Jamie Carragher's autobiography is widely recognized as one of the most honest football books
published in recent years and a passage on youth team football is particularly candid.
Liverpool's longest-serving player, understandably, has forthright views on the Academy system,
given that he was one of the last high profile graduates to break from the trainee ranks into the
Reds' first team.
Neil Mellor left Preston to join Sheffield Wednesday on year's loan deal this summer. It isn't the
sort of transfer many Liverpool fans will have picked on but it is significant for one particular
reason: Mellor is one of the most successful graduates to emerge from Liverpool's academy over the
past ten years.
Remember Wayne Harrison? Or Richie Partridge? What about John Welsh? The likelihood is that some,
if not all, of those names will sound familiar but certainly not as much as had been expected.
In their youth - and we're talking about when they were just out of school here - all three had
been considered certainties to make it.
Hugh McAuley is hoping his players use the FA Youth Cup final as a platform for success further up
the football ladder.
The Liverpool coach was delighted his side secured the club's third appearance in the final in the
past four seasons with Friday night's 3-1 second leg victory over Birmingham City.
ESPN's Bill Simmons is one of the great sports writers, and writes of how soccer has officially
arrived in the US-
When Donovan scored that Cup-saving goal against those spineless
playing-for-a-tie-when-they-needed-to-win-by-two-goals Algerians, the moment resonated like no
other goal in American soccer history.
Newcastle United players Michael Owen and Steven Taylor have today praised stand-in coach Chris
Hughton for the difficult job he's been given at the club. Owen and Taylor - praise coach Chris
Hughton today - good for them Chris must be feeling very lonely right now, and he only has Richard
Money and rookie coach David Thompson [.
Ricardo Quaresma has volunteered to be the MatÃas Delgado of today's match. Remember Delgado the
BeÅŸiktaÅŸ midfielder who proclaimed prior to the 8-0 thrashing his club suffered at the hands of
our boys that 'This Liverpool side is vulnerable and not the super team of previous seasons'? Yeah,
wasn't so smart, well, Ricardo Quaresma has one-upped the Argentine by declaring that he wants to
make us fans cry.
