Premier League teams have been excelling in the unofficial Champions League for under-19s, with three in the semi-finals

Rarely has the Emirates Stadium felt so barren or bitter, yet so full of promise. On a Monday night where temperatures arrived by express delivery from the Siberian steppe – one CSKA Moscow player even wore leggings – Arsenal became the third English side to reach the last four of the NextGen Series, the unofficial Champions League for under-19 teams, with a comfortable 1-0 win in front of nearly 7,000 people.

It was the latest show of strength in the futures market from an English side. Chelsea, who face Arsenal in the semi-finals on Good Friday, recently beat Barcelona 2-0 away and Juventus 4-1 at home. Arsenal stifled last year's champions Internazionale on their own soil, before departing with a 1-0 victory. And Aston Villa, who play Sporting Lisbon in Friday's other semi-final, outplayed Ajax, traditionally a chest-out powerhouse of European youth football, during a 2-1 away win.

Success at under-19 level is one thing, success at senior level quite another. But in a season when so many senior English club sides have flopped in Europe, and the national team has bobbed along with the steadiness of a toy duck in a child's bath, it has offered a warming counterblast.

Whether it is a harbinger of a rosier future is unclear, but many Premier League clubs are quick to stress the benefits of facing top-level European clubs on a regular basis – with the added benefit that midweek matches give first-team managers a chance to monitor how their young guns are developing.

Terry Burton, Arsenal reserves and head development coach, says: "It's a great competition. What you want is for players to test themselves against the best, and NextGen gives you that. We've been to Marseille, Bilbao, Olympiakos and Inter. Our squad now realises that teams won't always treat you the way you treat them. That you might not always get a decision. They are learning a huge amount."

There was certainly much to admire in Arsenal's victory over CSKA. The muscular directness of the 17-year-old German Serge Gnabry, who scored the winner; the tidy passing of the Swede Kristoffer Olsen and captain Nico Yennaris in midfield, and the measured menace provided by Thomas Eisfeld, another German, and Hector Bellerin, a Spaniard poached from Barcelona's Masia, on the flanks.

Bellerin, who set up Gnabry's goal and impressed throughout, stressed how much he has enjoyed playing in Europe this season, adding: "These games are different to the league, so to have experiences like this is very important to our development."

So why have English teams been so successful? Partly it is down to weight of numbers. Six of the 24 sides in the tournament are from the Premier League. Sheer resource plays a part too. Tottenham, who were knocked out in the quarter-finals, have one of the best training centres in Europe, while Chelsea are renowned for their use of analytics even with their youth teams.

As Ben Smith, Chelsea's head of academy performance systems, explained at last week's Sports Analytics Innovation Summit: "We want to be the best development centre in the world. We use analysis and feedback after every session, even with our young players."

Villa also have a renowned youth academy and were recently granted category one status as part of the Premier League's Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP). One of EPPP's aims is to improve coaching standards and increase the number of home-grown players, but Burton believes it is too early to credit it for the clubs' success in NextGen.

"I'm sure with the EPPP criteria that we will produce better quality players, but it has only come in this season," he says. Instead Burton, a wily old fox who managed Wimbledon in the Premier League, believes that individual clubs are reaping the rewards for coaching structures put in place over many years – and, in Arsenal's case, a scouting system that extends across Europe.

"We're not bad, are we?" Burton says with a smile. "You look at the make-up of our team, and it's full of different nations. We've got two Germans, a Swede, a Bosnian, a Spaniard, a few English lads, and they blend in well together."

This weekend, a tournament that is gaining traction will also attract eyeballs, with both semi-finals and the final, on Easter Monday, screened live on Eurosport. But a predator is lurking. Next season, Uefa will launch a rival under-19 tournament for the 32 clubs in the Champions League. How it will play out is