Our performances on the pitch are finally starting to pick up, but there have also been encouraging signs throughout the early part of this season regarding the progression of the club as a whole.

In particular, the youth system; there's been a home-grown player in the squad for all but three of our games this season, with the young trio of Tom Beere, George Oakley and Ryan Sweeney all making the bench on Saturday.

And they're not just there to make up the numbers. Tom Beere and 17-year-old Ben Harrison have started seven times between them, while Oakley has come on as a sub three times in recent weeks.

On top of this increasing involvement in the first team squad, the youth teams have experienced some success in their own right, with an FA Youth Cup third round tie against Premier League side Burnley coming up next month.

Fans sometimes question how relevant all of this is to first team success. It's certainly true that there's still a lot of development needed before we get the conveyor belt of young talent we had in the 90s.

But an unavoidable aspect of modern football is that you need money to rise through the divisions - and unless you're willing to sell out to a Saudi billionaire, a thriving youth system is just about the only way to do this.

One need only look at the likes of Southampton, Swansea and even Bournemouth to see the possible outcome - all have seen success funded in part by a strong academy system.

It's not something that appears overnight though - it'll take time to develop and expand the academy, and to get the young players used to first team football.

But there's clearly a very decent pool of talent at the top end of our youth system at the moment.

If we can maintain the current rate of development, we may well earn back the money invested in it many times over.

And it never hurts to have a bit of home-grown passion in the team.