The much maligned Leicester Tigers Academy

http://www.leicestertigers.com/news/13320.php

The Tigers academy has received some criticism for the numbers of players it has in the England age groups squads. Needless to say when the Tigers academy (or at least the ones 18 or under) came up against England under 18s on Sunday at Welford Rd there might have been some scores to settle with only Tigers inside centre Pohe receiving and under 18 call up.

A Tigers victory in a 27-15 finish should maybe give some of the England coaches a nudge in the right direction!

Tigers scorers;
Tries: El Mahdi, Wells, Bowen
Conversions: Lynn 3
Penalties: Lynn 2

England scorers;
Tries: Stephenson, Northcote-Green
Conversion: Olver
Penalty: Olver

I don't think i've heard any criticism of the numbers in Eng age grades, the problems that people have had have been the few players making it in to the first team that actually look better then average and the subsequent journeymen foriegners hired in their places.

Good to see that the future is looking bright though.

Guess this also highlights the value of playing together as a team and training together over a period of time, rather than as a bunch of indviduals bought togetehr at short notice.

Egland might as well write of this 6 nations :/


Sam you are the Tigers nerd...are any of these kids near ready to be Geroge Ford ( or even better Tuillagi ) yet?

Yappy there was only 1 player from Tigers named in the England under 18s squad and 2 in the England under 20s. Where as the Tigers first 15 would contain Deacon, Croft, Youngs, Manu and Murphy all of whom spent time in the Tigers academy.

Progression is certainly not the easiest thing but there was a slight concern in some quarters that the academy system at Tigers was failing. Losing the academy director and chief scout in the last few years probably didn't help.

Sam you are the Tigers nerd...are any of these kids near ready to be Geroge Ford ( or even better Tuillagi ) yet?

I guess that's a compliment... the winger El Mahdi looks to be a real flyer, think Varndell with a better step and committment to tackling (though he is a bit weedy looking at the minute) so he could be a very handy player in a season or two. Pohe the insider centre is a bit of a boshing centre and reminds me of Tom Youngs before his conversion to hooker. Lynn seems to be settling in at 10 as he was a bit of a utility back until Ford stepped up out of the academy and into the A/1st team. It's a bit to early to judge the forwards though the second row Tom Price who is 18 but with the England under 20s (who didn't play in this game as he's on an exchange programme with Clermont) seems very highly rated. I'd guess two or three will start to come through in next seasons LV Cup. There's certainly some potential there with the likes of Cain and Thacker coming off the bench against Quins on Saturday then starting on the Sunday.