The aim is to give youth players even earlier playing time in the men’s area and thus make the transition to the professionals easier. The team will consist of the most talented players from the U17 and U19 divisions as well as transition players who were trained in the Lilien’s youth performance center (NLZ).
On the initiative of head coach Torsten Lieberknecht and under the leadership of Björn Kopper (NLZ director), Björn Müller (NLZ sporting director) and the transition coordinator Pascal Pellowski, a concept for structural adjustments to the NLZ performance area was developed over the past few weeks. This further development of the existing concept for the transition area includes a comprehensive restructuring of the team structure in the NLZ. Instead of competing with a U16, a U17 and a U19 as before, in the future there will be a U17, a U19 and the above-mentioned top talent team. The U16 will no longer be there; the players from the U15 will instead be integrated directly into the U17 in the future. From summer onwards, like the U19s, they will compete in the youth league organized by the German Football Association. The most talented players from both U teams will train with the top talent team in the future and get playing time in the Hessenliga. With this innovation, the Lilies‘ talents should, on the one hand, be used as early as possible in the strongest junior leagues and, on the other hand, be given the opportunity earlier to get playing time in the senior sector with the top talent team.
Torsten Lieberknecht: „I expressly welcome the fact that the club has developed a viable concept that I have never seen before in German professional football. With this unique Darmstadt approach, we are convinced that we can provide a goal-oriented transition for talented youth players “I would be happy if we could enable even more young players to make the leap into the professional team in the future and also be competitive in talent scouting.”
Uwe Kuhl, appointed presidential representative for the youth training center: „We have dealt intensively with this and given a lot of thought to how we can individually promote our top talents even faster, better and in larger numbers. With the structural adjustment in the NLZ area, we are offering the players now the opportunity to gain a foothold among the seniors at an early stage.“
It is not yet clear where a future top talent team would train and play its competitive games. Initial discussions with potential clubs have already been held.
