Bill Tuiloma

God, there soon won't be any players left here!

some very nice touches there

looks a decent standard too

Bills Marseille Reserve grade teams season starts this weekend with their first game in the CFA2 Division. Unfortunately Bill did not make the team, nor did he make the match squad of 16. He is not injured as far as I can tell so I suppose they think he is not ready yet.

Its early days yet but he must be a bit disappointed to miss the cut. He did feature in quite a few of the preseason game but it was always off the bench. They tried him as a DM and also as a CB. He did get OK reports from his first match but nothing much since. There were a few mutterings how he needs to learn French......which would certainly help him integrate better.

I guess the rub is that however talented a kid is, coming from playing amateur suburban football in NZ to a pro setup in Europe is going to take a big adjustment. Most of the other Reserve players would have come through the clubs U17 and U19 teams and would be tuned into the pro setup.  Bill just has to knuckle down and work his butt off. He certainly has talent and the club will be doing everything to get him up to speed but he really needs to break into the Reserve starting 11 as soon as possible.

Bill tweeted that he had been to his first OM home match and how awesome the fans were. The Veledrome is truely a magnificant stadium and the fans are the loudest I have ever heard. Alex Fergieson described it as a "very very special place" after Man U were given a tough game there

Shouldve gone to the nix wouldve started at RB or LB im certain of that

Yeah  Nix or marsielle ?   

Tweeted the other day that he scored, but OMII last in the weekend.  Must be playing for another team within the club?

Played for the OM U19 Team on the weekend and scored.

You got a link in english somewhere?

Good to hear he got a goal.

Really interested to see how he develops there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKifOCO7En8

This is the level BT will be playing at with the U19. Very, very good level

Has Next Gen been canned in favour of FIFA Youth Champions League ?

I thought it was Champions League clubs whose Youth teams will play in the new competition.

Tweeted he was cleared to play for OM CFA side. Would explain absence during those games. Playing today

Bill came off the bench in the 70th minute for his first hit out with the OM Reserves. His team were down 1-3 at this stage and the score was the same at the finish. Good to see Bill get a run and now he needs to get starts and cement his place in the Reserves.

I have been in Marseille for the last week.....its a fantastic city, really lively and interesting. But its a bit like the wild west at the moment. There is a bit of a  war going on between the young guys who sell drugs on the street. But instead of using fists or knives they are using Kalashinkov's. Our second day hear there was a shootout near the Opera house in the city centre and three guys were injured. Last Thursday the son of the Olympic Marseille director of Football was shot dead in his car. Lots of conspiracy theories around town about corruption and illegal payoffs etc.

But getting back to football and Bill. The local papers have been running a series of articles on OM's new recruitment policies which probably explains how a kiwi kid from the burbs in Auckland ends up at OM. Acccording to the OM Director Marseille  realise they can't compete with the hyper funded Paris and Monaco. So they are going for the Borussia Dortmund model of investing heavily in recruiting on  the cheap for youth players. Nothing original in this as lots of clubs do it.  But what they are looking at is also grooming young players and selling them onto other Ligue 1 clubs in France. This week two 19 year olds from Bill Reserve team mates were moved  to Lorient. One sold for 500,000 euros. OM has a big reputation in France so other clubs are interested in their development players.

So for OM, Bill is good business...its a win win for them. They got him for free....if he turns out to be a gun player then he will play for the top OM team. If he is not good enough then they can make a tidy profit selling him on in France. Either way looks like Bill will have a pro career in Europe.....it just might not be at OM

Totally awesome for him.

Listed as a midfielder in OM's UEFA Youth League squad of 20 to play Arsenal today hmm

Game will be streamed live on OM.net. For any insomniacs who want to see Bill in action. Starts 1500 France time which is 1 am NZ time??? OM have strengthened their side by bringing guys like Bill in from the Reserve side so hopefully he will get a start.

Amazing opportunity for Bill. This tournament is for all the U19 sides of the clubs that are in the Champions League this season. So Bill will get to play home and away against the youth teams of Barcelona, Real, Man U, Bayern etc etc. It will be a good test for him against many of the worlds best youth players. But a side from that just the experiance of traveling around Europe and being involved in this amazing competition will be something that he will always remember. A few months he was running around on muddy suburban grounds in Auckland and now he's about to come up against Arsenal in a Champions League youth competition. There will be  loads of scouts at these games so what better way to put yourself in the shop window than by playing well in this competition.

playing as a holding mid. already down 0-1.

http://www.om.net/fr/Saison/101002/Actualites/69862/Suivez_le_match_OM_Arsenal_en_direct

Bill played full 90, they lost 4-1

Watched most of the game.....except when the feed kept crashing out...grrrrrrrrr!

Arsenal were too classy for OM. Which is what you would expect as the Arse play pro EPL U19 and OM play regional amateur football. THe Om boys are individually talented but the Arsenal kids were a better team.

Bill did not look out of place. He played holding midfielder and had a solid game. He put it some crunching tackles and distributes well off both feet....he really does have good vision for passing. A few of his through balls were brilliant.He gave the ball away a couple of times but at this level it seems everyone was coughing the ball up. Without putting the pressure on him he could well finish up as a AW holding mid in a few years time. He certainly has the skill set and size to do the job. He is quite a big unit....he bounced a few of the skinny Arsenal boys off the ball. Obviously OM see him as a holding mid so he will get two years of good coaching there. I guess the only negative I could say about his performance is he could probably up his work rate a bit. He has all the skill in the world but at times just seemed to jog along behind the play.....still its early days and you don't want to be too picky after he has had only two months as a pro

Cheers for that summary, that's awesome.

Photo of Bill Tuiloma and the Marseilles youth side lining up before the UEFA Youth League game yesterday against Arsenal:

https://twitter.com/Arsenal/status/380317912923250689/photo/1

Match thread on UEFA.com (Bill gets a few mentions): http://www.uefa.com/uefayouthleague/season=2014/matches/round=2000501/match=2012965/postmatch/commentary/index.html

Match stats: http://www.soccerway.mobi/?sport=soccer&page=match&id=1592246&_teamtype=youth&localization_id=www

UEFA Youth League site: http://www.uefa.com/uefayouthleague/

Serge Gnabry who scored twice for Arsenal is a former German u-17 international who made first team appearances for Arsenal last season and has been on the bench this season in the EPL.

Dortmund beat Napoli 1-0 in the other game in Marseille's youth league group, resulting in table: 1.Arsenal 2. Dortmund 3. Napoli 4. Marseilles 

Next match - away to Dortmund October 1

39 match photos, including some of Bill, from Getty Images (premier international photo agency):  http://www.gettyimages.co.nz/Search/Search.aspx?EventId=180958305&EditorialProduct=Sport

Bill is in 1st row of photos (#5), 4th Row (#4), 5th Row (#2) - Hover cursor over photo to enlarge & bring up info.

any highlights?

Couldn't find any on You Tube - and unfortunately you have to subscribe to Marseilles TV to view material there.

Bill played today for the OM U19 team...they had a good win 5-2. The team are now preparing to play Dortmund in a few days in the U19 UEFA Champions League. Exciting times for Bill. Playing for the U19 in this tournement is way better than playing for the OM Reserves IMO

To give you an idea how good some of the kids are in this U19 competition there is a German kid called Gnarbsy who just scored for the Arsenal seniors against Swansea?? in the EPL today. Bill played against him a few weeks ago when he played for Arsenal U19 in the game against OM U19. I watched that game....Gnarsby scored a good goal but did not look particularly outstanding.

 The Dortmund U19 is supposedly a quality side. They put an enormous effort into youth development....it could be a tough game for Bill and the OM boys.

Bill played full 90 minutes in the UEFA Champions League Youth Competition against Borussia Dortmund U19 today. OM lost 2-5 unfortunately.

 For the six CL U19 games played today the total number of goals scored was 26!!!! Obviously defense is not a major strength of youth leagues

In the AW squad. Well done Bill.

Unreal really when you think he was playing for Birkenhead at Napier u 19s  last October,

Bill is a graduate of APFA, where is was for 3 years, they now have two AW, and 15 players at pro clubs and 10 in US colleges

15??

I'd like to think I have a fairly good idea on our young overseas players and I'd be lucky to name half that.

Do you have a list of who and at where??

He' s easily god enough to be in that squad get the young lad's in there the older stale players arnt good enough simple.

What's happened to Musa?

Not all 15 are NZ, APFA works with Domestic and International players