by Stranded »
14 Sep 2021 08:19
royalp-we It seems many of our fans think that everything the academy produces will be able to step up to the first team.
I’m intrigued to see if Southwood has improved since his howler of a debut performance against Huddersfield last season. I guess we’ll find out tomorrow night.
We all know that is not the case, you just need to look at the number of academy "stars" now plying their trade at lower levels than us to see that. What I hope most of our fans are hoping for is that our outstanding production line of young goalkeepers is about to produce one who could be our first choice for the next decade - we didn't give him a new deal (1 year plus right to extend for a second) because we didn't rate him - we could have easily let him slide and picked up a cheap back up but he is rated here - in Scotland, he was raved about for almost single handedly keeping Hamilton up.
He looked nervous v Huddersfield and made a mistake in the final minute to cost us a win but the circumstances were that he came into a team who wanted the season over having fcuked up the play-offs and anyway it is one game - arguably our most successful keeper, Hahnemann, came to us as a bit of a joke, he was not rated where he had been - 3rd choice at Fulham and off the back of a poor loan at Rochdale - he finally got consistant minutes with us (at the age of 30!) and we all know what happened next.
Southwood has talent and now has the chance to get 10-20 games as first choice under his belt at Champ level (instead of knowing that however he performed, he was going to be back on the bench next game) and hopefully help improve the defensive line - I don't get why you wouldn't be excited by the prospect. It may not work out but it might. It might...
Last edited by
Stranded on 14 Sep 2021 08:21, edited 1 time in total.