The Premier League has begun monitoring the GCSE results of children in its youth-development system amid concerns about whether those released by clubs are being properly equipped for life beyond football.

Telegraph Sport can also reveal that the League is considering bringing forward the deadline by which players in their final school year are told if they are being retained by academies under the Elite Player Performance Plan.

The plan to more closely monitor academic attainment as part of the EPPP and compare results with national and regional averages was revealed by one of the driving forces behind the current system. Dan Hunt, who quit as head of elite performance for the world’s richest league in November, told Telegraph Sport: “There are questions that need to be asked around the players that are being released.

“Are they being released educationally proficient and has their education been backfilled? Have they been given all the life skills to cope with rejection at an early age?

“I think that the EPPP and the Premier League – and football – has a responsibility for the young people in its system. And they are young people. Ultimately, a lot of them are school kids.