Taylor aiming for Gloucester City Reserves to help bridge the gap from youth to First Team in debut season

Gloucester City Head of Coaching Josh Taylor is aiming for the gap between youth to the First Team can start to be bridged following the introduction of a new Reserves side.

The side will offer men’s football opportunities for U18s players during their two season stint for the Cheltenham Youth Floodlit League side and the years following from that to help give the young players a chance to move into the First Team after gaining that experience.

Friday night saw a reality check though, with the young City side suffering a 10-1 defeat at home to an established step 6 side in Stonehouse Town and following the game, Taylor admits that whilst the defeat was disappointing, the brand new side will learn from the game heading into the new season.

“It was our second game together and have only had three or four sessions, with 22/23 completely new lads in the squad so it was always going to be a tough test against Stonehouse.

They were strong, athletic, won their duels and were as good as I expected them to be with the players they have. But the result is irrelevant for us, for us it’s a big learning curve of where we are at so early in the journey and where we want to be.

We’re excited to see the team evolve and progress, so the game was about minutes in the legs, a chance to work on a few things technically and tactically and of course, we are disappointed by the score line and the manner we lost in the end – but we have come away as a coaching team reflecting on what we can do going forward.

We have another squad playing Cheltenham Town Academy on Saturday, before a friendly away at Lydney Town on Tuesday night, so we need to regroup and go again and see what the next few weeks bring,” said Taylor.

The introduction of the Reserve side is the latest milestone in Taylor’s plans to bridge the gap for young players into the Gloucester City First Team.

When Taylor arrived at the club, they had controversially scrapped both their U18s and U21s sides and realistically the club are yet to bounce back into a position where players as good as Lee Smith or Tom Webb were when they broke into the First Team – but year upon year the void is being filled to allow the club try and offer legitimate chances for progression.

After a number of years of an U18s side, who lifted the Cheltenham Youth Floodlit League’s Severn Sport Cup in May, the Reserves side is the next logical step in the right direction and Taylor admits whilst it is good step for the club, it is part of a five year plan to get the side established and offering regular opportunities for player development.

“When I first spoke to Severn Sport three or four years ago we didn’t even have an U18s programme and the gap from youth to First Team was huge,” said Taylor.

“Something that was important to me once I started in my Head of Coaching role, was trying to bridge that gap. We want to be able to answer the question ‘why do players want to come and play for Gloucester City youth?’ by saying that there are opportunities here to develop and break into the First Team at hopefully step 2 in the future.

Over the last two years, we’ve been working really hard on the U18s programme and we felt that we were in a really good position both on and off the pitch.

The foundations of last year’s U18s side are going to stay on alongside a brand new U18s side at the club – who the majority of are first years.

We aren’t expecting for their to be quick success, this is a longer term project, with the eventual result being that in three or four years time we are seeing players representing the First Team.

We are looking to get the Reserves to the highest level we can, with the likes of Stonehouse Town or higher to allow us to bridge the gap even further,” Taylor added.

First Team Manager Daf Williams called up a number of U18s players to be in matchday squads in the second half of last season, and has continued that trend by including a number of youth players in the squads so far this pre-season with Taylor saying that having a manager like Williams, who believes in developing young players will benefit the youth programme and the five year plan.

“It’s brilliant working with someone like Daf in the First Team who has great faith in what we’re trying to achieve,” said Taylor.

“Daf also understands that this isn’t going to be a quick turnaround, we’re not going to see quick success. We’re really excited to see the lads being involved in friendlies, but we want these boys to stay on after U18s football into the Reserves and we can have a squad of 19-21 year olds, where as this season the majority will be 16-18 year olds.

We are excited for the season ahead though, as we look to give the players the foundations to really kick on both individually and us as a club,” Taylor added.

Gloucester City Reserves will be playing at step 7 in the Herefordshire County League, news that will divide opiniions within local football as it bypasses the need to work your way up into the Gloucestershire County League by competing in the Stroud League and Gloucestershire Northern Senior League and Taylor admits that starting as high as they can was a key to registering the Reserves side to make it a worthwhile venture.

“We did explore other options, but this one was the one that appealed to us really. We wanted to try and position ourselves as high as we could,” admitted Taylor.

“The Hereford County League will be a competitive and challenging league and having previously been involved in the Gloucestershire County League, I think playing at this level will be good for us.

We’re excited even though we are going into the league a bit blind, but let’s see what happens, whilst enjoying the journey.

We want to make our homes as tough as possible and make the KMM a bit of a fortress to give us an advantage, so we are excited to get underway.

The aim is of course step six and even step five, however many years that may take, but this season is about being competitive and if we can get a top eight finish in our first season then we can all be really proud of how far we have come,” said Taylor.

With the Reserves side working alongside this season’s U18s team, City have offered continuity in the form of Management, with Shaun Poole and Ollie Taylor the Management team for both sides with U16s coach Tom Kear in a Head of Recruitment role to help keep players coming through.

Speaking about the trio, Taylor says it was crucial to have the same Management in place for both side’s and thankfully Poole and Taylor jumped at the chance to manage both sides.

“We had conversations around Easter time about the opportunity to express an interest for the Reserves and it was something that both Shaun and Ollie to jump at straight away.

They were both really excited about the project and what we put forward to them, which is great as we wanted to align the goals of both sides and didn’t want separate management for the Reserves.

Shaun, Ollie, Tom and myself all follow the same beliefs, values and footballing philosophy and it works perfectly really, so we’re excited to see how the progress.

They are all great to work with, Ollie is an up-and-coming coach in his journey, where as Shaun has been around the Northern Senior League and County level so knows a lot about the game and Tom, with his background in recruitment and bringing players in, it feels like a perfect blend so we cannot wait to see how where this journey takes us,” added Taylor.

Gloucester City Reserves head to Lydney Town on Tuesday night with their Herefordshire County League season starting in August.

Cover photo courtesy of Gloucester City AFC