Last year, there was talk of Silvano Vos joining the first team environment after impressing those around the AC Milan youth ranks. However, there has been nothing of him recently.
Vos’ arrival went a little under the radar. Deemed a promising youngster, he was never seen in the elite bracket of youth signings, and he headed straight to the Milan Futuro project. So, it is understandable why he was never really in the limelight.
Nevertheless, he impressed quickly, and there was soon talk of him graduating into a first team situation. Of course, not in a full-time way, but as an earlier entry to the pathway than was initially planned when he signed.
Yet, he has almost disappeared since those suggestions.
Vos’ disappearance
Today, Calciomercato.com (via Radio Rossonera) has looked into the situation, and it starts with a simple fact, he has not made an appearance for the Futuro since March 2, 2025, more than a year ago now.
In the summer there was discussion of an exit to Lausanne, but the figures could never be agreed. Either way, it seemed that his pathway to the first team may have changed, but that is not the reason for his silence.
Instead, it relates to an injury picked up in the same summer. Since, he headed back to Holland, where he underwent treatment and has been recovering since, and at the start of this year, he began ‘the re-athletization process’.
It is unknown where his future lies, or when exactly he will be back amongst the youth team. However, he is still young, so he cannot be truly written off.
That’s another case of something so familiar here in this website: people go CRAZY about the potential of young players, ignoring that it is only a VERY TINY minority of those players who make it into the first team of one of the main clubs of the top five European leagues (England, Spain, Italy, Germany, and France). The VAST majority of youth players never reach this level, and end up either in minor teams of the top five leagues, or in teams of lesser leagues (like the Belgian, Dutch, Ukrainian etc) or in second leagues of the Serie B and C variety; this, when they don’t entirely disappear.
To make it to an elite level, there is a huge number of factors that need to line up correctly. Sure, talent is one of them, but while necessary, it is not enough.
There is injury (seems to be the case for Vos), there is psychological maturity, resilience, drive, being in the right place at the right time, having good support from club and family, having a good agent, surviving well the youth system and being able to move on, facing the competition of young players from countries that don’t even have much of a youth system like African and South American leagues, being able to play against grown men, having the right muscular and athletic development, and so on.
Just see how even a great promise like Camarda is struggling. You know, the Yamals and Estevaos of this world are a tiny minority. They are the exception, not the rule.
Another way to see this, is to compare the roster of youth national teams, with the roster of senior national teams 15 years later. In most cases there isn’t a single overlap. Sometimes (rarely) there is an overlap of one or two players. It means that promising players who were members of a youth national team, dropped off and never made it to the senior national team, showing that being a promising youth is one thing, but realizing this potential and actually becoming elite, is a VERY different thing.
See, we currently have two players who can be said to be more prominent and decent overlaps among the Azzurri, if we look at previous Azzurrini players: Moise Kean, and Pio Esposito. For the latter, I suspect that this has more to do with the scarcity of good Italian strikers than any world-class status of Pio Esposito. See, he isn’t even a starter for his club, where he is behind Lautaro and Thuram. The latter is a product of the French youth system. The former is South American (remember what I said about the competition?). Among the Azzurri, Esposito is also not considered to be a starter, and in the pecking order, he’s behind Retegui (Argentine-born) and Kean (who is indeed a product of the Italian Youth System and a former member of the Azzurrini; one of the exceptions). Arguably even behind Raspadori and Scamacca (who, to be fair, are also former members of the Italian Youth System, but I’d argue, not that good; more examples of people who make it due to the scarcity of better players).
At Milan, we had Calabria who never actually amounted to much. Yes, we had Donnarumma; that’s a full-blown exception, for sure; exceptions do happen; he is the undisputed starter for the Azzurri and a world-class goalkeeper (hardly anybody else I quoted in this post is world-class; of these, only Donnarumma qualifies).
Currently at Milan we have Gabbia, Bartesaghi, and De Winter as products of Italian youth system who made it into the first team. It’s already too many and it is already an exception situation. Neither one of these three are exceptional, though. Gabbia had rare appearances for the Azzurri and is by no means a regular, there. Bartesaghi was called up once but never made it into the pitch. De Winter did have appearances for the Belgium National Team (I actually think that he has more potential than both Bartesaghi and Gabbia).
Anyway, QED. Promising youth who make it to the highest level are rare and are the exception rather than the rule.
So, let’s stop the “OH MY GOD, THIS YOUTH PLAYER IS SO GOOD; HE SHOULD BE PLAYING FOR THE FIRST TEAM” craze.
And before someone says “but everybody was at one point a product of the youth system,” that’s not true. First of all, not all European clubs have youth academies, especially those from Serie B and C and their foreign equivalents. Many players climb up from more obscure backgrounds. Also, I’m not just talking national teams; I’m talking players who make it into the the first team of the MAIN clubs of the top 5 European leagues. Many of those are international players who come from Africa, South America, some from Asia (and even a few who come from North America – Mexico, Canada, and the United States), not necessarily members of a youth academy system, which are not that common in under-developed countries and even in non-European developed countries.
So many people were against me when I was saying that boy is rubbish and troublemaker in Ajax they accused him to fight all of his teammates and couches how can you buy such nonsense player