Aberdeen Football Club were successful in applying for Leonardo funding support earlier this year, with four representatives from the Club and Youth Academy undertaking a learning visit to the world’s biggest football club, and most successful Academy development programme… Real Madrid.

AFC shares a history with the mighty Spaniards with every Dons fan aware of the club’s greatest triumph coming in Gothenburg in 1983, defeating the side from Spain’s capital to lift the Cup Winners’ Cup. That link has been maintained, with AFC’s Head of Youth Academy, Neil Simpson part of the delegation that visited Madrid on this occasion.

The primary objective of the visit was to identify best practice behaviours which help develop the stars and leaders of the future, an objective shared by Leonardo. The open nature of the visit allowed the AFC representatives to study training methods and practices at close quarters, as well as get the opportunity to discuss Academy support programmes such as sports science, coach development, medical provision and performance analysis.

In 2007, a delegation from AFC, which included Head of Youth Academy Neil Simpson and Football Operations Manager Steven Gunn, visited Madrid’s training ground Ciudad de Real Madrid during the UEFA Cup campaign of that season which had pitted the Dons against Real’s city rivals Atletico. Much was learned during that visit and valuable relationships forged which culminated in a visit by Real coach Jose Manuel Gil Delgado to AFC’s Youth Academy to deliver coaching masterclasses to Academy coaches. This time JMGil played host as the AFC team were given access all areas to the inner workings of the Real Madrid Youth Academy.

Head of Youth Neil Simpson said, “We were fortunate to have the opportunity to develop a relationship with Jose and were delighted when he invited us back to Real’s training complex, this time for a week-long visit. During the week all of the Real staff were hugely accommodating and we were allowed access to all training sessions and matches from U8/9s to Real Madrid ‘B’.”

Head of Junior Academy, Gavin Levey was particularly impressed with the access afforded to the AFC contingent. He said, “We had a week of observing training sessions and in total we were able to take in about 16 different sessions across all the different age groups. We were based at their fantastic training complex, the facilities are superb, and probably the best we have seen.”

However, the most impressive aspect of Real’s approach is not their significant investment in infrastructure, players and facilities, but their modestly sized, yet highly effective Methodology Department, tasked with creating, developing and installing a club-wide philosophy on football and one which represents the prestige and history of this football giant.

Gavin said, “Even though they are one of the richest clubs in the world, they still place such a big emphasis on developing their own talent. Already they have a lot of home grown players in the first team squad and that will continue in the years to come. They are the most successful club in the World at developing young talent, topping the league table for most players currently playing in Europe’s top 5 leagues.

“Their U19 side is extremely talented. Zinedine Zidane has a son in that team, with his three other sons also signed for Real in the Academy as well! Curiously, all four play in a different positions. 

The AFC Youth Academy has been developing its football philosophy and a consistent delivery of coaching over the last number of years, with the focus being on installing this within the Junior Academy and developing this through the age groups as players progress year on year through the system. We are beginning to see the fruits of this as those who have experienced our Advanced Centres and skills programmes are graduating to full-time football. It is vitally important that this good work continues and is built on season on season.

Neil was highly impressed with the coaching methodology employed at Real. “It was a fantastic experience to see how the plans and philosophy outlined on paper are so rigidly applied throughout all the age groups at Real. Jose Manuel Gil had explained that one primary aim of the Academy is to develop players and teams that are instantly recognisable as Real Madrid with the quality and style of play shining through. Of course, that is not without its challenges. 

Steven agreed, “This is a process that has taken a number of years to achieve, with time set aside dedicated to developing and documenting the philosophy and then planning and implementing its execution.

“The positive results can take years, but Neil and Gavin have already started a number of initiatives in the last few years that have meant we’ve seen a consistent flow of young talent into full-time football and onto the First Team squad.”

Gavin was delighted to see AFC’s philosophy and approach in many things done by Real, but there’s always room for growth and continual improvement in such a competitive market. “It was good to see they were doing things that we have implemented at AFC. It re-enforced the fact we are doing the right things in many areas. 
“But our motivation for the visit was always to learn new things. 

“The big thing that we have taken back is the stages of development – what the players are expected to learn at each age group and how specific that work is.

“They achieve this by setting a specific football curriculum at each age level, with specific areas for development targeted at different age groups. The U11s would focus on one aspect of the game, the U12s another, and the U13s another.  

Neil explained further, “They are able to address shortfalls in player development for those players entering the system in later years by setting aside dedicated time within the annual coaching programme to work on these.
“The work on the training pitch was clear to see in the way all their teams played, from age 8 to 23 (up to Real Madrid B). It was obvious that each player knew his role in the team and each team looked to play the Real Madrid way, high tempo, opening up the pitch and creating chances.”

All the players in each of their teams are technically gifted, identified mainly from a local base in and around the Madrid area. Neil explained, “The Madrid catchment area has a population of over 5 million people, so the depth of talent is much greater than in the North East of Scotland. But that just motivates us to work hard to identify and recruit the best young talent in our own area. Jose Manuel Gil had explained that Madrid have scouts in all regions in Spain, but had found it particularly difficult to recruit players from the Basque country because Atletic Bilbao had developed relationships with schools and boys’ clubs which meant they had access to all the best young players. That’s almost a strategy we are looking to employ in the North East as we expand our scouting operation locally and further develop our relationship with excellent clubs and dedicated people working at grass roots in the boys club game.”

Everything learned on the visit always came back to the main theme: Club Philosophy. Neil said, “It was clearly evident that in everything Real do, their philosophy shines through. They work hard to maintain standards throughout the Academy and operate in a coherent and structured manner.”

Gavin agreed, “A philosophy and a playing style does not just appear overnight. It happens over a long period of time. We started putting in the building blocks with the very young ones from the Advanced Centres, kids as young as 6 and 7. That then has been filtering its way through to the older age groups. It is something Neil and myself are working on with others at the Club and it is a philosophy that will take time to implement.” 

“We are off and running with it. We have had a model in place for the past two seasons and we are happy with it but we are now looking at the bigger picture and that is what we took back from the Madrid trip. What we have in place is working but we’ll be looking to build on this now and in the future.”       

Steven Gunn echoed Gavin’s comments, “This process and throughout the Football operation, we are always looking to provide continual improvement year on year to try and stay ahead of the competition. Learning visits like this are invaluable both to staff individually and to the practices and methods which can be adopted for the wider Club. We are grateful to the Leonardo programme which has opened up some excellent opportunities for staff and players over the last number of years and we’ll be seeking to access funding from Erasmus+ to continue this good work in the future. A final thanks must go to Jose Manuel Gil Delgado, Jaime Torcal Cano and their colleagues for being fantastic hosts and sharing so much with us. It’s a relationship we’ll be looking to build on in future.”