Audi 2007 Annual Report Download - page 114

112 SPORT&ATHLETES
ized their youth team policies. Even the ten-year-olds now join
their coaches to analyze their game on video recordings.
Míchel prefers to use ex-professionals as coaches. “We look
for experts who really know what it’s all about. After all, we
want one player each year to go through to the first team.”
Bernd Schuster’s team currently includes seven players from
the youth academy, while a total of 38 Real graduates play in
Spain’s first division. The club is not trying to convey just tech-
nique and tactics. The keyword is the “holistic approach.”
The players are regularly given character training. As Míchel
says: “We cultivate strong characters who can face up to the
pressures of professional soccer.”The club also has two of its
own teachers to make sure that the young players’ academic
performance is not affected. A stable personality is extremely
important in professional soccer, particularly because the step
from the protected world of youth soccer into Spain’s tough
professional league is a difficult one. It makes sense, then, to
allow rookie players aged 18 or 19 into the second team, Real
Madrid Castilla, where they can put themselves to the test and
show what they can do in competitive conditions. The Castilla
team currently plays in the third division. “Here, youngsters
learn to handle the pressure they will later encounter in the
A team,” explains coach Juan Carlos Mandía.
The boys in the youngest team, the “Juvenil C,” still have
a long way to go before that point, although their lives are
already ruled by soccer. Four times a week, they train at the
new hi-tech camp, opened outside Madrid in 2005. The boys
are bussed from the city center to the training ground in the
north-east of the city. When the facility is complete, it will
have eleven pitches, offering excellent playing conditions for
everyone. However, not everyone will receive equal treatment.
Guest teams will have their own changing area and not be
allowed into the central building. The club is also building
pitches and a hotel complex for visiting teams who want to
hold training seminars here and breathe the “royal” atmos-
phere. The club also makes distinctions internally. “We try to
visibly motivate people,” explains Gallego, the deputy head of
the academy. Both the locker rooms and the pitches are
arranged in an ascending sequence up a slope. The lowest
building is home to “Benjamín B” and located a few steps
down from those for “Benjamín A,” and so on up to the level
of the professionals. Thus, players moving up a team experi-
ence promotion at a physical level as well.
This symbolizes how much importance Real places on compe-
tition. The youngsters seem to be up to the task. The atmos-
phere during training is relaxed, although concentration is in-
tense. The boys, who one minute ago noisily romped down the
hallways, now focus completely on the quite complex moves
they are practicing. “Tactics training starts early. Kids learn
fastest at a young age,” says Míchel. The club’s playing philos-
ophy is taught to the boys right from the beginning. Each
player can rattle off the rules – like young Victor Illana from
the Juvenil C team. “Our objectives are clear. We always
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TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Find out more about Real Madrid’s youth training
initiatives and try your hand at our interesting soccer quiz
at www.audi.com/ar2007/soccer.