{"id":46692,"date":"2020-10-04T00:43:53","date_gmt":"2020-10-03T13:43:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/aston-villas-new-promising-under-18-forward\/"},"modified":"2020-10-14T03:18:22","modified_gmt":"2020-10-13T16:18:22","slug":"aston-villas-new-promising-under-18-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/aston-villas-new-promising-under-18-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Aston Villa\u2019s new promising under-18 forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

Aston Villa\u2019s overhaul of youth operations and player recruitment shows no signs of letting up after the club announced the signing of highly-rated youngster Ruben Shakpoke<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The promising teenage forward joins Villa having represented England at Under-15 level and is also eligible to represent Nigeria in the future.<\/p>\n

Shakpoke\u2019s signing is Villa\u2019s sixth major academy<\/a> capture of the summer window which started with Ben Chrisene from Exeter City, followed by Sil Swinkels of Vitesse Arnhem before Aaron O\u2019Reilly, Lamare Bogarde and Oliwier Zych have all since bolstered Villa\u2019s exciting academy.<\/p>\n

Academy manager Mark Harrison said: \u201cWe\u2019re delighted to announce Ruben\u2019s signing and welcome him to the club.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has joined us after a lot of hard work was put in during our recruitment process and I thank everyone for their efforts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re looking forward to working with Ruben and developing his talents.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sporting Director Johan Lange and academy manager Harrison are looking to recruit Europe\u2019s most promising youngsters, and identifying the next wave of British talent is a good start.<\/p>\n

Villa even beat Dutch giants PSV Eindhoven to the Shakpoke\u2019s signature, according to reports. The striker also had a number of suitors on these shores too, but such is Villa\u2019s pull with an ambitious project to break into the upper echelons of English football in the coming years, academy prospects want in.<\/p>\n

\"Harrison's<\/p>\n

Shakpoke\u2019s taste of club and country<\/h3>\n

Shakpoke made his debut for Norwich\u2019s under-18s side in November in a defeat at Everton before rejecting the chance to sign a scholarship with the recently relegated Premier League club. The forward has been tipped to move on since the start of last season.<\/p>\n

Before making his U18 debut as a schoolboy, in a game for Norwich\u2019s under-15s side, the forward scored an impressive 11 goals in a single game against Watford in 2018. In that same year, Shakpoke was invited to England\u2019s under-15 training camp, later featuring in a game against Belgium in February 2019 alongside fellow new Villa recruit Chrisene.<\/p>\n

Shakpoke, like Chrisene will link up with Villa\u2019s under-18s side headed by Richard Beale who joined the club as under-18\u2019s Head Coach following 13 years at Birmingham City as the club\u2019s Senior Professional Development Coach.<\/p>\n

Villa have been populating their youth sides with the player profiles CEO, Christian Purslow and Academy Manager, Mark Harrison desire.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the Villa Supporters Trust\u2019s AGM in January, Purslow said: \u201cFrankly, I\u2019m going to be brutal, 22-year-olds playing in an under-23 team means your system isn\u2019t working.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means your system has failed because 22-year-old footballers at Aston Villa need to be in the first team. The ultimate goal is to populate the under-23 team with 11 outstanding 16, 17 and 18-year-olds, then I will know it\u2019s working.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that will take years, not months. We need to be higher in recruiting the best eight-year-old, nine-year-old, 10-year-old, 11-year-old, 12-year-old, 14, 16, one a year that makes it and gets a professional contract at 16.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beale\u2019s under-18 side have won all three of their opening U18 Premier League games against Leicester, Norwich and Reading. Sitting pretty at the top of the league having scored a handsome five goals, Shakpoke\u2019s arrival will only improve Villa\u2019s academy performances this season and beyond.<\/p>\n

The post Aston Villa\u2019s new promising under-18 forward<\/a> appeared first on AVFC – Avillafan.com – Aston Villa Fansite, Blog, & Forum..<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Original Source: A Villa Fan<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aston Villa\u2019s overhaul of youth operations and player recruitment shows no signs of letting up after the club announced the signing of highly-rated youngster Ruben Shakpoke. The promising teenage forward<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":51360,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46692"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46692"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46704,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46692\/revisions\/46704"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astonvilla.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}