SIR ALEX FERGUSON'S call for radical changes to England's academies has been given the go-ahead by the Premier League.
Top-flight chairmen rubber-stamped a revolution in youth coaching at an end-of-season meeting last week.
The Elite Performance Plan means clubs have up to five times more hours to work with youngsters - which Fergie demanded in the aftermath of the Champions League Final defeat to Barcelona.
The current system, which limits the coaching of players to just 2,000 hours between the ages of 10 and 18, has been scrapped.
In future, clubs such as Manchester United will be able to match and even surpass the Barcelona model which allows 8,000 hours over the same period. A limit has been set in England of 10,000 hours.
Also, players will no longer have to live within 90 minutes of their clubs - although United often evaded this by relocating families from London to Manchester.
But there remain issues to be resolved over how much compensation should be paid if players are poached from lower division clubs. The new changes come into force from the start of the 2012-13 season.
http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/notw/nol_sport/nol_football/clubs/manchester_united/1328215/Manchester-Uniteds-Alex-Fergusons-green-light-over-England-youth.html
