Revamp In The Air

With The SPL about to meet to discuss proposals to shake up the top flight and henry McLeish about to announce his recommendations from part II of his review of Scottish football, there is an appetite for ideas to improve the game up here. There has been often been talk of B sides of SPL clubs playing in the lower leagues. Rangers reserve team manager Tommy Wilson, for one, would support the idea to see young players given the opportunity to play against senior SFL sides. As football in Scotland prepares for what could be a time of change, Wilson believes the powers that be could do worse than follow the example of clubs like Barcelona, who have a B team playing in the second tier of Spanish professional football.

Wilson said: "I've just come back from Barcelona and I spoke to the staff there. The Barca B team is fourth in the second division in Spain. The thing that they've got right there, that I hope we do, is that they have flexibility. A player from the B team can go up and play in the first team and a first-team player can come down and play in the B team. I had quite a good relationship with some of the Spanish coaches from my time at the Scottish Football Association and I got an invitation to go over there so I took it up. It's something we hope we can build on. I certainly learned from my time there. There are lessons we can learn from Barcelona. To have so many players who have come through and been developed at their academy, that's why I took the opportunity to visit."

This season has seen several youngsters make the breakthrough to the Rangers first team, with Kyle Hutton and Darren Cole making their Champions League debuts against Manchester United and Turkish champions Bursaspor respectively in recent weeks. Wilson went on: "In a country as small as ours it's always peaks and troughs. I know that from my period when I worked with the SFA and took the national youth teams, one year you could have a really good crop and the next year it would be not quite as good. It's not like a country like Spain who have so many million people and who always seem to produce good teams. In our academy, we have very good years and then years when the quality is not quite as high. This is a vintage year. The talent can only flourish if given the opportunity and fortunately we've got a manager that is prepared to do that."

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