Statistically, there will always be more failed youth than successful ones at a big club like ManUtd where the pressure is huge. We’ve seen this many time before, for one Rashford there are ten Cleverleys. So your logic kinda fails in this instance.
What is a Cleverley ?
If you take the period since Phil Neville made his debut, 8 United youngsters (Wes Brown, O'Shea, Fletcher, Welbeck, Evans, Lingard, Rashford, Pogba) have made at least 50 PL starts for United. McTominay currently has 11 PL starts. There are 6 former United youngsters (Luke Chadwick, McNair, Gibson, Januzaj, Richardson, Cleverley) since Phil Neville, who have made more PL starts for United than McTominay but not reached 50 PL starts (Chadwick has the same number of starts but more PL mins). Of those, Cleverley had the most PL starts (42) by a huge margin.
If you take a longer period of time, from Whiteside onwards, the figures look more encouraging. From Whiteside to Phil Neville, there are 12 United youngsters who went on to make 50+ PL/League starts for United, while there were four that made more starts than McTominay currently has but failed to reach 50.
So adding the two together, 20 that went on to make at least 50 PL starts for United and 10 that left having failed to reach that benchmark.
The big drop off comes much earlier, the large group of players who started one League Cup game, or perhaps got less than 20 mins as a sub (Mads Timm, Larnell Cole, Josh King, Notman, Shawcross), up to those who got just short of 500 mins playing time in all competitions. A player that has been trusted to start in CL games, matches against Liverpool and Chelsea in the PL, hasn't got much in common with a youngster who left the club having been given 20 mins as a sub in the League Cup, a token 1 min as a sub in the PL like Tom Thorpe or James Weir, or one start in a dead match at the end of the season.
Since Phil Neville:
- 29 United youngsters left the club having played between 1-100 mins in all competitions,
- 23 got between 101-500 mins,
- 7 departed having played between 501-1000 mins,
- 4 managed more than 1001 mins but less than McTominay has so far. (McNair technically belongs in this category too but I've left him out)
- 6 mentioned previously (Luke Chadwick, McNair, Gibson, Januzaj, Richardson, Cleverley), more PL starts, PL mins or total mins, than McTominay but left before reaching 50 PL starts
- 8 players that have started at least 50 PL games for United (Wes Brown, O'Shea, Fletcher, Welbeck, Evans, Lingard, Rashford, Pogba)
(apologies for any errors, I may have missed a player or two - figures don't include players currently at the club but with less playing time than McTominay as it is difficult to predict how their careers will turn out)
Anyone who gets to 11 PL starts for United has a serious chance of reaching 50. Some won't develop as the club hoped, some will leave in frustration at the lack of opportunities, some will suffer when there is a change in manager.
Obviously if you use a different benchmark to 50 PL starts, then the figures for successes and failures will change somewhat.