Swansea City's academy enjoyed a golden period as the youth side claimed a stunning league and cup double during the 2016/17 season.
The remarkable collective rise of those who featured under Cameron Toshack and Gary Richards coincided with the first team's alarming regression that culminated in relegation from the Premier League in May 2018.
As such, several of those young guns were tasked with replacing the likes of Alfie Mawson, Lukasz Fabianski, Federico Fernandez, Jack Cork, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Fernando Llorente who were all offloaded by the Swans in the space of a short period.
One by one, those rough diamonds - namely Daniel James, Oli McBurnie and Joe Rodon - were polished up and sold for vast sums as Swansea continue to balance the books after returning to the second tier for the first time since the 2010/11 campaign.
Now in their fourth consecutive season in the Championship, Swansea are no longer receiving parachute payments, while the Covid-19 pandemic has ensured finances need to be managed more carefully than ever.
The club are expected to be firmly active in the January transfer window, with several players likely to depart the Swansea.com Stadium.
However, in what is clearly a change from what has become the norm since the conclusion of that gut-wrenching 2017/18 campaign, Swansea go into the upcoming window without a need to sell one of their key assets.
Of course, that is not to say none of their main men will depart in the opening month of 2022, because every player has a price.
But such is the scale of the transition taking place at SA1, the focus is more on moulding the squad to Russell Martin's needs as opposed to ripping up the playbook and starting from scratch.
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Swansea's summer purchases show how the club have planned for both the short and long term.
Players including Joel Piroe and Flynn Downes have been pivotal under the new regime and will continue to be while they remain at the club, although they are among a cluster who have swiftly gained decent resale value as a result of their efforts.
Piroe - who is just 22 years of age - more than anyone has caught the eye of those from outside south Wales since joining the Swans from PSV Eindhoven in the summer.
Aside from Jay Fulton - who could well leave the club next month - Dutchman Piroe is the only player in the current squad to reach double figures when it comes to goals scored for Swansea's first team, a statistic made all the more impressive given that he didn't make his competitive debut until August, although it also highlights the worrying lack of goals from elsewhere.
He has struck 12 times in his 22 appearances for Swansea to date, which is one more goal than Rhian Brewster managed in the same number of outings for the Swans during his loan spell from Liverpool.
Incredibly, the 23 goals scored by Piroe and Brewster combined for Swansea were all from open play. Brewster was sold by Liverpool to Sheffield United for an eye-watering £23m just months after his glorious spell under Steve Cooper.
So it's clear to see that, in the space of just a few months, Swansea have a real gem on their hands.
Age and contract status are key factors when it comes to determining who can be regarded as assets, so Downes, Ben Cabango, Brandon Cooper, Matt Grimes, Liam Walsh, Morgan Whittaker, Michael Obafemi and Liam Cullen are all men who could potentially be sold to recoup fees in the future.
But those inside the club suggest the winter market is more about offloading fringe men to trim the squad and subsequently free up funds to bring in transfer targets as opposed to being forced to sell important figures to boost the coffers.
"Any football club will be looking at a balance in terms of ins and outs," said sporting director Mark Allen.
"I'm not going to sit here and say 'we're going to bring loads in and none go out'.
"I think it's a balanced approach to this, and they will be related. Where that balance sits at the moment, I can't say.
"Suffice to say, we've got planned activity for January and we'll see where that takes us."
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