I'll be honest Mel, I don't know. And it's funny because I've heard the exact opposite in interviews - that they ARE considered part of the first team! Right now it all seems a bit muddled but it's a new system and new approach and hopefully there'll be more clarity on it as time progresses.
The only thing I'd add is that if I had a choice between bringing in an u23 who's been training with the first team and knows Cully and Joe's tactics, or some random kid from Harrogate on a 4 week loan deal, I'm going with the u23 every time. So I understand how it's meant to work from that perspective, it's just that right now we don't seem to have the numbers to make it make sense. Not enough u23s to play u23 games, and the ones we do have are basically playing for the first team because that squad's too small as well.
Again, I like the idea of the system and I also don't want to sound negative - as injuries ease perhaps we'll see more of how it was initially envisioned to work?
