Callum Kavanagh

U21s/U23s is a very low level of getting real time experience. That's why loans away are so important.

I'm sure Coburn and Hackney will testify to that. You don't even have to necessarily do well. It's the whole experience of getting bullied every week or even living away from home etc.

The fact Kavs not overly done it during his 2 loans isn't a breaker. I mean I'm sure scunthorpe fans would say Hackney was cack. Also an even more extreme example is Harry Kane. The majority of his loans were awful.

He seems to be a bit of a poacher / good finisher. He probably doesn't have the alround game we require to fit our formation. That said with all the injuries and youth on the bench you'd have thought he would have had some kind of look in.

I notice Carrick says the young lads who've been included have been training with the first team. I'm not sure if Kavanagh is?

I'd expect another loan in Jan.
 
I always feel like Boro are very good at playing really young players in the U21/U23 leagues, we often seem to be playing sides packed with 17 year-olds. So they’re stepping up ahead of schedule and playing teams of 19 and 20 year-olds, but the club seems to find it tricky to bridge the gap and get a lot of them out on loan at the right time. They don’t seem to push on properly between 17, 18 and 20, 21.

In the past we’ve ended up with players aged 21 and 22 who’ve sort of missed the boat with us because they’ve just not developed. And then because they’ve not been out on loan or played very much senior football, they struggle to find clubs who’ll take a punt on them when they’ve inevitably released because they don’t have enough games under their belts. You have players like Coulson at 24, 25 just sitting about not playing. Stephen Walker was another. Just hanging around for years.

We have players like Joe Gibson(22), Cain Sykes(21), Bryant Bilongo(22), Sam Collins(20), George Gitau(20), Isaac Fletcher(21), Calum Kavanagh(20)… they’re all 20+ and appear to be absolutely nowhere near our first team. There is always time for them to develop and push on but you’d suspect they won’t be doing it with Boro tbh.
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
We have players like Joe Gibson(22), Cain Sykes(21), Bryant Bilongo(22), Sam Collins(20), George Gitau(20), Isaac Fletcher(21), Calum Kavanagh(20)… they’re all 20+ and appear to be absolutely nowhere near our first team. There is always time for them to develop and push on but you’d suspect they won’t be doing it with Boro tbh.
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I think this is pretty normal. Every year each team has to let go a bunch of seniors (20-year-old+ players) who haven't made it into the 1st team squad. Last season, Man City let 10 seniors go. That's just the way of the world. The difference though is that City earned something like £40m from their sales because some of the seniors may not get into the City team but are still good enough for a bottom end Premier team.

Our best seniors are possibly good enough for League 1 or a bottom end Championship team but there's no money to be had from them. Best we can hope for is a sell-on clause but most of our seniors are simply released because lower league teams know they can pick them up for free later.
 
BoroPhil said:
There's obviously something holding him back. Scores goals regularly at youth levels but struggled a bit out on loan, had a few injuries. Isn't in the Ireland u21 squad. Never really been in and around the first team despite his goals. Would be interesting to hear what Carrick thinks of him.
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His time at Harrogate was maybe too early for him, got injured, body maybe not robust enough at that point. I don't think he got really fully fit or on form last season. Refound himself, got a bit stronger and he is not scoring for fun again. His Premier League 2 record is 20 goals in 27 games, for comparison Cam Archer had 10 goals in 28 games at that level!

He's a year younger than Josh, we need to remember that, but he probably deserves to be pushing for the bench, not sure if he's been training with the first team, anyone know?
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
We have players like Joe Gibson(22), Cain Sykes(21), Bryant Bilongo(22), Sam Collins(20), George Gitau(20), Isaac Fletcher(21), Calum Kavanagh(20)… they’re all 20+ and appear to be absolutely nowhere near our first team. There is always time for them to develop and push on but you’d suspect they won’t be doing it with Boro tbh.
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Gibson was near last year but has had a year of injuries since then. Sykes not sure he will make it, Bilongo came into the academy setup late, so his football age is probably still 20 or 21, Gitau won't make it at this level, Kav, time on his side still but smashing it at PL2 level.
 
Nano said:
The U21 league is a really low level. All the best players in that age group are out on loan or in first team squads. The overage players, if there are any, are only there for fitness. The difference in physicality between playing against kids and adults is huge and that is the difficult thing about stepping up so even the standout players will struggle. We had the issue last year with Balogun who clearly had talent but was very weak. I'm sure they will have been including him in training and if they think he's not physically ready then it's probably correct.

The old days of having a proper reserves are long gone. That's why teams are so keen to get players out on loan. There's only so much to be gained from bossing kids games.
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Also why cup competitions are glorified reserve matches. Its the only way to get fringe players any meaningful playing time
 
GibbosEmpire said:
Didn't Kav play last night? He wouldn't play 2 games in 2 days
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I dont think sitting on the bench would be beyond a young lads capabilities, he could have managed a brief cameo which would have spurred him on further.
The lad has talent and deserves a platform to show it,if not with us then somewhere else.
 
I remember watching him in a pre-season friendly maybe last season? At York…

He looked quality there. Admittedly not the greatest of levels but the boys got talent.

Let’s face it, if we didn’t have Leo in charge, Hackney would likely have never been given a chance either.
 
If you have only played 31 senior games at league 2 level by the age of 20 you have hardly any chance of making it at Championship level. There is the odd exception to that of course, but as a rule it just doesn't happen.

I always remember Gary Neville saying you need to have played 100 plus games at the level you want to make it at by the time you are 20/21.
 
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