The Well Runs Dry At The Newell’s Old Boys Academy | OneFootball

They helped to produce some of the world’s best football players but Newell’s Old Boys’ pathway from the academy to the first team is now filled with potholes, writes Jamie Ralph.

There’s a well-shared theory amongst fans of Newell’s Old Boys that for the senior team to be doing well, it needs to have a core of players that have been produced in the academy. It’s backed up by data and history. The club has won seven titles in Argentina and those seven winning teams have always relied on a strong squad hinged with experienced homegrown players but supported by young academy upstarts.

Not only that, but every manager who has led Newell’s to a national league has been an ex-player who came through the academy: Juan Carlos Montes, José Yudica, Marcelo Bielsa, Américo Gallego and Tata Martino. Gallego is the only one who was not born in the club’s home city of Rosario, but he joined Newell’s as a youth player before returning to win the title as manager in 2004.

When Newell’s Old Boys last won the championship in 2013, the vast majority of players used in that season by Tata Martino had started their careers at the club.

There were 23 in total who came from the academy. Players like Maxi Rodríguez and Gabriel Heinze had returned to the club after decorated careers in Europe while young players like Fabián Muñoz and Martín Tonso were tasting professional football for the first time, playing minor but important roles during that season of glory.

There’s an argument to be made that the Newell’s Old Boys academy, known as “Las Malvinas” is the most famous in the world. While not solely down to the fact that Lionel Messi, widely regarded as the sport’s greatest ever player, started his career at the academy, its roll of honour is a list of players, some who became better known as managers, who are central to the history of football in Argentina. There’s Bielsa, Valdano, Batistuta, Pochettino, Scaloni, Samuel, Heinze and so many more to mention. Not bad for a club that only won its first title in the 1970s and has captured just two league titles in the last 30 years.

But the conveyor belt has suddenly slowed down. While a small number of talents moulded at Newell’s are still valuable assets at the top levels of world football, a colossal change in modern football scouting and the financial rewards and capital that are associated with the quest for success in Europe means that the academy’s best players never reach the first team.

Enzo Barrenechea, who will play for Aston Villa in this season’s Premier League, left Newell’s without a senior team appearance the moment he turned 18, having been watched while playing for the club’s youth teams for years.

It’s not just a problem at Newell’s. Since the success of Alexis Mac Allister and Julián Alvárez in England, Premier League clubs have suddenly identified Argentine academies as hot sources of talent. Chelsea’s new signing Aarón Anselmino had played just 5 senior games for Boca Juniors before the London club came calling.