Confirmed Signing Niels Nkounkou

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Lewis Gibson is still only 19 and was doing very well at Fleetwood pre lockdown.

Holgate also spent some time in the U23 before he got a few loans, the good 1s are generally loaned out, if they have the talent the pathway is there, as we are seeing with DCL, Holgate, Davies and Gordon.

This is another reason Europa is so vital to us as a club.

Not sure the loan system is much use either tbh. I just can't remember a single young player that has come through for us who went out on loan before starting for us. Osman and Barkley are perhaps the nearest, but both had made PL debuts for us before they went out on loan. Davies was straight into the first team, as was Vaughan and Anichebe.

Josh Bowler was one who came to us for a decent fee. Been with us 3 years now and is nowhere, despite being 21. Gibson has been here three years as well. Holgate had made first team appearances in his second season with us. Stones had half a season with us before making his PL debut.

Even with the Europa, giving lads a dead rubber to play in doesn't seem to do much for their development. If you look at the lineup from the Krasnodar game whenever that was - https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/spo.../players-evertons-last-europa-league-13931763 - none went on to do anything at all for us.
 
This is supposed to be just the sort of signing that Brands is supposed to be good at.
so it will be interesting if wecan start building a development squad ready to make the step up.
 

This is a numbers game signing. Make enough of these punts and some of them will eventually come good.

It's hard to evaluate without contract terms, but if OM was willing to tender a new contract it's hard to see how it's a poor roll of the dice on a free.
 
Hopefully we'll see him involved in these kinds of celebrations in the future. (Yes this is just an excuse to post this video.)

 

Josh Bowler was one who came to us for a decent fee. Been with us 3 years now and is nowhere, despite being 21. Gibson has been here three years as well. Holgate had made first team appearances in his second season with us. Stones had half a season with us before making his PL debut.
Sometimes the players are just not good enough, but we also have had a huge disconnect between U23s and 1st team. Trivia question: Who was the last player before Gordon to make his PL debut for us after having played in the U23s first? I’m guessing at Beni Baningime back in Oct 2017. So we went over 2 years without giving any new youngster game time at all . During this time Gibson never even got a sniff and we made decisions like playing Cuco Martina at left back or bench cover instead , Gibson was bought primarily as a CB but has played left back for England youth.
Note, I used the past tense , I’m hoping that Carlo and Brands are sorting out that disconnect by having the better U23s training with the 1st team. If they’re not good enough they still don’t play , but id imagine that attracting young Niels would have at least have included him being developed alongside 1st teamers , even if he plays at U23s .
 

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