LAHAD answered it in two sentances ...
but Im going to use a few more - but one question first - would we get the instant success that a lot of people want now if we didn't purchase or even try to purchase the best 'matured' players?
As its allready been muted on here in some thread a while ago - the owner seems to envision spending money of the best possible players to cement a top four possition, when that is regulary acheived the club will start to run it's self drawing from the talent that is currently building up in the academy.
Unfortunatly though, with youth, raw talent isn't all that's required to become a top footballer - comitment to improvment, the intense need to win, the fight and the mental strenth to pull you through bad patches and grounding to keep your feet on the ground are all persoanlity makeups of most of the top top stars that make it big and keep there for a long time and when some promising young starlet comes through and looks great for one season but they dont have all of the above then they (too often) fall by the way-side.
We've been very lucky to have had these uncut diamonds coming through the ranks and playing in the first team from the academy before Thaksin etc - the quality of the talent that came through was good enough to keep us in the Prem when we were short of a bob or two, but so many seemed to think they'd made it and let the limelight get to them - perhaps not train as hard as they did or start living it up...
As LAHAD said:
The cream always rises to the top.
It isn't just skill and talent alone .... Take Lee Croft & Willo Flood to name a couple - all came through arround the same time (well perhaps a little before) Ireland and SWP. They seemed to have what it takes but now one plays in a pub league and one for Derby, they rose to the top but couldnt keep there!
Ronnie O'Sullivan said that the hardest thing about being at the top of what you do is staying there - Mentally you can't be arsed training and you stop seeing the point in doing 7 hours of training and might do a couple half hartedly - the real 'Cream' realise this and still push themselves through it - Stevie and SWP being shining examples!
So basically it takes a long time to get the players coming through the acedamy, and getting 11 of them to become the best players at the same time would be a master stroke by anyone!