The audit process forms part of the League’s monitoring of the Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP), created in 2012 and designed to increase the quantity and quality of homegrown English players. The categorisation system permits the best-ranked academies more contact time with young players and ensures their development teams participate in the elite competitions at youth level.

The news comes after another season of trophy success for our youngsters. Our Under-18s claimed a third successive triumph in the FA Youth Cup, and a fifth win in seven years. We also retained the UEFA Youth League, a Champions League-equivalent for the Under-19 age group.

Both titles were won with teams almost entirely English; all 15 players involved in the Youth Cup final were England-eligible, while only four of the 25 to feature throughout the entire European campaign were not homegrown.

Those facts demonstrate the success of a switch in recruitment to local youngsters, identified through the development centre programme and signed as Under-9s, the earliest age a young player can commit to a club. First team debutants last season Tammy Abraham and Fikayo Tomori, as well as Ruben Loftus-Cheek, are all graduates of that pathway.

Neil Bath, the club’s head of youth development, recently outlined the need for constant improvement to ensure our programme remains at the forefront of the game. A new permanent indoor facility at the training ground is due for completion in September, while there has also been an emphasis placed on coach development.

Joe Edwards, youth team manager for the past two seasons, will spend the 2016/17 campaign working with the club’s loans department, allowing last term’s assistant Jody Morris the opportunity to step up as lead coach, assisted by former youth team captain Ed Brand. In the younger age groups, James Simmonds is another Academy graduate now turning his hand to coaching and he will spend this season working with Frank O’Brien and Jon Harley with the Under-15 and Under-16 groups.

Elsewhere, Under-21s assistant and former Blues defender Andy Myers has taken on a first team coaching role in the Eredivisie with Vitesse Arnhem. His position at Chelsea will be taken by Ian Howell, who moves up from the Under-13s.