Key Performance Indicators] for positions. So, for example, pass options for a centre back, we identified six. And AI is able then to support us in the identification of where the player is, where does a player need more support, in which areas?
"We give them the data from training and this is currently a trial with a company and we are working as a kind of joint venture currently to develop these KPIs, and they gave us then this artificial intelligence and like we give them the football knowledge.
"They give us the knowledge that I would never understand how to build and then it's a good one-two we play and like position by position, we develop this frame. I'm really excited that once we will have everything in place and be able to show the player that the specific need of closing these specific gaps.
"Then on the other side, the IDPs are linked to this and to use the time in the most effective way with practitioners who are able to deliver this quality of training in detail. And I'm really thankful that the club and the leadership team gave us everything we need."
Much of the IDP lessons are about making players think more about the progress they need to make as they get closer to the reality of a senior career. Coaches can suggest improvements but the idea is that these young footballers take on the responsibility for all of the decisions that they make - on and off the pitch.
Krucken is convinced that City are on the right path, and the minutes in the first team back this up. There is also confidence that this can continue under Maresca, a former Under-23s manager at the club who has a strong track record of playing youngsters from Leicester and Chelsea.
"This big vision of developing the Ballon d'Or winner one day is an indicator that we are driven to try to be excellent in everything we do and learn from failures," the academy director said. "Because we are not doing everything right, but we are open to face mistakes, and this is also kind of our culture.
"Either you win or you learn - this is what Ferran Soriano always says, and I believe this is the right attitude and this is the path where we are following. I can't wait to implement these things and work with dashboards and I think it's needed that the players have these intrinsic motivations to see, okay, I'm here, I have to close this gap.
"The player should be in the driver's seat for his development, not us who tell the player all the time, you have to do harder here, you have to work here, here. The players have to feel that this is needed for them to become a first-team player at Manchester City, and I think these ideas hopefully help us. And if not, then we learn again and we create new ideas."
An extended interview with academy director Thomas Krucken will be available on the Talking City podcast and on YouTube on Monday afternoon.
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