Birmingham City’s new academy technical director Mike Rigg has stressed the importance of regaining Category One status to improve the quality of players stepping off the Wast Hills production line.
Knighthead want to make Blues’ academy Category One once again and Rigg, 53, has been appointed to work alongside academy managers Liam Daish (football) and Louisa Collis (operations). Blues were awarded Category One status by the Premier League in 2021 but they were downgraded after 12 months.
Explaining the importance of becoming a Category One academy, Rigg told Blues TV: “The Premier League’s Elite Player Performance Plan has created the best academies in the world. There’s only a handful of Category One – I think it’s 22 – clubs in the country. It was put to us at the time when EPPP was launched that it was about best with best.
“It will enable us to attract the best players. It will enable us to put our coaches and pit them against the best coaches in other clubs, be it Manchester City, Chelsea, Tottenham, or more locally competing against the likes of Aston Villa and Wolves.
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“And it will help us recruit the best players. You can see the outstanding work that’s been done here over a short period of time to modernise Wast Hills. There’s an intent by these owners to not only be one of the best in the country but one of the best globally.
“We’ve got some pretty good talent coming through the 18s and the 21s, so that pipeline is something that will have to be worked on over a longer period of time. There’s certainly been the intention with the investment to make sure we’re on top of that.”
Rigg worked for Manchester City alongside Blues chief executive Garry Cook before taking on roles with QPR, the FA, Fulham, Burnley and Al-Jazira. Cook played a part in luring him to Birmingham but Rigg has revealed that first team technical director Craig Gardner, with whom he will work in tandem, also helped.
Rigg explained: “I’ve known Craig for some time. Craig came in and was part of the technical director’s licence when I was doing some work with the FA. Craig knows the club inside out and he convinced me that there’s a big project on and they are determined to get to Category One status.
“Secondly, I had worked with Garry Cook previously at a different club in a different era and he was coming in and said there were big plans within this club. Based on what both of them said in separate conversations it was too good an opportunity to miss.”
