Itβs September 2019. Aston Villaβs new Academy Director Mark Harrison has conducted his first interview, detailing his alignment with the clubβs vision and his excitement in assisting the progression of Villaβs youth.
Previous to Harrisonβs arrival, Aston Villa fans have witnessed many homegrown talents slowly fade into the shadows with not many establishing themselves within the first team. Exceptions to the statement being Jack Grealish of course, yet it felt that many graduates from Bodymoor Heath were not aligned with plans at Aston Villa but were immediately released. The club needed a man who could improve the setting from the Academy level, and collate the best talents locally as well as nationally to establish a word-class youth system at the heart of Aston Villa football club. Could Mark Harrison rise to the challenge? Now three years on, fans are already seeing the improvements.
Having been the Academy manager at West Bromwich Albion since 2006, Mark Harrison was at the forefront of the development of multiple talented footballers. From Kemar Roofe to Louie Barry, West Bromβs Academy system has had a remarkable rise in recent times with Baggies fans appreciative of the genius that is Mark Harrison. Under his watchful eye, West Brom achieved their Category One status back in 2012 after investing heavily in coaching, medical, sports science and recruitment staff. They also laid a new UEFA standard pitch next to the clubβs indoor training area, with these intricate details showing Mark Harrisonβs ideology in full, ensuring each element of a playerβs development is enhanced to a high level. Especially with emphasis on modern research such as sports science, Mark is ensuring that not only is the body physically fit and able but physiologically, a player is equally fit and able.
Chris Barnes, a sports scientist who was employed by Middlesbrough in 1997, brilliantly summarised sports science and its importance in an article on one.catapultsports.com.
βFundamentally sports science is based on the same set of principles as many other areas of applied scienceβ, says Barnes. βScience in the broadest sense is a way of approaching problems and the creation of systems which enable you to deliver systematically and effectively.Β The core components of sports science are physiology, biomechanics β how we move β and psychology. At the moment weβre generating a huge amount of data and we canβt ignore the fact that nowadays sports scientists need to be particularly skilled in handling analysis and data. Take those core areas and then sports science purely and simply means weβre using them to try and address the performance questions that arise from sports.β
Chris Barnes
Most importantly, the relationship between an Academy and the first team can not be underestimated. In recent years at Aston Villa, especially during Sean Kimberleyβs tenure as Academy Director from 2014-19, numerous first-team managerial changes have not helped the academy system, along with a further two changes of ownership and two different Sporting Directors. An academy is the core to any football club, with young players needing the confidence and assurance to know that a pathway to first-team football is available for them to work hard towards. As we have seen with the rise of players such as Jacob Ramsey, Tim Iroegbunam and Carney Chukwuemeka, with many more talents ready to pounce at the chance of first-team football, Bodymoor Heath is thriving with not just world-class footballers but world-class human beings.
Mark Harrison, during his first interview at Aston Villa, immediately shared his principles, core beliefs and values.
βNever lose sight that it is about the player and player development, making sure each player has their own individual development plan, thatβs going to ensure that if they donβt quite get to our first team – which is a massive challenge with us being a Premier League club and hopefully moving forwards not just being a Premier League club but being a club that is going to compete in Europe, when you think that we are recruiting from all over the world – thatβs what we are going to be competing against.β
Mark Harrison
With Tim Iroegbunam, Carney Chukwuemeka and Aaron Ramsey all successful with Englandβs Under 19s, winning the Under 19s European Championships, the Villa faithful have the right to be excited for the future of Aston Villa Football Club. Under the stewardship of Mark Harrison at the youth level to Steven Gerrard at the first-team level, the club have become a cohesive, well run entity who are bound for continued success for years to come.Β
AUTHOR | LIAM BRYAN
Authorβs UTV PODCAST archive Liam Bryan – UTV Podcast | An Aston Villa Blog
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