Watching the u23 players in the a league, there hasn't just been a lot of young players getting time (I count 31), so many of them have been standouts. I realized you could put together a team of just u23 players that weren't just getting regular time, but were absolute standouts in the games I've seen. 

-----------------------gauci-----------------------------
-Bos---triantis------trewin--------farrell/Talbot----
----------------D'Arrigo-----Balard--------------------
---------------------Niewenhof.---------------------
----------------tillio------kuol----silvera---------------

It seems it isn't just my imagination, all but 3 of these starting 11 are in the top 40 players in the league according to fotmob. Here are the players rank and rating

4 Tillio 7.80 
5 Niuwenhof 7.74
6 Bos 7.71
16 Kuol 7.44
24 Gauci 7.27
31 Silvera 7.19
34 Trantis 7.18
39 Balard 7.13
42 talbot 7.12
48 trewin 7.09
59 Farrell 7.02
90 D'arrigo 6.85

We always hype up the youth, but this definitely seems a step up and I think as a team they are roughly lower Juliper league level which is a remarkable step up from just a few years ago. The above 12 are just there tip of the iceberg. Other u23 players getting regular time are

Alagich, Toure, Popovic, Drew, Gomulka, Bodnar, Yazbek, Thurgate, colli, wood, Stokadis, Ruhs, Segicic, Natta, Gurd, Duncan, Bosinovski, Pierias and Najjarine 

I would argue all look pretty comfortable at this level

Are there any u23 players standing out to people that I'm missing?

Waine and Milanovic

Ah yes Milanovic has done well!

thought Waine was a kiwi

He is a kiwi but he’s still the best U23 striker in the comp.

ah fair enough. Good for them :)

Hope our u23s are at least at this level next olyroos campaign - especially when you consider that volpato and circati could in principle be a part of this age cohort

Jeggo and Davidson are at the lower level of the Juliper League - Just sayin. I could see some of these players at Jeggo’s level, though a few years ago he did well in the Roos team. Davidson did well in the AL a few seasons ago.

Indeed and i reckon only two of that 11 are behind jeggo and davidson

Coaches keep selecting more experienced players, because they don't make mistakes and are more consistent.

Short term it  often works, but  long term those older players make little improvement over time.

Conversely, younger players are less consistent,  and make more mistakes, but are capable of really fast improvement over short periods of time.

Some coaches are happier to promote youth though. Arnold did at CCM.

 

there have been 32 u23 players getting serious minutes this year with 9 of them standouts. It seems a big jump this year in both quality and quantity for the youth!

the Jupiler league is a relatively rubbish league - if we removed the salary cap in the AL and had a P/R i reckon we would have a better league. 

The biggest advantage it has is the top sides compete in Europe which brings in big money and puts players in the shop window but overall Belgium similar Croatia, Serbia, Poland etc  'great development' pathway but a sub-par league partially due to being raided by bigger leagues 

we need to remove this mentality every league in Europe is automatically good - most are no better then the AL or MLS etc but they have vastly most finanically support as football is the number one sport and the cash in playing in Europe is huge

just playing in the Europa league gives clubs like 3-4m Euros group stage the UCL is much higher then that. 

Unfortunately the ACL is  garbage with crap prize money and most clubs losing money competing in it - Asian as a confederation has a long way to go 

one of the big reasons no one likes to talks about our decline in development is we compete in far less youth competitions ie U20 WC and prior to joining the AFC we competed in most Confederations cups - it put our your in the 'shop window' 

i look at the signing of Koul that only happened because of a friendly against FCB imagine how many players have missed out on golden opportunities due to not having the ability to prove themselves the NYL was a fucken disaster for development and the AL is not enough to develop talent 

would be fantastic if the prize money eventually grows. Funny enough I could see an east asian champions league being more commercially viable

the issue is the Asian confederation is run like shit - there is too many nations and too much division between the West and East Asians 

Winning the ACL should give at least a 30m USD prize at the moment it is 4m USD - that wouldnt even cover the cost of transporting and housing the squads for the competition and that is even if you add in the pathetic travel subsidy. 

you make more money playing E-sports.....im not fucken kidding literally make more money playing FIFA2023 then winning a top confederation football competition and people wonder why no one rates the Asian confederation. 

what annoys me is it isnt like the confederation does not have money population wise it is the biggest confederation on the planet
 
personally maintain it was a mistake to join the AFC i am in the minority but i think football has gone backwards being part of Asia

Out of this bunch I can definitely see Bos, Nieuwenhof, Gauci, Kuol making the Asian Cup squad, and a bunch more be involved in the next WC qualifying cycle. It's a fresh change having so much youth coming through in the A-League - i find myself watching almost every game to follow them

The one ingredient we lack is Football Culture, I've been to football clubs in England, Scotland, Holland, Greece and France, and not in the top clubs.

You live it and breath it over there, I also found the people involved are more welcoming, prepared to discuss football, they ask and answer questions with no ego.
They admit they don't have all the answers.

Kiwis dont count when its about Australian players about this thread.

The problem is the lack of incentive, the reason why the Mariners promote young players is to get an ROI with transfer fees as they not rich like other a-league clubs, Adelaide United are similar as well but it seems the rest of the league dont have much interest in bringing through young players.

Which is why its disappointing the APL and PFA are not interested in JJ's idea of an transfer system at this stage, it would only encourage more clubs to bring more young players through whilst making money from developing a player.

Of course we need more clubs as well, but overall it requires a change of mind set from the clubs too.

Correlation is not causation.

I think we would have regressed in either confederation. Given the choice between the 2, Asia is the better confed to be in IMO.

Can’t believe I forgot about Alexandar Popovic who probably is the best U23 CB in the entire league

I included him actually and agree he is excellent. Amazingly I couldn't fit him in the starting 11 above since there are players doing even better in my opinion

That's an interesting opinion that does not seem to line up with the performance of the teams they play in.
Not to mention the fact that Popvoc is basically our no.1 CB 

Perhaps put another way, its good that it can even be a discussion which of the three standout young cbs are the best