Simon Clark marks his first anniversary with the club this week, and our under-18s coach has a clear message for all young Dons striving to earn a pro deal.
“We don’t want to be second to anybody, we want to win the title,” said Simon in an extensive interview from our New Malden training ground.
Last season, Simon guided the squad to runners-up in the Youth Alliance South East, pushed Leeds to extra-time before exiting the FA Youth Cup at the fourth round stage and helped produce three more graduates for our first team.
See how Simon Clark’s talented crop of young Dons are putting in the hard graft below, along with the thoughts of their coach.
“There were loads to learn from last season,” said Simon. “All we’re going to try and do is be better in every way – physically, technically, tactically, and socially. We’re going to try and raise the bar and keep going in an upward trajectory.
“We’ve spoken to players and their parents in pre-season about them having no ceiling. If they push, drive, live their lives the right way and become obsessed with their career as a professional athlete – there is no limit to what they can achieve. They can go as far as their mind, body and technical ability can take them.”
Our under-18s have also switched training pitches for the forthcoming campaign. It’s something Simon sees as crucial not only for their development, but also important to have that pathway of training next to Johnnie Jackson’s first team.
“It’s absolutely huge,” added Simon. “We want to be in a position where the gaffer or ‘Skivo’ call over and require a number eight, then my best eight will go over. It doesn’t matter if he’s an under-16 – if he’s my best eight, then he goes over. We’re here to maximise what the players can do and get them onto that first team bus as soon as possible.
“You’ve got senior professionals that will demand excellence off you. The job for myself and my staff is to make sure that the players have that in them to be able to walk over there and not just make up the numbers. We train so hard to make sure that they are capable to go over and push and add to the group.”
As well as taking some big hits from Under-18s Lead Therapist Josh Stepien on a tough training circuit, our talented group want to make some big impressions of their own in pre-season.
At the weekend, things started with a creditable 4-3 defeat away to Stoke City’s youngsters. Simon added: “It was a close game and a wonderful experience.”
“I wanted to play against a certain number of category one and two sides where we’re not going to have so much of the ball. I also want us to play against higher-level non-league teams. It’s all about performance, what we learn from it and the preparation it gives us for when the season gets underway.
“We wanted an overnight stay for the Stoke game, a couple of things to do and a training session while we were up there, and it turned out to be perfect. We were at Stoke’s training ground and on their number one pitch. We believe they had three or four first year pros in their starting line-up and we started with two under-16s, who did tremendously well, and it was a really positive trip for us.”