Recently, Perth Glory announced the signing of Young Socceroos striker Jamie Maclaren, a former Blackburn youth player who had been starring for the former EPL side's academy last year. Upon announcing the deal, coach Alistair Edwards stated:
 
"I'm absolutely delighted that Jamie has chosen to sign for Perth Glory... He had a host of clubs interested in him, but he clearly feels that he can progress with us and his signing is another clear indication that our club is establishing itself as a place where the best young Australian talent will be given the opportunity to play regular first team football and develop."
 
For a fanbase that has had to put up with years of a youth policy best described as questionable, if not entirely absent, these words are manna from heaven. The very idea that now, under Edwards, Perth Glory is trying to position itself as a leader in terms of youth development in Australia is something that was simply unthinkable in the time before the former Glory striker came back to manage the club. If there's any doubt what influence Edwards has had on this approach, you only need to ask Maclaren himself:
 
"Alistair definitely played a massive role in my decision to come. I believe he’ll help develop my football at club level which will hopefully allow me to fulfill my ambition to keep progressing through the national team setup."
 
Without disrespecting Ian Ferguson or the players that inhabited his team sheets, you could never really call Glory's past teams 'youthful'. In the 2012/13 season, Glory had the oldest squad in the A-League. Further to this, you would need to go back to 2008 to find a Glory squad that wasn't in the top two oldest squads in the league. While in many cases experience is king, and there's certainly no denying the quality of some of Glory's older players in that time, the club's record during this period certainly shows that there is no relationship between having an experienced squad and winning A-League honours. 
 
It seems Glory's new manager has thrown this approach to the wind though, and in his book you can get into the team no matter what your age may be - something that no doubt comes as a welcome change to Glory assistant and youth team coach Gareth Naven. Approaching his first proper season as coach, Edwards has wasted no time introducing fresh blood to the club. Young keeper Jack Duncan returns to the city of his birth after time spent with Newcastle Jets - and he is another player capped at Under 20 level for Australia. In March, Glory reinforced the pathway they're now promoting between their National Youth League team and senior side, as teenage full backs Matthew Davies and Riley Woodcock took the step up to the full-time squad after Edwards handed the pair two year contracts, understandably exciting the young men. As 17 year old Woodcock stated upon receiving his senior shirt from club legend Scott Miller:

"It's great to get a deal, especially as I've always been a Glory fan. With Alistair coming in, the club's changing, it's a big opportunity for me and I'm loving every minute of it."

But the signing that captured most people's attention this year was that of Daniel De Silva, a 16 year old attacking midfielder formerly of Kingsway Olympic and the AIS. De Silva was impressive in his debut for the club, one made at the tender age of just 15 years old. He's since gone on to play four A-League games and represent Australia at the Under 20 World Cup in Turkey, where he put in a man-of-the-match performance in a 1-1 draw against Colombia, scoring the goal that initially had put the Young Socceroos ahead. The young man has since garnered a lot in the way of hype and attention, with fans and club scouts alike keen to track his progress in the coming A-League season.

Clearly then the 2013/14 Glory side has no qualms about bringing young talent into the mix - be it from abroad or the club's own youth ranks. This certainly brings about benefits for the club; fans attracted to watch how young locals fare, the potential of increased returns on player sales, and the knowledge that there could be a few A-League diamonds to be uncovered in the ranks of Perth's younger players. Additionally, it helps the club's bottom line as younger players typically receive lower wages than those given to A-League squad members in their late 20s and early 30s. But despite all the positives, there are a few doubts and concerns hidden behind the general buzz of excitement in Perth.

First off the bat there is the signing of two young players in particular - Alistair Edwards' own sons, Cameron and Ryan. The former is a 21 year old central midfielder who originally debuted for Perth against Wellington Phoenix in 2011, but saw limited opportunities from that point on and was eventually picked up by Reading FC along with his brother Ryan. Cameron left Reading to join the Nike Football Academy and was then picked up by Melbourne Heart. Again though, he found opportunities hard to come by until being signed by Glory once more for this coming season.
 
His 19 year old brother Ryan, an attacking midfielder, was also a former Glory youth player who continued on with Reading and has graduated from the academy to the reserves squad on a contract that still has two years to run. Reading's willingness to let Ryan have a loan move down under perhaps signals that he is likely to get more time for the Glory senior side than he would have for the Reading first team - but to do so he'll need to dislodge a number of established Glory players, or alternatively fellow young gun Daniel De Silva.
 
Some see the signing of the Edwards boys as a risky move for the club, given the claims of nepotism levelled at former Glory coach Steve McMahon. His own son, Steve Jr, was never up to par for A-League standard (even in the 'bad old days' of the first A-League season - remember that?) and as a result McMahon Sr was hounded in the press and in the terraces. Alistair clearly has some faith that his boys can do the job expected of them in WA - not to mention it would seem odd for the Glory gaffer to spruik the benefits of the WA club's youth development policies only for him to have Cameron playing in the eastern states. But fans will be sure to be watching these signings very closely, so there may be a little added pressure for family members this season.
 
Signing Ryan might attract less criticism - he has been given an extended contract with Reading FC after all - but even then, we've seen these loan moves fail before and fans will be hoping Alistair has made the right call. The spectre of McMahon will linger over these signings until fans see enough evidence to pass judgement; and they'll get a fair go being young WA lads, but not even Edwards' favour with the fanbase will excuse the same nepotism Steve Sr displayed, and nor should it. Ironically though, in past seasons Glory fans have complained that the likes of Cameron and Ryan weren't kept in WA and developed - so anyone slating these signings before they're given a proper run may want to remember back to their own statements from years past.
 
The other worry about having a group of such young players in the team is the strain of professional football on not just their bodies, but their minds as well. Those reading this article would do well to remember the tale of Kaz Patafta - a youngster who was picked up by Benfica at 16 years old after being ignored by A-League clubs, before returning to play 40-odd A-League games for Newcastle and Melbourne Victory. At various times, Patafta was labelled 'the next Harry Kewell' or 'the brightest young prospect in Australia' by fans and pundits - and his performances for Australia's representative youth sides seemed to indicate a bright future awaited him. Now though, Kaz has no A-League contract and helps to run the Ontong-Patafta Football Academy. Patafta is just 24 - the same age as one of Ian Ferguson's final signings for Perth, Isaka Cernak. Being young and talented doesn't mean that you'll automatically crack success in the A-League or overseas - and Perth Glory may find that not all of their signings go on to reach their full potential.
 
In fairness to Alistair Edwards though, he's well aware of the dangers of putting pressure on young players - and perhaps that's why he has chosen to leave De Silva at home in Perth whilst the rest of the squad heads to South Africa for a pre-season tour:

"Danny has been told to go away for a month so he can become a kid. He basically has to go and have fun and finish his school work. He's got a lot of things to catch up with because he hasn't had a break because he's had back-to-back seasons for quite some time."

Perhaps this is a hidden advantage of Edwards' sons being in his team - he would have seen similar scenarios play out with his own boys, both as a coach and as a father. Therefore Edwards may be in one of the best positions of any A-League coach to know how to manage young players - not just in terms of their footballing journey, but how they grow into young men and develop their own careers and lives. 
 
An increased representation of youthful players, then, is a double-edged sword - you win some people over with it, but at the same time you're banking on some of these bets paying off in the A-League arena, and clearly that's something that doesn't always happen. In this author's mind at least though this is a gamble that Perth Glory have to take. After so many years of playing squads that are considered 'old' in A-League terms, Glory finally has a coach willing to take the vast experience contained in the heads of players like Burns, McGarry, and Thwaite and combine that with the youthful exuberance and creativity that comes with the addition of players like Maclaren and De Silva. More importantly, in Edwards Perth has a manager who won't just sign younger players, but play and develop them as well - the important step missed under previous coaches all the way back to David Mitchell. 
 
The signing of his own sons is sure to raise some eyebrows in footballing circles, but if Alistair Edwards truly means what he says about turning Perth Glory into the place that young footballers in Australia come to in order to develop, then it shouldn't matter what your surname is, so long as you're young WA talent looking to grow a future in the round ball game. Perth fans have had optimistic pre-seasons before - but this time, we've got a whole new reason to think that the club is serious about building a brighter future for WA football.