DAN ASHWORTH is determined to do all he can to avoid a repeat of the situation that saw promising Newcastle United youngster Bobby Clark jump ship to join Liverpool a year-and-a-half ago.

Clark, who is the son of former Newcastle United midfielder Lee Clark, was regarded as one of the most promising youngsters in the country when he progressed through the Magpies’ academy as a teenager.

However, in the summer of 2021, at the age of just 16, the forward left Tyneside to join Liverpool, with the Reds shelling out a compensation fee worth around £1.5m once potential add-ons were included.

He signed his first professional contract with Liverpool in February, and made his Premier League debut as a substitute in August’s 9-0 thrashing of Bournemouth, with Jurgen Klopp describing him as a “really interesting player”.

Clark left Newcastle during a time of considerable upheaval at the club’s academy, and since his appointment as sporting director this summer, Ashworth has made an overhaul of the Magpies’ youth and Under-21s set-up a key priority.

Steve Harper is now settled in his role as Newcastle’s permanent academy manager, and while Ashworth cannot give any guarantees over the retention of the club’s leading teenage talents, he accepts there is no point spending millions on the development of promising youngsters if the players in question then leave before they have even featured for the first team.

“I’d be lying if I said that (the situation with Clark) will never happen again,” said Ashworth. “Ultimately, what you can’t control are the different reasons why players want to go to a club. It might pathway, it might be money, it might be where family are situated or a link with that particular city or country.

“But I think the more you can make players feel valued, the more you can give them evidence of a pathway to a first team and the more the club are striving towards the targets we'd like to achieve, that gives a story and a reason for a young player or senior player to stay and be part of that journey.

“I don’t know the situation around Bobby. I don’t know the specific details around it but, ultimately, our goal is to make sure we do attract and retain the talent and manage that talent better than anybody else.”

Ashworth boasts extensive experience within the academy system, having worked as academy director at Peterborough United and centre of excellence director at Cambridge United in the early years of his career before going on to take up a position as the FA’s director of elite development.

Understandably, a large amount of his focus since joining Newcastle has been trained on supporting Eddie Howe and the first team, and addressing the infrastructural issues that had remained unaddressed throughout the Mike Ashley era.

However, he has also poured considerable time and resources into improving the academy set-up and attempting to create a more effective pathway from the youth set-up to the Under-21s and then on to the first-team group.

Crucially, he is confident Howe buys into his vision of cherry-picking the best young talent from around the world and developing them into senior stars, with the recent acquisition of Australian teenager Garang Kuol, who will officially join at the start of next month, part of that process.

“It’s about getting the young players in the building that have the potential to play in the Premier League,” explained Ashworth. “Then, it’s about managing them and giving them the right coaching pathway and game stimulus, which could be with our Under-21s or could be on loan with Shola (Ameobi).

“It’s about giving them the pathway through. There are multiple examples of clubs across the country where the academy is full of talent, but there’s no way through. You get a change of owner, a change of manager or a club getting relegated or going into administration, and all of a sudden, these players come through and it’s, ‘Blimey, didn’t we have a load of good players in the Academy!’ They haven’t just suddenly landed there – it’s about joining up pathways.

“All I can say is that I’m a former academy manager and I’m really passionate about giving young players an opportunity. But they have to be good enough.

“Football will decide if they’re good enough or not, but what we have to do as a club is give them the right people, the right coaching and the right pathway. And give them the opportunity to play - if they are good enough - in the top half of the Premier League.”