They used to say you know you're getting old when the policemen start looking like callow youths. And the footballing equivalent of that, for me, was hearing Frank Lampard telling the current generation of young players that their professional lives are too easy and that it wasn't like that in his day.
Football, like society in general, moves on - not always necessarily for the better - and in recent year the pace of change has accelerated.
Lampard, reputedly the highest-paid player in the Premier League, and said to have an IQ well above average, will no doubt appreciate this fact more than most. He just has to compare his lifestyle and remuneration with that of his father, Frank Senior, whose playing career spanned from 1967 until 1986.
But Frank Junior's central point this week was that because young footballers are given too easy a ride by clubs now, their commitment has suffered, they mature more slowly and the comfort zone is making them less professional in their attitude.
Lampard particularly lamented the passing of the time-worn tradition whereby youngsters were obliged to clean the senior players' boots and carry out other mundane chores as part of their apprenticeship. He feels strongly that such a regime promoted a sense of perspective and a strong work ethic in the game.
There is certainly something to be said for a steep learning curve in which menial work, combined with football training, can foster such values as humility, camaraderie, an understanding of where you rank in the pecking order and an appreciation of the privileged lives footballers lead, when they do eventually make it as professionals.
The old system was, according to many older pros and traditionalists, worthwhile and character-building.
So why has it been replaced?
You can call it political correctness, enlightenment, the recognition that young players need an education beyond football, or the realisation that more time on the training pitch and less time sweeping the dressing rooms produces technically better young players. Not surprisingly, it seems to be a combination of all these factors.
In essence, the establishment of football club academies changed the landscape for would-be young stars and hastened the demise of the old-style football apprenticeship.
Advocates of that system maintain that it instilled discipline into the lads, helped keep their feet on the ground, made them appreciate their football even more, and 'didn't do us any harm'.
But in England, things changed big-style when Howard Wilkinson was appointed as the FA's technical director and published his Charter for Quality report.
The revered French system, and in particular Le Centre Technique National Fernand Sastre - the elite Clairefontaine academy - was adopted as a role model. Clubs were given a new blueprint for developing top quality young players.
At the same time, the blueprint recognised that football had other obligations within society. There had long been concern that football offered those unlucky apprentices, unable to make the grade, no coherent exit strategy. They were effectively cast adrift at 18, their dreams shattered and with no qualifications.
So, in came a far greater emphasis on the classroom, rather than the boot room.
Football was belatedy trying to ensure it had provided everything it could for the lads who didn't make the step up to professionalism. After all, there is something like a 65-70 percent fall-out rate among trainees between the ages of 16-21, and football has a responsibility to provide them with alternative career options. Proficiency in boot cleaning may not be a huge advantage to such lads.
There is also now an emphasis on providing continuing education for those who stay on in the game - for example from specialist sports scientists and psychologists involved in instructing young professionals how to look after themselves properly to maximise their potential and prolong their careers.
Then there is the fundamental question: is it more useful for a youngster to spend time cleaning out a toilet or a senior player's boots, or to be on the training ground working on his weaker left foot?
There are a couple of other issues to consider here. In contrast to the 'old days', top pros wear a new pair of boots virtually every game, and the training pitches are now so manicured that there is very little to clean anyway.
And there is also the greatly intensified competition between clubs to buy younger and younger talent. Players like Wayne Rooney, Theo Walcott, Giovani dos Santos and Aaron Ramsey have all been signed as raw teenagers for huge fees in recent years, and it is hard to imagine them being assigned menial duties as part of their lucrative new contracts.
Whether the youngsters are missing out on something important in their development is debatable. Certainly, it seems intuitively correct that a degree of menial work will help keep them balanced and less inclined to take their careers for granted.
At the same time, it is important not to generalise.
Manchester City defender Nedum Onuoha, for one, responded to Lampard's comments by mounting a spirited defence of today's young players, insisting that at City, youngsters are not getting an easy ride.
He stressed that the lads are worked very hard at the academy, and while not cleaning boots they are cleaning the cars of the coaches, or doing groundwork or something similar.
It may be impossible to judge (or measure) which system produces better PEOPLE in the long-run; but it is easier to conclude whether the technical proficiency of young FOOTBALLERS is improving. I would say that it is

Originally Posted by Joeskie

Big time. Frank is class act for sure. Giggs is another.