Laurent Banide, Latics' new coach, is looking to youth to produce the next range of players at Boundary Park. Banide has not coacked in England before but has experience - he has been in charge of 14 different clubs in 12 years, including spells in Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Banide explained, "It's the right job because I love English football. When I passed my diplomas I went to Southampton and Ipswich. I love this football. It's a good time because after eight years in other countries I come back to Europe. It's a good opportunity to work with a big club and good players. I saw some videos and honestly, before, I didn't know the club. But I know the president [Abdallah Lemsagem] and then I follow the results. It's a club with potential, very old club with experience and I try to push the players to play well and give the pleasure to supporters."
"My philosophy, I worked a lot with the academy at Monaco so I like to work with young players. [Thierry] Henry was the best player in France. You need to give confidence to the young players and to work with the strong points of the player. You need to work every day and to talk and to help and that's my job. I did that in Monaco with Thierry Henry, with Trezeguet and a lot of good players. I try to continue because even when you work with professionals you have a lot of young players and you need to help them. They have a good potential. We have a lot of young players with good potential. We will see, we need to have a time to see the players and what we need."