Di Paola sets out long-term vision for Horsham's future

The Hornets’ long-awaited move to their impressive new facilities at The Camping World Community Stadium has seen the club’s multiple youth sides and newly reformed U23s team thrive in their respective leagues.

The U23s, who disbanded midway through the season last year, are doing especially well, currently sitting joint second in the Bluefin Sports Insurance Development South Division having notched impressive 5-1 and 2-0 wins over Ramsgate and a previously unbeaten Phoenix Sports.

Horsham have sides in every age group except at under-17 and under-18 level and with Di Paola’s first team also flourishing at the top of the BetVictor Isthmian Premier Division, the Horsham manager shared his long-term vision for the club.

He said: “(The U23s) are doing really well. Mark (Hawthorne, U23s manager) is doing a good job and it’s worked quite well this year, where we’ve been able to give a few of our boys some minutes, which is a big help.

“For me, the next phase of it has got to be to get a really decent U18s in, slowly build the progression for the players, and then it will eventually filter through.

“It’s a long-term project that the club’s got to properly buy into.

“If they want youth players in the first team then we’ve got to get the right set of youth players into the club and not just have it as a youth club, which is what I think it is at the moment.”

He added: “That’s the area we’ve got to work on if we want to start bringing our own players through – we’ve got to have a pathway that works.

“We’ve got to take the view that, for each age group, we’re striving to get the best players in from the area.

“Then, all of a sudden, those boys will be playing for Sussex in cup finals and as they get up through the age groups, we’ll have a really good 18s. The 18s can then feed into the 23s and then our 23s won’t be 17-year-olds which a lot of them are at the moment.

He continued: “That’s how it’s got to be put together but as a club, we’ve got to buy in to building that proper pathway.

“We need to be encouraging managers to go out and get the best players at the age groups.

“Lewes, Worthing and Whitehawk are the benchmarks in Sussex because they go and get the best players.

“It’s a real work in progress and it’s one we’ll probably have to look at for next year.”

17-year-old Archie Goddard has become a star in the U23s this year, scoring in every competitive match bar one so far this season with 14 goals in nine appearances.

Asked whether he may begin to filter some U23s players into the first team, Di Paola was typically coy. He said: “A lot of them are quite young so they’ve got to be really good to get in our squad.

“That’s a great position for the club to be in, by the way.

“We’ve got quite a big squad but there’s one or two in there that in a year or so might be knocking on the door for being in next year’s squad.

“However, I’m also mindful of the fact that Mark’s had to work ever so hard to put a group together and we have to keep them as strong as we can.

“There are a few I‘ve got in mind but we have got a really strong squad at the moment so it’s going to be hard for them.”