Mark Birch steps up to the helm of Carlisle United’s youth team with one eye on the future and another on the past. The coach’s job is to produce first-team players at a time growing their own appears more important than ever at Brunton Park.

It is also a challenge to continue a line which, at certain points in United’s history, has been impressive: whether in the burgeoning 1990s, or the more recent flowering of Blues youth.

“Everybody wants to see as many Cumbrian players, or players coming through the youth system, playing for the first team,” Birch says. “That’s what a club like this has been built on in the past.

“The important thing here is to carry on the tradition of producing players. It’s something that the fans like seeing and it’s something we’ve got to continue to do. The fans like nothing more than a Cumbrian lad playing in the first team.”

In these times of budget restrictions, the accent on youth simply has to be strong. Carlisle have, in recent times, turned out some genuine talent in the likes of Jarrad Branthwaite and Liam McCarron and, a few years earlier, Kyle Dempsey.

The first-team squad currently harbours a few promising prospects, such as Taylor Charters, Josh Dixon and Lewis Bell, while there are good hopes for some of the youth team that will be under Birch’s wing next season.

The 44-year-old has extra control in this department after a reshaping of some of United’s academy personnel. Eric Kinder, the former academy manager, has stepped down from that position and into a part-time coaching role with the Under-18s.

This will see him assist and support Birch, who has risen through the academy coaching ranks himself. A new academy boss, Simon Friel, will oversee all aspects of United’s youth development and manage the administrative demands that come with being a category three academy in the Elite Player Performance Plan structure.

But it is Birch, the former right-back, who will call the shots when it comes to the 16 and 17-year-olds aiming to make the decisive next step.

“Eric wanted to step down from his current role but we were really interested in keeping him as part of the club,” says Birch of the experienced Kinder. “A club like us can’t do without the knowledge and experience Eric’s got. Especially with younger people stepping into roles, he’s somebody we can lean on.

“I’ve stepped up to be professional development phase coach, which is managing the Under-18s, and Simon Friel will be stepping into the academy manager role.

“It’s something that I’ve always seen myself doing. Coaching is my forte. I’m not someone who likes sitting in offices doing paperwork; I like to be out on the grass working with players.

“I think I’ve worked with every single age group from Under-7s, so I think now as Under-18 coach I’ve got a good idea of what is going on in the younger age groups. At the end of the day, we want the best players at Under-18 level, and if I can identify little things we can change in the younger age groups that will help the lads in the Under-9s–Under-16s programme, I think that will be a good thing for everybody.”

A professional football club academy, such as that run by United, is a different beast from the youth set-ups of old. Birch must be conscious of this whilst trying to help the likes of Sam Fishburn, Gabriel Breeze and numerous others towards a professional future.

“There’s a lot more player care along the way now,” he says. “As coaches you have to change along the way, and be aware of society, and what’s going on around it.

“If you look at the coaching programme now, there’s a lot of education in and around it which I think is a good thing. The YTs [youth team players] are with us for two years, and we have to make sure if they go on to be professionals…that’s great, we’ve done our job, but if they leave us after two years they have to be ready for the next step in their lives.

“They walk away with an education programme, a few coaching qualifications, and hopefully walk away a better person than what they are when they walk through the door.”

United, needless to say, want to produce good players as well as good citizens. Bridging the gap is not always easy. Despite the potential in the ranks, and the recent history of nurturing players, last season was not a vintage one for heaps of home-grown first-team starts. Charters made a certain impact on the first team, but five first-year professionals (including Birch’s son, Charlie) did not get close to Chris Beech’s reckoning, and were duly released.

The conversion rate needs to be better. “We’ve been quite successful in the past couple of years in getting players through to professional contracts,” Birch says. “What we’ve probably got to be better in is getting them game-ready for the first team. The more ready they are the quicker they can progress, from being young pros to fully established first team players.

“It comes down to understanding what it takes to be a professional footballer – knowing the demands, the expectations put on them, the psychological side, the pressures that come with the role. And physically, technically and tactically, you’ve got to have a good understanding of what the expectations are.”

Kinder, whose second spell at the top of United’s youth regime is now over, will remain an invaluable presence, Birch says.

“Over the last two years myself and Eric have worked really closely on the training ground and match days – to be honest, I don’t really see much change in that,” he says. “We’ve got a similar way we like to play and train. It isn’t about me coming in and changing everything, it’s what is best for the club and the players.

“I don’t think my role will change massively and you have to give Eric credit for that because he’s really helped me with the transition. There have been times in the last two years where he’s stepped back and let me make a decision – some of them have failed, but it’s been about me learning. I’m sure sometimes Eric has thought differently, but he’s let me do it then we’ve talked about why it maybe wasn’t the best thing afterwards.

“It would have been easy for Eric to just tell me what he would do, but he’s allowed me to grow.”

A different dynamic comes with a new man at the top of it all. Friel was promoted from within to take the academy manager post. Only by all aspects of the youth department working in harmony can Carlisle be at their best in terms of creating good and potentially valuable footballers.

“I think it’s important that we work closely because we want to make sure we get the best players through,” Birch says. “We’ve got players in our thoughts already for the next intake of Under-16s, and I’ll still be working quite closely with that age group alongside Simon.

“He will set the programme out for that but it’s all about making the transitions as smooth as possible. We’ll try and make sure the Under-16s and Under-18s mirror each other so that when the lads so step up they’ve got the best chance of succeeding.”

A club cannot ignore or bypass the administrative demands of EPPP. This aspect of the job did not prove to Kinder’s liking and so United’s solution was to make the most of his coaching attributes, whilst asking Friel to step up.

“If you look at the academy system now, the admin work and the audit process is really intense,” Birch says. “You’ve got to be up to date all the time; it isn’t just a case of the auditors giving you a week’s notice so you can get everything sorted.

“It has to be work in progress so when you do get audited all you do is the same as you do every day anyway. You can’t pull the wool over their eyes. They’ve seen it all before. So Simon’s role will be really important.”

As will Birch’s. Carlisle’s Under-18s have a testing pre-season programme against clubs such as Newcastle, Sunderland, Middlesbrough and Blackburn, before their season starts in earnest – and more of their young hopefuls try and walk the road to Beech’s first team.

“I’m really looking forward to it,” Birch says, “even though it feels a bit strange because the transition has been there for a long time. I’ve been heavily involved in what has been going on so there won’t be much difference.

“I think as a whole what we’ve done in the last couple of years has worked, so I won’t be coming in and trying to rewrite the book on Under-18 football because I don’t think we’re far away.”