Thanks to "doudoubi2" for the tip! ——

Cristiano Ronaldo's imminent departure shocked everyone in San Antonio, and the adults in the neighborhood were envious of Ronaldo who was going to England to play in England's championship team, which meant that his life would be turned upside down, and at the same time, his family would be rescued from the abyss of poverty.

The players and coaches of the Antonio team also came to congratulate Ronaldo, especially Ronaldo's childhood football mentor Sosa, who communicated privately with Aldridge for a long time, and told Aldridge his understanding of Ronaldo and his suggestions for growth without reservation.

Aldridge was grateful and carefully wrote down every word Sousa said, Ronaldo showed his talent for football at a very young age, but he also had obvious shortcomings that had to be cut out as he grew up that would not help him in the future.

After Aldridge paid 200,000 pounds for the training of the national team, Ronaldo carried a travel bag on his back, wore the clothes that his mother cleaned and ironed for him, and left his hometown with Aldridge with a reluctant but stubborn face.

Although Ronaldo is Portuguese and speaks Portuguese, his Portuguese is not as formal as Aldrich's, because he has a strong hometown accent, and Aldrich used to learn Portuguese as the most formal.

This may have caused him to be discriminated against, especially since he had to learn English and go to school in London, and in any case, as his mother Dolores said, he had to learn to be independent!

After leaving his hometown, Ronaldo became reticent and barely spoke anything to Aldrich along the way. It wasn't until he came to Millwall Club. Aldridge personally led him on a tour of the team's home stadium.

Although the Lion's Den Stadium looks small in England. But the capacity of nearly 20,000 is much larger than the 8,500 capacity of the home stadium of the national team, which opened Ronaldo's eyes, and when he heard Aldridge say that within four years they will move into a new stadium, a world-class stadium that can accommodate more than 60,000 people, Ronaldo's face obviously became a little excited.

Then Aldridge took him on foot to the Leo youth training base, Ronaldo with a large travel bag followed him, and many passers-by greeted Aldridge friendly and saw Ronaldo. I thought it was Aldridge's relatives, they were all residents of the neighborhood, and naturally they were also fans of Millwall.

Many people asked about Millwall's summer signings with concern, and Aldridge could only laugh it off formulaically.

When Ronaldo stood at the door of Leo's academy base, he was completely stunned.

"This, this, this is bigger than the club looks!"

The academy site is quite extensive and has undergone a new round of expansion in the summer, as Aldridge intends to start this summer and bring in first-team training as well. It's just a training course, and there are more than twenty of them, large and small. It is suitable for different training programs, and will be expanded in the future to prepare for more subordinate echelons.

The Leo Academy has a large façade and is full of grandeur, with the name of the Leo Academy and the Millwall emblem carved on the wall next to the door.

The new Premier League season kicks off on August 8, and the day after tomorrow is the day when the first-team players return to the team, and the pre-season training camp will kick off.

At this time, the training base was in full swing, with members of the coaching staff at all levels standing on the sidelines, and on the pitch in front of them, the youth team, the reserve team, and some first-team players who had returned early were chaotically grouped together to play entertainment games.

When Aldridge came to the sidelines with Ronaldo, who was staring at the pitch intently, it was like a stimulant shot for the other young players, and the players of the first team were much calmer, and the players who were not playing on the field took the initiative to come over to greet Aldridge.

"Chief, who is this kid?"

Ronaldinho ran over and stared at Ronaldo curiously, but heard Ronaldo say loudly: "I'm not a child!" ”

He still understands general English.

Aldridge found staff and arranged a dormitory for Ronaldo.

After Ronaldo looked back at the pitch and left, Aldridge turned to Ronaldinho and asked, "How is it?" Is Egypt fun? ”

Xiao Luo smiled: "It's not bad. Did you watch me play? ”

Aldrich smiled and shook his head.

Xiao Luo suddenly looked depressed, he is the most dazzling person who led the Brazilian team to the top of the World Junior Championships in the summer!

Aldridge patted him on the shoulder and said earnestly: "Ronaldinho, you have to understand that the junior team championship is not equal to the youth team championship, let alone the national team championship. ”

Xiao Luo was speechless.

Trezeguet happened to be next to him, he was wearing casual clothes today, and he also returned early, but he didn't plan to play, and he also said with a depressed face: "But I really want a youth team championship." ”

Aldrich laughed.

At the World Youth Championships held in Malaysia in the summer, Trezeguet is really going for the championship, and the French 97 World Youth Championship generation has a golden forward, Trezeguet, Henry, and Anelka.

However, it is useless to rely on the strength of the striker alone.

Argentina, Samoel, and Cambiaso, who have flowing blond hair, and Riquelme, and Aimar, who can't stop the demons from emerging in various positions

Even more depressing is England.

With Owen up front, Frank Lampard and Killen Dier in midfield, Rio Ferdinand at back, Carragher and other players who Fleet Street believes are the next generation of national team leaders have gone to Malaysia with one goal: to win the title.

Unfortunately, it backfired.

Millwall's rookie Duff also went to the World Youth Championships, and his performance was not bad, which made Blackburn regret a little: he had already waited for the World Youth Championships to talk about transfers.

It's rare to see Najib smiling and smiling, and the other party walked over and smiled at Aldridge: "You've come at the right time, you've brought back players from other countries, but let's also look at what we've achieved in London." ”

Aldrich smiled and nodded.

Then a strange scene happened on the sidelines of the training ground.

That scene is similar to the scene in "The Godfather" where the family members meet the leader.

Aldrich Eight Wind stands still, Najib, Jenson. Benitez lined up like an old member of the family. They scrutinized the young men who walked in front of them with scrutinizing eyes.

These young players are nervous and excited at the same time. It's like stepping on the draft stage, wanting to make a good impression on the manager, and if he can be selected directly into the first team, it will be a jackpot.

Najib surprised Aldridge as soon as he came up.

There are two young players who were not on Aldridge's summer shortlist, but they came to Millwall for trials and came from afar, Australia.

Marco Bresciano and Tim Cahill.

The two spent the summer trying out in Millwall from Australia, a Commonwealth country. Coupled with the fact that most Australians are of British descent, it is not uncommon for Australian players to come to the UK to develop, such as Lucas Neil in Millwall and Colwill in Leeds United.

Aldridge shook hands with the young talents and gently encouraged them, and then, Adam went around in the summer, and according to the information on Aldridge's recruitment list, the eight homegrown players brought back to the team appeared in front of him.

Jermaine Jenas

Scott Parker

Michael Carrick

Paul Robinson

Darius Vasseur

David Dunn

Francis Jeffers

Ridley King

Under the operation of Andrew's agency, several players from the Nordic side were also recommended to come here for trials, and finally two were retained.

Brad Hangeland

Christian Paulsen

Together with other local players, close to twenty people were left for the trial. Although they are all unknowns, Aldrich does not think they have no future. Millwall was in the transfer market in the summer, and the first team only sold Stam and Phillips, but many players in the youth team who were not the focus of the team have received invitations from other teams, and those invitations are basically from League One and League Two teams, which have brought the club about 300,000 pounds in transfer income, and there are some people who are over 20 years old but have no football to play, the club has prepared a coaching contract for them, although it is impossible to be popular on the green field, but for their lives, It can provide stable work and life security.

This summer, Millwall not only expanded the Leo training base again, but also the youth army expanded rapidly.

Looking at these high-spirited young men, Aldridge knows that the youth team of nearly 100 people of all ages is now only a few who can play in the first team in the future, but this situation does not make him embarrassed, football is a field of cruel competition, there are many good seedlings in the youth team, everyone influences each other, actively competes, and helps them grow better, even if they fail to get ahead in Millwall, they can transfer to other teams, and the players receive better training here. The club gets the transfer income when they send them away, which is a win-win for each other.

Aldridge and his coaches went to the conference room in the administration building, where they began to carefully divide the echelons and determine the positions of some of the echelons in which the players would be trained.

In addition to the first team, Millwall originally had a reserve squad and a youth squad.

The role of the reserve team is to improve and maintain the condition of the players who cannot enter the squad, as well as the recovery of the players who have returned from injury, there is a large turnover of personnel, belonging to a temporary transfer team, some players who struggle for the main position have also played in the reserve team for a long time, plus a few resident players who "accompany the prince to study", basically the age group is in the U23.

For the past three years, the youth team has played in the Under-18 English Youth Premier League, even if the players are over the age of 18, as the competition allows three Under-19s to join.

And this summer, Millwall's youth team expanded, and the club first had to establish an U21 team, and there was also a league at the U21 level, but Millwall did not sign up before, because the youth team players were too young, and the key players were not over 18 years old.

Further down, there is a team of U16s and U14s.

In the age group of 14 years old, Millwall has also recruited some players, in addition to young players like De Rossi and Ronaldo, Aldridge introduced from abroad, many local parents are willing to send their children to Millwall for football training, but they are certainly not like De Rossi and Ronaldo who accept the full management of the club, some are similar to "day students".

Aldridge has also set up the U12 echelon, this echelon is a bit of a ticket nature, parents send their children here will basically be a relaxed attitude of entertainment, so that children can find friends to play football together, coaches usually look at it, guide it, if you find good seedlings, you can also directly recommend it to the upper echelon of the club to focus on.

In this way, Millwall has six subordinate echelons in addition to the first team.

The reserve team is played with the first team league, 38 games a season, because the opponent is also the reserve team of the Premier League club, so the level will be at least the middle of the League One, but the intensity is certainly not as good as the real points league.

The U21 Youth League is also played with the club's first team, and the number of matches depends on the number of registrations from the clubs in the same league.

The Under-18 League is more formal, but it is divided into divisions, playing in the league in the first half of the season, deciding the regional champion and then entering the knockout rounds, with the FA Youth Cup, which add up to a minimum of 28 games in a season.

Further down the echelon, it is mainly based on training, occasionally contacting friendly matches on their own, or playing games against community teams, of course, the personnel list can be adjusted by themselves, and 15-year-old players can play directly in the Under-18 League if their level is sufficient.

Originally, it looked like the lineup of nearly 100 people was crowded, but after Aldridge and the coaches divided the players according to their age, it seems that the echelons are not necessarily so bloated. (To be continued......)