BRIAN McClair, the SFA performance director, and Gordon Strachan, the national team manager, have announced a raft of radical new proposals to overhaul the country's youth academy structure, plans which include drastically cutting the amount of kids in academies and introducing an NFL-style draft for loans between Premiership and Championship clubs. The former Manchester United academy director has spent the seven months since his appointment consulting with clubs, youth coaches, players and affiliated bodies as he reviewed the performance strategy he inherited from his predecessor Mark Wotte.

The plans, which were presented to representatives of Scotland's 30 Club Academy Scotland (CAS) members on Wednesday, were also given an airing at Holyrood yesterday to first minister Nicola Sturgeon and sports minister Jamie Hepburn. They will now go forward via a working party with a view to bringing them into being by the start of season 2017-18.

Ironically, considering al the proclamations of doom about participation numbers, one of the first ideas is that Scotland has too many kids training at so-called 'pro youth' level, rather than too few. That figure is currently in excess of 2,300 and experts feel that cutting it would allow more focus on 'best v best' to allow this top layer of talent to fulfil its potential.

Indeed, McClair believes there is simply too many centrally-funded academies full stop, and wants to cut these down with further stress being put on regionalised academies such as the one at Forth Valley. The loan draft plan envisages all 12 top flight teams selecting five players to put in the draft pool, which can then be selected, in reverse order, starting with the team at the bottom of the championship.

While the proposal was given a cautious welcome, the devil is in the detail and there is much discussion still to be had. Whether the likes of Hamilton, Motherwell and Airdrie could be expected to streamline into one pan-Lanarkshire academy when all have different targets and goals is one point, while clubs such as Falkirk and Dunfermline would surely desire to have their own academies were they promoted to the Ladbrokes Premiership rather than down the divisions.

Some say that the plans are too geared to the nation's traditionally bigger teams - ignoring the fact that players such as Ryan Gauld and Andrew Robertson spent time at the likes of Brechin City and Queen's Park - and the draft idea is simply unworkable. While the NFL draft allows professional teams to pick the top prospects coming out of college, football teams tend to like to pick and choose where the players they still own would end up for a season, rather than leaving them at the mercy of a style of football, manager, or location which isn't too their liking.

“I am glad we had the opportunity to discuss and debate Scottish football’s current reality and how we can all work together to improve," said McClair. "The most important thing for me is that we all agree that we need to improve and that any future plans should put the development of the young player at the heart of everything we do."

“I am Scotland National Coach but I am also a father and grandfather and I care passionately about the state of our game and the future of our game," said Strachan. "Naturally I am disappointed we did not qualify for the European Championships but Scottish football’s challenges run much deeper. We need to get back to producing exciting players again, players who can be relied upon to start for their clubs at an earlier age, players who will then become more experienced and better prepared when it comes to international football. We need to be honest with ourselves when it comes to assessing where we are, where we want to be and how we get there."