The Liverpool youth coach Rodolfo Borrell has criticised the "unacceptable" standard of the club's academy. Borrell's assessment is that it will take two years before the set-up is close to the right level. "The reality of what we found here was unacceptable," said Borrell, who joined nearly a year ago having worked with Cesc Fábregas and Lionel Messi in Barcelona's youth system.
"The under-18s had no centre-forward, no balance, no tactical level, no understanding of the game. We are working hard, but you can't change things overnight. I think we have made a lot of progress over eight months, but we need to improve a lot more to get more players into the first team. I think if we keep working hard maybe in two years somebody can appear in the first team."
Borrell's brief from the Liverpool manager Rafael BenÃtez is to develop more English players. This week the club signed the England youth international Jonjo Shelvey from Charlton. He will go into the reserve squad, as they seek to redress the balance having previously brought in a large number of foreign youngsters.
"The best players to defend the Barça shirt are Catalan players, the best players to defend the Liverpool shirt are English players," Borrell told BBC Sport. "We have to fight to make English players arrive. The rest of the players who are not English must be massive quality."
