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Martin reported to be a loan target for Alex coach Holland. Will Roeder give the nod?

21st February 2008 By Latest News Leave a Comment

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Beccles teenager Chris Martin is a wanted man, according to the Stoke Sentinel newspaper, as Crewe chief Steve Holland looks to take City's England Under-19 striker on loan.

Holland – Crewe first team coach and Academy director following Dario Gradi's move upstairs to become 'technical director' at Gresty Road – is anxious to boost the Railwaymen's strike power ahead of this weekend's League One trip to Leeds United.

And, according to The Sentinel, has two players in his sights – Hibernian's Clayton Donaldson and Martin.

Whether or not Holland is successful in his quest remains, he himself suggests, firmly in the balance as he tries to second guess what the two respective managers are thinking.

“We have made some inquiries and spoken to some managers, but you have to question how close we are,” the Crewe coach told The Sentinel. “When no-one gets back to you, you wonder whether you are a million miles away.

“I really don't know whether we are close or not. What I do know is we are still looking and we have made inquiries in the last two weeks, one or two of which are still not dead. We are still continuing to look and if we could bring in a forward who would improve us, then we would do it.”

From Roeder's perspective, a loan move for Martin has both advantages and disadvantages.

The City boss has long confirmed that there is a big talent there, but question marks clearly still linger. 'How much do you really want it?' would be the gist of the gauntlet that Roeder and his coaching staff continute to lay at the 18-year-old's feet.

And after his last first team start – the 1-1 FA Cup home draw against League Two minnows Bury – lasted just 45 minutes, so Martin has found himself being returned to Ricky Martin's charge and a chance to discover the delights of Under-18 Academy football, in his case a 4-1 defeat at West Ham United. He was not, however, involved in last weekend's 2-0 derby defeat against Ipswich.

The fact that Martin racked up five goals in the space of two Reserve games – against first Grays Athletic and then Luton Town Reserves at Kenilworth Road – cut little or no ice with the City chief.

“It is up to him,” Roeder said recently, as the Martin question once again did the rounds – particularly on the back of Jamie Cureton's recent absence for that appendix operation. Roll the clock back 12 months, and the City Academy product was having the time of his footballing life.

A year on and all that initial promise is starting to follow a similar, frustrating path to that of Ryan Jarvis.

Jarvis, of course, was the 16-year-old who once scored four goals in the first-half away against Sweden for the England Under-16s. At that stage, he appeared to have the footballing world at his feet; he would then go on to score a fabulous goal in the Premiership at home to Liverpool.

After that, however, the Fakenham-born striker's career has coughed and spluttered its way through a succession of loan moves – the latest to Notts County – as opportunities to grab a Norwich shirt came and went all too often.

Purely as a curious aside, County now have three players on loan at Meadow Lane – Jarvis, Danny Crow from Peterborough and Ali Gibb from Hartlepool. All three graduates of the Canary Youth Academy.

Back in Norfolk and with fellow teenager Ched Evans setting Martin a bench-mark, it will be interesting to see whether Roeder decides that a loan spell at Gresty Road under Gradi's watchful eye might, finally, bring the real Chris Martin out to play.

“I can only give them a stage to go out and play on and they have to produce a performance on the day that keeps them in the team. Chris would be the first to admit against Bury the last time he played he didn't play particularly well,” Roeder added, suggesting that it was more about what Martin did when he didn't have the ball than what he did with it when he did.

Both Roeder and his reserve team boss Paul Stephenson have readily conceded that he knows where the goal is. That bit is not in doubt.

“We are on to him in training every day to increase his work rate for the team,” explained Roeder. “He has to realise that it is not all about standing up through the middle. You have to work hard for the team when you're not in possession, and he finds that quite difficult. But we'll keep working on him and hopefully the penny will drop.”

Whether it has no reached the stage where they will get someone else to work with him in the hope that they can get the penny to drop may yet, of course, be influenced by this weekend's glut of suspensions with Darel Russell, Mark Fotheringham and Dion Dublin all out of the home clash with Barnsley.

With Cureton now back from his appendix trouble, Roeder now has one potential partner for Evans up front; another might be Gary Doherty leaving the on-loan Alex Pearce to step into his shoes at the back.

The City boss has also hinted at giving Kieran Gibbs a go down the middle should the on-loan Arsenal youngster not be required elsewhere. He has, after all, a whole new central midfield to find following the various indiscretions of Messrs Fotheringham and Russell.

But somewhere in that suspension-hit mix, both Martin and his fellow Academy product Michael Spillane ought to figure – if only to make up the numbers on the bench.

After that and the prospect of a hectic schedule of games through March and the thought of what that might do to Dublin's 38-year-old limbs may well cause Roeder to think twice about letting anyone else out on loan.

But faced between the choice of Under-18 football and the opportunity to prove a point with Crewe, the youngster himself might leap at the chance.


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