Melbourne Victory Youth coach Darren Davies believes that his team is the best in the Australian top-flight in terms of developing talent, and is looking forward to partnering with new assistant John Aloisi in the side’s NPL campaign.
Davies says their standing in the National Youth League – where they finished fifth in the league – was a positive result given the current crop of players was one of the youngest Victory have ever featured.
“Our goal is to develop first-team players, and at this moment in time we’ve got one of the best records of the last three-four years of developing first-team players in the A-League,” Davies said.
“So any young player that wants to play in the first team has got more chance at this club than others, and we’ll continue to do that.”
In the current first team, Nick Ansell, Scott Galloway, Jason Geria, Andrew Nabbout and Connor Pain all have A-League experience, and it’s the same system that Borussia Dortmund backup keeper Mitchell Langerak came through.
Davies is also looking towards this weekend, where the youthful outfit will make their debut in the upcoming NPL 1 East, taking on Dandenong City on Saturday afternoon.
“We knew we we’re going into the season with a younger group, with the NPL in mind. This isn’t about today, this isn’t about next week, this is about our long term vision,” Davies said.
“Now we’ve got about 40 players, we’re going to go into the NPL, we’re going to fully embrace it. Our sole aim is to get first team players out of those 40 players.
“A lot of the boys are looking a bit tired, so we’ll freshen the boys up. I don’t know when we’ll get time to do that, but we’ll manufacture that break and we’re really looking forward to the NPL.”
Davies will have an experienced set of hands alongside him for the upcoming season with Socceroo great and former Melbourne Heart Head Coach John Aloisi signing on as a coach for the youth side, replacing Vaughan Coveny who is already involved in an NPL capacity at Sunshine George Cross.
“I’ve got a good relationship with John, I’ve got an enormous amount of respect for him. I probably first got to know him when he was coaching the Melbourne Heart Youth team – I think there was a mutual respect both ways,” Davies said.
“Vaughan Coveny has been instrumental in everything that’s gone on here over the past four years, first and foremost I cannot speak highly enough of Vaughan and his input to the youth program. Unfortunately, he couldn’t commit to the NPL season”
“John will work with all our youngsters, same as myself and Vaughan [Coveny], we’ll all be digging in together for the betterment of our players.”
Melbourne Victory Youth will make their debut in the NPL against former Victory coach Aaron Healey’s Dandenong City on March 17.