Loanwatch 09-10

[Kingsley Junior]

Church and Sig have two years on Antonio.

He's only just 19, and when we signed him he was an 18 year old from Tooting & Mitcham he immediately made the step up to league 1. That's a big a step-up.

Inconsistency is the hallmark of young players, lets wait till he grows up a bit before writing him off.

In short he still has the potential to be something more, it's too early to give up and sell.

They don't actually have two years on him. Sig is 6/7 months older and Church 15/16 months older. In terms of the English school system, Sig and Antonio would be in the same class and Church the year above. Not that this has an impact on my own personal opinion on the matter, just stating the ages for clarity.

Antonio 28/03/90 Sig 09/09/89 Church 10/12/88

[Maquisard]

Church and Sig have two years on Antonio.

He's only just 19, and when we signed him he was an 18 year old from Tooting & Mitcham he immediately made the step up to league 1. That's a big a step-up.

Inconsistency is the hallmark of young players, lets wait till he grows up a bit before writing him off.

In short he still has the potential to be something more, it's too early to give up and sell.

They don't actually have two years on him. Sig is 6/7 months older and Church 15/16 months older. In terms of the English school system, Sig and Antonio would be in the same class and Church the year above. Not that this has an impact on my own personal opinion on the matter, just stating the ages for clarity.

Antonio 28/03/90 Sig 09/09/89 Church 10/12/88

That's my birthday - we're twins !!!! (give or take a year or two )

[ZacNaloen]

Church and Sig have two years on Antonio.

He's only just 19, and when we signed him he was an 18 year old from Tooting & Mitcham he immediately made the step up to league 1. That's a big a step-up.

Inconsistency is the hallmark of young players, lets wait till he grows up a bit before writing him off.

In short he still has the potential to be something more, it's too early to give up and sell.

They don't actually have two years on him. Sig is 6/7 months older and Church 15/16 months older. In terms of the English school system, Sig and Antonio would be in the same class and Church the year above. Not that this has an impact on my own personal opinion on the matter, just stating the ages for clarity.

Antonio 28/03/90 Sig 09/09/89 Church 10/12/88

I was just estimating based on year of birth. I genuinely thought Sig was a year older though which is a real reflection of his ability.

[winchester_royal]

Back on topic.....young forward Andrew White is set to sign on loan for Bournemouth if the Football League ratify the deal.

[Ian Royal]

If his goal return now (10 from 25) is good enough, then 5 from 13 is pretty much the same scoring rate. Give or take. It's nothing to sniff at.

Give or take because it's wrong according to Soccerbase anyway?

Anyway, the point is his loan scoring record was faily poor apart from one short spell where it was ok, no better. Yet he has still proved an excellent addition at this level. So to write off Antonio on the basis that he's been in and out of the Saints team at the age of 19, is a bit silly IMO>

Soccer base is wrong.

From RFC Site

He then made a loan move to Leyton Orient, and became the 1000th player in their history, playing 12(+1) games for the O's and scoring five times.*

*Note that the Press Association incorrectly have Simon as scoring four goals at Leyton Orient. He did in fact score both for the O's in a 2-2 draw with Leeds.

Glad I qualified that now. Useless bloody PA.

[KC Royal]

From watching the JPT final highlights on Sun night it looked as though Antonio had a great game. He may do a decent job in the Championship yet.

Its going to be interesting to see what club and player decide to do at the end of the season though. If he stays i can't see him getting on the bench for anything other than league cup games. He's behind Kebe, McAnuff and Henry in the pecking order, and Tabb, Robson-Kanu, Davies and Church could all do a job on the right as well. So it may be better for his career to join Southampton permanently in the summer.

[Royalwaster]

From watching the JPT final highlights on Sun night it looked as though Antonio had a great game. He may do a decent job in the Championship yet.

Its going to be interesting to see what club and player decide to do at the end of the season though. If he stays i can't see him getting on the bench for anything other than league cup games. He's behind Kebe, McAnuff and Henry in the pecking order, and Tabb, Robson-Kanu, Davies and Church could all do a job on the right as well. So it may be better for his career to join Southampton permanently in the summer.

Just watched them too and was thinking - wow, this lad must be over the moon. Playing for T&M at the start of the season and scores a cracking goal at Wembley towards the end of the season. There must have been all these lads watching the game saying "I played with him only a few months ago!". Good stuff.

[Hoop Blah]

We signed him at the start of last season, another of Coppell's gambles, not this season, so he wasn't playing for Tooting last August.

Don't get me wrong, he's still done well to step up to League 1 level and contribute to a decent side, but it's not quite the metoric rags to riches you describe there.

[ZacNaloen]

We signed him at the start of last season, another of Coppell's gambles, not this season, so he wasn't playing for Tooting last August.

Don't get me wrong, he's still done well to step up to League 1 level and contribute to a decent side, but it's not quite the metoric rags to riches you describe there.

He went back on loan to Tooting almost immediately.

[Wycombe Royal]

We signed him at the start of last season, another of Coppell's gambles, not this season, so he wasn't playing for Tooting last August.

Don't get me wrong, he's still done well to step up to League 1 level and contribute to a decent side, but it's not quite the metoric rags to riches you describe there.

He went back on loan to Tooting almost immediately.

But not this season as royalwaster said. This season he has been on loan Southampton.

[Royalwaster]

We signed him at the start of last season, another of Coppell's gambles, not this season, so he wasn't playing for Tooting last August.

Don't get me wrong, he's still done well to step up to League 1 level and contribute to a decent side, but it's not quite the metoric rags to riches you describe there.

He went back on loan to Tooting almost immediately.

But not this season as royalwaster said. This season he has been on loan Southampton.

True - sorry - seemed to think it was this season. When did we sign him?

[ZacNaloen]

We signed him at the start of last season, another of Coppell's gambles, not this season, so he wasn't playing for Tooting last August.

Don't get me wrong, he's still done well to step up to League 1 level and contribute to a decent side, but it's not quite the metoric rags to riches you describe there.

He went back on loan to Tooting almost immediately.

But not this season as royalwaster said. This season he has been on loan Southampton.

For some reason I thought he meant last last august, which is just silly of me.

[Hoop Blah]

True - sorry - seemed to think it was this season. When did we sign him?

July '08 according to Soccerbase, but I don't remember him going straight back to Tooting, but he probably did.

He did have a little spell on loan at Cheltenham last season as well though.

[Wycombe Royal]

True - sorry - seemed to think it was this season. When did we sign him?

July '08 according to Soccerbase, but I don't remember him going straight back to Tooting, but he probably did.

He did have a little spell on loan at Cheltenham last season as well though.

The clubs profile says we signed himin October 2008. I would trust them more than Soccerbase.

[Hoop Blah]

Fair enough, I'd go with the OS too!

I thought I'd remembered him joining midway through a season but assumed it was my memory playing tricks on me when I checked.

They don't mention him going straight back out on loan though...did that happen?

[ZacNaloen]

It wasn't quite immediate, it was just the first thing of note that happened after he was signed to the club.

[West_Reading]

We had a 'promising' crop of youngsters around about the Pardew era too, the likes of Darren Campbell, Andre Boucaud and Peter Castle. But none of them made it. So we really have been blessed with the current crop.

[leww_rfc]

It shows our academy is Quality when we beat Arsenals.

[Royalwaster]

We had a 'promising' crop of youngsters around about the Pardew era too, the likes of Darren Campbell, Andre Boucaud and Peter Castle. But none of them made it. So we really have been blessed with the current crop.

I remember when I first started watching Reading (around 2001), our Under-18s (or whatever) and Reserves stood out for losing most of their games by at least 5 goals - was something we used to joke about. I guess that also reflects the change in quality in that we seem to completely dominate games these days ... or has quality of opposition changed?

[TFF]

Reserve football has certainly changed in the last few years.

Not many clubs actually field a reserve side, choosing instead to play youngsters in a more regular/competitive format. Lots of the billy-big-bollocks players in the first team get the hump about playing for the second string.

That's not been the case at RFC (and maybe McD's recent record hints as to the reason why) so our reserve team has been stronger, winning the prem reserve title. I dare say that the opposition playing the youngsters "up a level" results in a corresponding weakening of their academy teams compared to ours.