papereyesUkeAlan PartridgeUkeHuntley & Palmer Recently or in general?
Can you think of any?
Jamie Ashdown benefitted immensely from a loan to Rushden and also Matthew Upson owes a lot to his loan at Reading.
And which one remained at the club that loaned them out?
My point exactly
Loan sends a "try before you buy" message to the player, thta they are not a valued member of the squad
Except for clubs in the Premiership aiming to give a player some vital experience and a test to see how good they could be.
In the current Arsenal side, you've Eboue plus a current crop (of which some may not make it at Arsenal) of Bentner, Larsson etc. In the current Villa side, you've got Cahill, Ridgwell, Agbonlahor, Samuel and Moore who have been out on loan. Newcastle have Milner - on loan from Leeds to Swindon while there, and then a season at Villa. Parker was out at Norwich for a few games while at Charlton, and fellow Newcastle midfielder O'Brien had a spell at Carlisle.
Defoe had a famous spell at Bournemouth, as a youngster, as did Rio Ferdinand.
For young players with talent, it is a good, no, very good way of seeing what level a player can perform at.
Just because some players don't break through isn't an indictment of the loan system, its probably because they weren't quite good enough.
Our record for bringing players through the academy over the last 2 decades is a sad indictment of how few clubs have got it more wrong than us
And, this thread is a sad indictment of the kind of influence our supporters have placed on the whole sorry process.
Being fortunate to have one of the best managers in the country for unearthing young talent who, in 2 short seasons, has made a complete and utter mockery of the doom merchants who support this club, is now having his judgement questioned by those who have at some stage or another written off nearly every member of the current squad.
The Arsenal example is a very good one.
How many of their current side were in that team of reserves we played in the cup last year?
Again, I'm delighted we have Steve Coppell so save us from our own supporters.............................Long is going nowhere because he deserves his chance in the Prem with us and, we have little to lose and everything to gain by giving him that chance.