By Geoff Warner, Senior Assistant Academy manager
The spell between now and the end of April is perhaps one of the most important when it comes to our Academy. It's the time that we are making our final decisions on who will be retained and who will be released from our setup.

Different age groups have different lengths on their Academy contracts. The 9-12s are all on one year and the 13-14s and 15-16s are generally on two years, with the full time scholarships kicking in after that.

They have already undergone one assessment in October, which gives them an outline of what we feel they need to improve on and also on what they're doing well. But at this time of year we have another assessment which is more decisive.

The boys that have some work to do need to be pointed in the right direction. In the third week of April they will be told whether they are going to be retained for next season.

Those on two-year contracts are obviously staying on for another year anyway, but even so they still need to be told if there are problems we've identified. It means that whenever this time comes around the boys are jittery and nervous, and so are their parents.

Boys that are finding it hard usually know that themselves already. And in the games they try to do things that they're not good at, because they're trying to get a new contract and impress us.

We feel that we've got a promising group of players. If you go back a couple of years, when our current U16s were aged 14, we played some pre-season games and it was thought then we had a group we weren't 100% happy with. I can remember we played Liverpool at Bisham Abbey and they beat us 9-0.

But the same group of players have really come through and improved. This year that group has produced six youth internationals and 12 scholars. So it proves the point of giving players good feedback and coaching them in the right way. I'm not saying they'll all end up as pros and great players. But six internationals at under 16 level is not bad for a club like ours.

Telling the boys who are being released is never a nice thing to do. There is no easy way, and we've tried a few different methods over the years. We've tried getting the parents in. We've tried getting the parents and the boys in together. We've tried sending letters. With the older boys we get the parents and the boy in together and give them the yes or no on scholarships. That's the right and proper way with under 16s.

But with the younger boys we first send letters to the parents and give them the option of how to tell their son. We then give appointments for them to come in and talk about it. They might want to go and have a look at another club, and we'll organise that for them by sending their reports and any other info out to other clubs and setting up trials for them.

As people who work with the boys for a sustained period of time, it's important not to get too attached to them. If you do, then it can blur your judgement. And if they can't keep up the elite pathway it's sadly not the best thing for a boy to be at an Academy if he can't keep up. In those circumstances they need to move to a Centre of Excellence club, which is easier from a commitment side of things.

We also make sure the boys know that just because they've been released doesn't mean it's the end of the road for them as a player. We have had boys in the past that have gone onto club football from us and have then progressed to come back to us or be successful elsewhere.

It's very important to give them hope. Generally, I don't think clubs make that many mistakes with releases, but sometimes it does happen. When I was at Palace we released Nathan Tyson, Dominic Blizzard, and Lloyd Owusu. And every club is the same. Sometimes you release a boy with potential. We tell these stories to the players so that they know that they're not finished in the game.

But it is best to be honest with the boys at this stage of their careers. You can't say in assessments running up to this stage that they're doing really well and then all of a sudden hit them with the April bombshell that they are leaving.

In terms of what we're looking for when we assess players, we work on a system called TIPS, which stands for technique, intelligence, personality and speed. On their assessment forms they'll have eight categories which cover those areas. They are graded from 1-10 and also given an average game score. With the assessments you can then match up the grades and see if the player is progressing.

The most difficult area to grade is potential. We've all seen players who are brilliant in training but can't produce on the pitch in a game, and the other way around.

Our coaches know the system really well now as they've been here with us a long time. We all know what we're looking for, but we're trying to find a mix. We need skilful players for midfield, strong lads for centre half, quick players for up front. It needs to be a range across the board, with as many different types as we can find.

I think the next few years are looking really healthy for our Academy. We have six internationals this year - in the u15s we have Nick Lyskov playing for Denmark and Angus MacDonald playing for England, and I'll be a bit disappointed if we don't have at least another one of our u15s playing for England next year. And it will be similar with the u14s. The way we're progressing we should have some internationals. The England scouts seem to be watching us more and more these days.