It was described as the 'coup of the century' when Kit Carson joined Cambridge United in October, but although insiders at the Abbey Stadium have warmly welcomed his appointment; supporters may not know exactly why his role is so important.

Speaking exclusively to www.cambridge-united.co.uk, Carson took time out of a very busy schedule to enlighten us.

"The main job I've got is to identify the best players in the youth section and then train and develop them so that they become first team professionals," he explained. "That is the key to my job; it is the job I've done at Norwich City - and at Norwich we had a very successful scheme where a lot of the boys came through and became quite famous players.

"I did the same 'up the road' (at local rivals Peterborough United) and that was also very successful. Twenty players came through that system into the first team and some were transferred on for big fees and many more will be in the future. The legacy of that will carry on for about five or six years.

"So my job here is to try and repeat that experience of those two clubs to the benefit of Cambridge United, and in every age group there are some very special players here," he said.

Kit is welcomed to the Club in October by Youth Development Officer Dan Ashworth, Chairman Reg Smart, and former manager John Beck.

Carson also believes that he knows what it takes to make a top-flight player: "In my experience, there are lots and lots of players with skill," he said, "but it's the extra ingredients that go into it that turn those players from being ordinary into great players. A lot of that depends on their mental attitude, so lots of the things we do with them are aimed at giving them the ability to stand on their own two feet, make decisions for themselves, look after themselves and care about themselves - irrespective of their footballing talent.

"That's why there's a big emphasis on going away on tours. A tour is where a boy has to learn to leave home, look after himself, mind his own possessions, consider others around him, be a good team player and team mate and so on. It's also why we have a lot of emphasis on giving them sessions on building mental strength and mental attitudes.

"Most Premiership clubs have psychologists or motivators in their youth policies. If you read Sven Goran Eriksson's book he outlines and explains that to make a great player it's their mental attitude above all that's the success between success and failure.

"You don't just take a lad and give him extra training. That's pointless, because there's loads of them with the skill and ability. It's the additional things you show them and do with them that really turns them from being ordinary into great. Every boy I've ever had who's made it, had this special extra ingredient."

Of course it's not a foregone conclusion that the young players are prepared to take on board Carson's wealth of experience, knowledge, and understanding of the mental side of their development. "Some boys won't accept it and will think it's nonsense," he said. "Some professionals might think the same - in the lower divisions. Others will take it on board, and you can see the results."

The youngsters come to Cambridge at eight or nine years of age and, although Carson does identify 'special players' at that age, any decision made at that stage does not exclude anyone from making it as a professional.

"It would be true to say that often you can get it wrong at that age," he said. "At under-12 and under-13 level though, you're not normally wrong - so you can identify at that age.

"The other thing is - and this is absolutely crucial - there can be, with a young player, a difference of six years in terms of physical growth on a 13 year old; one could be about 10 physically and one 16. So with a boy who you identify as having special talent at that age, you have to have the skill to work out whether he will progress physically. You mustn't pick just the big ones who look good, but pick those little players who don't look good yet, but will become good."

While some youngsters will fall by the wayside, Carson ensures that the door is kept open for later developers. "Some will decide at 14 or 15 that they want a life like the other lads," he said. "If you identify someone at 12, it's not necessarily certain that he'll be there at 16 - it could be a different boy. So I think the most important job of mine is to know every single boy at Cambridge United, and to know every week how they got on.

"Every Sunday night I get reports from all the Centre of Excellence games. I do see all the teams, but of course you can't watch them all at once. That way you get to know who's doing well and who isn't.

"I also have a system that any boy who says to me 'I want to do the extra training' does it. The boys who are training with me haven't necessarily been selected by me - they may have selected themselves. If any lad is so enthusiastic that he rings me up to ask for extra training, I don't care whether he's one of the best or not - he's got a mentality that's already showing me that he wants to get on. I never go and ask a boy to do extra training, because that's part of it - they have to ask you, and all good players will ask. All good players want to do extra.

Another aspect of Carson's role is to recruit the staff from within the Club to run the extra training. "I would have been asking Dale Brooks already, if he had not been promoted to Assistant Manager, to assist with some young ones. At the same time, you look at other staff, Nolan Keeley is another highly qualified member of staff. I've already asked him if, on Saturday morning, some could go with him and do extra.

"So it's important to use the skills of people within the Club. What I haven't done yet, because of circumstances, is to find out which members of the first team are taking coaching badges and recruit them. I think quite often professionals spot little things that other coaches don't, or can teach the boys little tricks that they wouldn't necessarily know.

"I also look to outside people. If, for example, Paul Ashworth (former U's Youth Development Officer, Peterborough United coach, and Dan's brother) returns from Latvia for a break when his season's over, I shall be on the phone to him asking him to coach some of these lads. He can either say 'no' or 'yes' ... but he'd better say 'yes'!

"It's the same when a foreign team comes over, I like to try and get the manager of that team to give them a different perspective."

There is also another, equally important aspect to the job: raising the funds to make all this work.

"I'm trying to secure ways of making all this possible," he said. "What I'm doing at the moment is identifying the companies in Cambridge who have links with countries that we visit. I'm hoping that through them and developments through the European Union and our Euro-members of Parliament, to try and get funding for us.

"Obviously we can't reply on the Football Club to provide the funding - it's got enough problems of its own - but this Club is very generous with its funding for the youth.

"I'd also like to upgrade the status of our youth policy by doing this, and raising us above the normal Centre of Excellence. Having only worked in Academies I find the difference in opposition is a real problem. Our boys aren't being stretched enough - that's why you need foreign opposition. We're not meeting opposition that's good enough to challenge us enough.

"We can do some of it, like we've had our under-12s play our under-13 Centre of Excellence team, so that makes it hard for them and therefore they develop, and our under-14s played an under-15s side. But we need to constantly challenge them. Every weekend in January, one of our teams is in Germany playing teams like Bayern Munich, Hanover, Werder Bremen and so on. It's a real challenge for them, but this way they will get in the habit of playing top sides.

"Academies in England are not allowed to play Centres of Excellence. There's a window in the summer when they can, but that's crazy. We'd be good enough to play Academies and we should be playing some Academies. If the Academies were set up to improve English football they are denying the majority of Club the chance to play the minority of Clubs - it's to the detriment of English football. I felt strongly about that when I was at Academy Clubs."

Kit summarises his task as follows: "At the end of every season I can say to Dan Ashworth that we've got these many players who are likely to play in the first team."

Kit will update us throughout the year on this site, and you can read about the under-17s and under-19s, plus the schoolboys' tours, in the Youth Teams section.