[Albion] Four teenagers started v Chelsea

[jackalbion]

Given all our successes with youth progression, has there been a player over the last few years you were amazed didn’t make it?

I'm not AZ Gull, but, I was always surprised Teddy Jenks never made it with us, always looked very decent.

 

[Gabbiano]

I'm not AZ Gull, but, I was always surprised Teddy Jenks never made it with us, always looked very decent.

Our previous Romanian wonderkid - Tudor Baluta!

Came incredibly highly rated but had horrendous luck with injuries and now back playing in Romania... as one of Mazilu's current team mates unless I'm mistaken.

 

[chaileyjem]

In the actual month of January, it is very possible that EVERY ONE of those five players you have listed will be unavailable!

Adingra will be at the AFCON with Ivory Coast
Enciso's return date from injury is unclear
Ansu Fati's return from injury is unclear
Mitoma will be at the Asia Cup with Japan
Buonanotte might well be with the Argentina U23 squad at the Olympic qualifying tournament

Enciso - club have confirmed they are looking for him to be back in January. (might not happen but thats what they've said)
Ansu Fati - again it was "up to 6 weeks" a week ago.
The tournament stuff for Mitoma, Buionanotte, Adingra is frustrating and risky (for Brighton at least) but you can't buy a bunch of players just to cope with possible absentees in Wolves and Luton in January and then have conversely too big a squad for the rest of the season.
Anyway the right approach is replacing March in the squad with those sort of qualities. (rather than recalling loans or relying on Mazilu) .
And I also expect Bloom to dig deep for a full back to replace / strengthen that area given Estupinan absence - left sided Full back, wing back etc. (Barco from Boca Juniors ? )

 

[BNthree]

Given all our successes with youth progression, has there been a player over the last few years you were amazed didn’t make it?

Given there was a lot of fuss about Haydn Roberts I was surprised he never made our first team. He’s at Bristol in the Championship so obviously a decent player.

 

[Jim in the West]

In the actual month of January, it is very possible that EVERY ONE of those five players you have listed will be unavailable!

Adingra will be at the AFCON with Ivory Coast
Enciso's return date from injury is unclear
Ansu Fati's return from injury is unclear
Mitoma will be at the Asia Cup with Japan
Buonanotte might well be with the Argentina U23 squad at the Olympic qualifying tournament

Luckily we only have two EPL matches in Jan (exluding the West Ham game - I'm assuming players going away on international duty will still play in the fixture vs WHU on 2nd Jan)....but unfortunately it looks like both Ivory Coast and Japan are likely to progress reasonably far, so Adingra and Mitoma could be out for matches in the first half of Feb, too (Palace at home and Spurs away). It's interesting (ie, unfortunate) that all these absentees play in wide positions. I'm assuming we'll see quite a bit more of Baker-Boaitey and Duffus

 

[Rookie]

Given all our successes with youth progression, has there been a player over the last few years you were amazed didn’t make it?

For me JFC. England at every level, games under Poyet and Oscar but then it went wrong and don’t think he ever really recovered from Hypia

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

Luckily we only have two EPL matches in Jan (exluding the West Ham game - I'm assuming players going away on international duty will still play in the fixture vs WHU on 2nd Jan)....but unfortunately it looks like both Ivory Coast and Japan are likely to progress reasonably far, so Adingra and Mitoma could be out for matches in the first half of Feb, too (Palace at home and Spurs away). It's interesting (ie, unfortunate) that all these absentees play in wide positions. I'm assuming we'll see quite a bit more of Baker-Boaitey and Duffus

We also have to acknowledge that if we want to make it through to the 4th round, or the 5th round of the cup, we'll have to do it with a heavily depleted squad. Also if we don't beat Marseille, we'll have a Europa game against a 3rd place Champions League team on the 15th Feb

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

Enciso - club have confirmed they are looking for him to be back in January. (might not happen but thats what they've said)
Ansu Fati - again it was "up to 6 weeks" a week ago.
The tournament stuff for Mitoma, Buionanotte, Adingra is frustrating and risky (for Brighton at least) but you can't buy a bunch of players just to cope with possible absentees in Wolves and Luton in January and then have conversely too big a squad for the rest of the season.

All this assumes that the injuries and suspensions will stop coming though. We all hope this will be the case, but history suggests we'll lose plenty more during the busy weeks and months ahead.

Anyway the right approach is replacing March in the squad with those sort of qualities. (rather than recalling loans or relying on Mazilu) .

This would be ideal, but buying a player in January for something close to March's skill and ability is asking for the recruitment team to pull another massive rabbit out of the hat. They've done it before but we can't rely on it happening. We certainly can't rely on it for the start of January which is looking like a massive pinch point for us

 

[hans kraay fan club]

I'm not AZ Gull, but, I was always surprised Teddy Jenks never made it with us, always looked very decent.

Given there was a lot of fuss about Haydn Roberts I was surprised he never made our first team. He’s at Bristol in the Championship so obviously a decent player.

I'd second both of these. In that ridiculous cup tie against Villa, when we fielded a youth team against a near full strength Villa side, these two both gave very impressive accounts of themselves. Roberts was only 17, coped well in defence, was serenely calm on the ball, and scored a goal.

(He's also the only Brighton player (to my knowledge, at least) who shares with ME, the honour of being captain of the Hove Park school team!)

 

[hans kraay fan club]

Enciso - club have confirmed they are looking for him to be back in January. (might not happen but thats what they've said)
Ansu Fati - again it was "up to 6 weeks" a week ago.
The tournament stuff for Mitoma, Buionanotte, Adingra is frustrating and risky (for Brighton at least) but you can't buy a bunch of players just to cope with possible absentees in Wolves and Luton in January and then have conversely too big a squad for the rest of the season.
Anyway the right approach is replacing March in the squad with those sort of qualities. (rather than recalling loans or relying on Mazilu) .
And I also expect Bloom to dig deep for a full back to replace / strengthen that area given Estupinan absence - left sided Full back, wing back etc. (Barco from Boca Juniors ? )

I do not disagree with any of that, and made a point of referencing the situation IN JANUARY, rather than the rest of the season. We look especially light in wide areas for those few games (and one / two rounds of the FA Cup) so it would be no surprise to me if we kept Mazilu (and some of the other young players earmarked for loans) about until the end of the month before letting them go out.

 

[chaileyjem]

All this assumes that the injuries and suspensions will stop coming though. We all hope this will be the case, but history suggests we'll lose plenty more during the busy weeks and months ahead.



This would be ideal, but buying a player in January for something close to March's skill and ability is asking for the recruitment team to pull another massive rabbit out of the hat. They've done it before but we can't rely on it happening. We certainly can't rely on it for the start of January which is looking like a massive pinch point for us

There might well be injuries but in effect only two long term injuries (March and probably Estupinan) . It looks worse than it is.
And in the end you can only name a certain number of players in your squad.
As for buying players then i'm certain thats the intention and i'm certain players have been identified but of course other clubs will want em too so its not as easy as that. Still a lot of work to be done. But i'm very sceptical that the strategy is recalling loan players or expecting that u21 players stepping up will be enough (although i'm sure they'll get more chances) .

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

There might well be injuries but in effect only two long term injuries (March and probably Estupinan) . It looks worse than it is.
And in the end you can only name a certain number of players in your squad.
As for buying players then i'm certain thats the intention and i'm certain players have been identified but of course other clubs will want em too so its not as easy as that. Still a lot of work to be done. But i'm very sceptical that the strategy is recalling loan players or expecting that u21 players stepping up will be enough (although i'm sure they'll get more chances) .

I’m certainly not saying no to a new signing, but I just think, if we’re recalling loans, we control the timing. Assuming loan deals allow a recall, (which I believe in the majority of cases will be the case as potential loanee clubs are in no position to dictate terms to us) then we can get players we know we can do a job at the time we need them.

The trouble with signings is that they are likely to come at the end of January. Exactly when our players will be start coming back from the foreign tournaments. And signing players is a random process, we might get our man, we might not. And the world knows we have an injury crisis, they know we got £100m for Caicedo. We’re signing from a position of weakness

This is why I believe loan recalls are better. We get back two or three players, who are ours anyway, Crucially we can get them at the start of Jan and this will get us through AFCON . I get there is some argument that it might hinder their development. I think that’s a risk worth taking though. Apart from maybe Undav, none of them are having a spectacular loan anyway.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

I’m certainly not saying no to a new signing, but I just think, if we’re recalling loans, we control the timing. Assuming loan deals allow a recall, (which I believe in the majority of cases will be the case as potential loanee clubs are in no position to dictate terms to us) then we can get players we know we can do a job at the time we need them.

The trouble with signings is that they are likely to come at the end of January. Exactly when our players will be start coming back from the foreign tournaments. And signing players is a random process, we might get our man, we might not. And the world knows we have an injury crisis, they know we got £100m for Caicedo. We’re signing from a position of weakness

This is why I believe loan recalls are better. We get back two or three players, who are ours anyway, Crucially we can get them at the start of Jan and this will get us through AFCON . I get there is some argument that it might hinder their development. I think that’s a risk worth taking though. Apart from maybe Undav, none of them are having a spectacular loan anyway.

Abdullah Sima is top scorer in the SPL, and Steven Alzate is doing well at Standard liege. They love him, there.

 

[jackalbion]

I'd second both of these. In that ridiculous cup tie against Villa, when we fielded a youth team against a near full strength Villa side, these two both gave very impressive accounts of themselves. Roberts was only 17, coped well in defence, was serenely calm on the ball, and scored a goal.

(He's also the only Brighton player (to my knowledge, at least) who shares with ME, the honour of being captain of the Hove Park school team!)

Well then he's to my knowledge the only player to also play for the Hove Park school team (the same as me), and play for Brighton, but I expect there are more.

 

[jackanada]

Well then he's to my knowledge the only player to also play for the Hove Park school team (the same as me), and play for Brighton, but I expect there are more.

George Cox is the only one I can name without researching it.

 

[jackalbion]

George Cox is the only one I can name without researching it.

Never played for Brighton I don’t think.

 

[Questions]

Teenagers ? They’re always f***ing starting.

 

[chaileyjem]

The trouble with signings is that they are likely to come at the end of January.

If we sign Valentin Barco - then its likely to be wrapped up before the window starts and he'll be on a plane to Lancing etc ready for the window to open on January 1st. (like Buonanotte last season)

 

[AZ Gull]

Given all our successes with youth progression, has there been a player over the last few years you were amazed didn’t make it?

It is such a difficult process developing promising youngsters and helping them become fully-fledged Premier League players that I don't think I've ever felt someone has been nailed on to make it. Perhaps Evan Ferguson, but he is a once-in-a-generation talent for a club like Albion.

However, casting my mind back, I'm surprised Jordan Maguire-Drew didn't achieve more with his talent. I also thought Jayson Molumby had the potential to become a Premier League player with Albion; he certainly isn't a failure (over 150 appearances at Championship level and 24 full caps for Ireland) and he might yet produce even better but I thought his ceiling was higher.

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

If we sign Valentin Barco - then its likely to be wrapped up before the window starts and he'll be on a plane to Lancing etc ready for the window to open on January 1st. (like Buonanotte last season)

Massive if, considering there are reportedly a number of clubs, including city in the hunt