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There's a Twitter account which, after the Manchester United team has been announced, publishes a running tally of consecutive games they've had a academy product in the match day squad.

At last count it was 3,723 games, a run stretching back to October 1937. The account, The MUFC Academy, is well-followed. And their tweet ahead of the defeat to Southampton on Sunday attracted nearly 300 re-tweets.

Most United fans who are active on social media, and many who aren't, are aware of the statistic. By it's nature, it increases by one every week which can make it feel like wallpaper. Seen but not really digested.

But take a second to think about how impressive it is. More than 3,500 games over nearly 80 years. It's a phenomenal record. Phenomenal.

It's hard to produce footballers. Just look at Ravel Morrison. Born in Wythenshawe with an incredible talent, he should be a god-send for a club like United.

But he's likely to leave West Ham for free this month with his manager, Sam Allardyce, eulogising about a player who could have been great.

“It's the old metaphor isn't it, you can lead the horse to water but you can't make it drink," said Allardyce this week.

“And it just shows how important you are in other areas to make sure you become a top player.

“Talent cannot be the only aspect of why you're going to be a great player. It has to be much more than just the talent.

“And in Ravel's position at the moment the talent is there, he just has to change his whole life and then hopefully somewhere down the line he'll become the player he should be.”

Without trying to dig up the past, Morrison has been in trouble with the police, while his attitude to things as simple as time-keeping have been called into question more than once.

He'll turn 22 next month and he's already looking for his sixth club. There are rumours he might have to leave the country to find a new one.

Morrison is proof of how difficult it is to produce players, and why United's record is so astonishing. Talent is not enough. Neither is work ethic, or personality, or a burning desire to succeed. You need all of those things and a bit more. Especially at a club like United.

It's something Warren Joyce, United's Under-21s manager, is well aware of.

“When you're winning things, the opportunities do not come along as often so we can be proud of that statistic,” he said in an interview last month.

"If you're just a mid-table club, it would be easier to get players into the first team and I don't think it would have been a massively hard achievement to do that and maintain it with the 50-odd players I could reel off who we have sold in the past years.

“It means it's very hard to get a young kid through when there are world-class players in nearly every position.”

Tom Thorpe is a good example. He's a clean-cut, disciplined professional, without the off-field baggage that comes with Morrison.

He's represented England at every level since Under-16s and was part of the Under-17s squad that won the European Championships in 2010.

Captain of the last United side to win the FA Youth Cup in 2011 - a team which included Morrison - he's highly-rated by Joyce, in particular.

But, after turning 22 this week, he looks likely to leave Old Trafford in the near future with a grand total of one first-team appearance.

Michael Keane, who's made 17 appearances for England's Under-21s, moved to Burnley this week. Good isn't good enough at United.

An education at Carrington does, though, set them up for careers elsewhere with 36 graduates playing in Europe's top five leagues, second only to Barcelona's 43. More than 100 full internationals have come off United's production line.

Yet, despite all the pit-falls and things that can go wrong, United have included a homegrown player in each of their last 3,723 match day squads.

It's a run that has been unbroken through 25 record transfers, 18 top-flight championships and three European Cups.

It's tempting to think United's academy isn't doing its job because the stars of the first team are now expensive imports like Angel Di Maria and Juan Mata rather than Paul Scholes, David Beckham and Ryan Giggs.

But then, on Saturday against QPR at Loftus Road, it's almost certain that a United manager will name a homegrown player in the match day squad for the 3,724th time in row. The MUFC Academy will tweet about it, but the significance will only resonate with a few.

Maybe only when the run reaches 4,000 or 5,000 will it get the attention it deserves. It's an incredible achievement.