This is a quite niche article, but I wanted to look at the minutes that the youth get in the professional teams of the province I live in: Limburg. There are four professional team in Limburg who play in two different divisions: VVV-Venlo and Fortuna Sittard play in the Eredivisie, and Roda JC and MVV Maastricht play in the Keuken Kampioen Divisie. In this article I will look at how many players under peak age have made minutes and how influencing those players were.
Due to the technical abilities of the source I’m using, it can only show the players that are still with the club and not all players who have played in the 2019/2020 season. I don’t mind as this also gives me a good idea of which players are going to make minutes in the coming season.
VVV-Venlo
VVV-Venlo saw a few people leave this season and therefore they are not included in the graph below:
- Lee Cattermole (32)
- Roel Janssen (30)
- Peter van Ooijen (28)
- Haji Wright (22)
- Johnatan Opoku (30)
- Jerome Sinclair (23)
- Thomas Bruns (28)
- Oussama Darfalou (26)
- John Yeboah (20)
- Nils Röseler (28)
- Elia Soriano (31)
- Samuel Scheimann (32)
- Damian van Bruggen (24)
VVV-Venlo had three players at peak age (25-30). These were Pachonik, Schäfer and Gelmi. They all still have contracts with the club. Of those players, only Pachonik played more than 1000 minutes and was a starter. Schäfer was the third center-back and Gelmi only joined in the winter. As you can see Kirschbaum, Post en Kum are way beyond peak age.
If you look at the youngsters, only Linthorst and Neudecker have played 1000 minutes in the 2019/2020 season. These are the only young players – who are still at the club – who got regular minutes in the Eredivisie and are under 25. There are a few talented players in the squad, but they didn’t get many minutes in the first team: Bastiaan, Janssen, Van Dijck and Dekker.
Fortuna Sittard
Fortuna Sittard saw a few people leave this season and therefore they are not included in the graph below:
- Wessel Dammers (25)
- Felix Passlack (22)
- Leandro Fernandes (20)
- Nikolai Frederiksen (20)
- Vitalie Damascan (21)
- Carlos Faya (18)
- Mark Diemers (26)
- Alex Carbonell (22)
- Amadou Ciss (20)
- Azbe Jug (28)
- Luc Tinnemans (22)
- Rowen Koot (21)
- Aron Dobos (20)
- Lazar Kojic (20)
Two things immediately can be concluded from this age plot. Fortuna Sittard have a lot of U25 players in their squad. They tend to have a lot of their youth in the first squad and actually giving them minutes. Essers, Sambou, Tekle and Cox all played more than 1000 minutes in the Eredivisie. Ugur, Rota and Karjalainen played significantly less minutes, but still were used. As were Raitanen, El Alblak, Ioannidis and Donkor.
Further we can conclude that Fortuna Sittard doesn’t have or play players which are beyond peak age. Only Smeets, Coselev, Ninaj, Angha and Amiot are in their peak. Even of the players that left the club this season, no one qualified as a player beyond peak age.
Roda JC
Roda JC saw a few people leave this season and therefore they are not included in the graph below:
- Maxime Gunst (27)
- Ivan Prtajin (24)
- Raf Mertens (21)
- Daryl Werker (26)
- Niels Verburgh (22)
- Richard Jensen (24)
- Juan Alonso (22)
- Roshon van Eijma (22)
- Tom Muyters (35)
- Timothy Durwael (29)
Again, Roda JC is another team with no players beyond peak age. They had one, but he has left the club. With Souren, Schlösser and Cotan they have three players U25 who have played more than 1000 minutes. They all have played more than 1500 minutes. Remans, Novakovic, Keulen and Milts have significantly less playing minutes.
In their peak age are Croux, Klaassen and Alberg who all have played more than 1500 minutes in the Keuken Kampioen Divisie. It will be interesting to see which route they will take in their new signings, as they have a majority of young players in their squad, who have actually played.
MVV Maastricht
MVV Maastricht saw a few people leave this season and therefore they are not included in the graph below:
- Marnick Vermeijl (28)
- Gavin Vlijter (23)
- Nino Everaers (20)
- Nigel Bertrams (27)
- Jelle Duin (22)
- Timo Stavitski (21)
- Gilles Deusings (22)
- Shermaine Martina (24)
- Joshua Holtby (24)
- Serhat Kot (22)
MVV Maastricht saw many players leave, but if you look at the players that have made minutes in the 2019/2020 season and are still there, you can see that there are no players who are beyond peak age. Schroijen en Van Acker are the only ones in peak age. All of the U25 players have played more than 1000 minutes. Martina, Deom and Mares have even played more than 1500 minutes.
Martina has left the club/is out of contract but was still included in this specific age plot.
Although VVV-Venlo is the highest finisher of the four clubs, it also had the most players beyond peak age and relatively little playing time for the U25. Fortuna Sittard is hard to make conclusions as their squad is completely different, with a lot of players coming and going. MVV Maastricht and Roda JC are building with their youth and giving them lots of minutes.
Ageplots from Robin Koetsier’s app
Data: Transfermarkt.com
