AS more and more money is pumped into youth development at clubs up and down the country, we caught up with Blackburn’s 1960s home-grown talent Stuart Metcalfe, who made his Rovers debut at 17 and believes more should be done to blood up-and-coming youngsters...
STANDING at Brockhall watching Blackburn Rovers’ next batch of youngsters hoping to make it on football’s biggest stage one day, Stuart Metcalfe can’t help but shake his head at one of the game’s great contradictions. On the one hand, the former Rovers stalwart sees more money being put into youth development than ever before while on the other he fears most of them being cut adrift in the new cut throat world of professional football.
Life at Rovers has come a long way since his early days of scrabbling around for places to train and spending hours fishing training balls out of the river.
But, while facilities have improved significantly for the game’s next generation, the 60-year-old fears the increasingly pressurised climate leaves most of them facing an uncertain future.
He said: “I would have loved to have trained at Brockhall when I was a kid. The pitches are beautiful, the facilities are fantastic. It was very different for me.
“We used to train at Witton Park and Pleasington and you would come home full of dog mess. We used to train at YMCA in the winter in a little gym - there was nowhere to train.
“No one had ever heard of academies. It all changed when Jack Walker took over and he got the club where they are today.
“It is harder than ever for youngsters though even taking all this into account. You have to be absolutely brilliant to get your chance now.
“I would like to see more players like Phil Jones coming through.
"I have watched the academy a few times and there are some good players but you know hardly any of them will make it.
“They won’t take the risk now, they get loan players in and they look abroad.
"It is just too important for clubs to stay in the Premier League now. You have to stay in the Premier League.
“The problem for me is there are too many foreign players in the game.
"How are these English lads going to get a chance? In the summer Rovers will probably sign four foreign players again.”
Blackburn born, Metcalfe remains firmly embedded in the town’s community with his home in Mill Hill and having worked as a nurse at Calderstones for the past 20 years.
From making his Rovers debut at just 17, the former England youth international went on to make more than 400 appearances for the club first as a winger and then as a creative playmaker in the centre of midfield.
He experienced the highs of promotion and the lows of relegation, while will always be remembered for scoring Rovers’ 5000th goal in a 4-0 win over Fulham in 1978.
“I started at Blackburn when I was 10,” he said. “We used to train Tuesday and Thursday nights at Darwen. We used to meet at Ewood and run up to Darwen.
“I remember being a ball boy in those days. We used to go behind the goal at training, on little Wembley next to Ewood, and the ball used to go in the river and we would have to go after it.
“After two years they asked me to turn professional at 17.
"When they got relegated they lost all their best players and maybe that did give me my chance.
"When they sold Mike Ferguson to Aston Villa, Jack Marshall said to me ‘you are playing on Saturday’.
“It was out of the blue. He gave me my chance at 17 and that was it.
"In those days you used to get your chance. I have to admit I wouldn’t like being a youngster these days. It is so difficult to make it.
“I loved my time at Rovers. We had a fantastic team under Gordon Lee. We had good gates and went ton win the Division Three Championship in 1975.
“We were a yo-yo yo-yo club because we didn’t have enough money to stay in the second division.
"We were buying old players, I don’t know how many centre forwards we had but they were knackered when they came in.
"They were not fit, they couldn’t run. But I still loved every minute.”
Howard Kendall’s appointment as player manager at Blackburn Rovers in 1979 was the start of the end for Metcalfe as he was to move on to Carlisle on July 1980, before quickly moving on to America.
“I was only 28 when Kendall came to the club,” said Metcalfe. “I was fit and had no injuries.
"I remember him telling me on his first day he was going to put me on the list because he played in my position and he said I was too good to be sub.
“I wasn’t happy, I was sat on the bench every time and so moved to Carlisle.
"That was a bad move but that is football. I then had a good time in America.
“I played for the Tampa Bay Rowdies under Rodney Marsh and in the winter season, Kenny Cooper an old Rovers keeper got in touch and signed me for Baltimore Blast in the indoor league.
“Playing for Rodney Marsh was great. He never used to talk about tactics, he just said ‘go out and enjoy yourself’.
"There were a lot of Brazilians, Italians and Argentinians.
"No one could understand a word we said to each other.
“If you did not entertain in America they would boo you off.
"In the indoor leagues it was like 12-10 or 15-9, it was like ice hockey. You played on a small pitch and it was rolling subs.
“It was televised and you used to get 30,000 people on a Friday night. It was fantastic.
"The Americans would hate the Premier League and that is why it hasn’t become popular over there.”
Metcalfe returned to England still very much with the ‘football bug’ and, after a chance meeting with his old partner in crime Tony Parkes, signed again for Rovers on a non contract basis in October 1982.
His only start came in a trip to Newcastle and, after scoring an own goal in a 3-2 defeat, quit Rovers that summer before enjoying spells in the non league with the likes of Chorley, Rossendale United and Feniscowles.
He said: “I was put on a pay as you play contract.
"Bobby Saxton was the manager and he said if he needed me he would use me.
“I was sub a few times, played up at Newcastle, scored an own goal.
"I remember the stick I got in the pub that night and it was on match of the day.
"I never got over that and that was the last game I played.
“In my day there were more entertainers. I was a right winger and every time I got the ball Keith Newton told me to take them on. Then I wanted to play in centre midfield because on the wing there were times the only kick you would get was us up the behind..
I would retaliate and got sent off because I was a bad tempered midfielder.
“When I went into the middle, Gordon Lee told me ‘don’t come back over the half way line’. Tony Parkes would cover the gaps.
"He would take me off if I dropped past the half way line.
"Football is more defensive these days.”
Source http://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/
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