West Ham win category one status

KUMB.com understands that West Ham United have been granted Category One status in the Premier League's Elite Player Performance Plan.

The news, when confirmed by the club shortly, will be a massive boost to Tony Carr and his team and their work with the club's Academy at Chadwell Heath.

Newly introduced for this season, the Premier League-driven scheme sees the introduction of a four-tier system which, critics argue, will increase the power of the country's elite clubs by ensuring that Football League clubs receive just a fraction of the fees they can currently command for promising youngsters.

Category One clubs like West Ham - to be known as 'Super Academies' - will be able to offer young players vastly suprior training programs whereas those clubs at the bottom of the scale - Category Four set-ups - will only be able to take on players released by other teams.

Additionally, selling clubs will now only receive between £12,500 and £40,000 for ever year a player has trained with them between the ages of 12 and 16 - whilst the existing '90-minute rule' - a rule that states a player must live within an hour-and-a-half of the club with whom he trains - will also be abolished.

Speaking last October about the battle to secure Category One status, Carr said: "There are ten Key Performance Indicators and each has a points system. We need to get 75 per cent of the points available to be categorised as a Category One.

"The Board have been fantastically supportive right from the word go which means a lot more investment. We are putting that investment in place by providing classrooms and employing more full and part-time staff, so we're getting ready for next season."