Last weekend, Cheyenne Dunkley ‘liked’ one of my tweets. You probably haven’t heard of him.
Neither had I until six days ago prior to my inaugural visit to Oxford’s Kassam Stadium, an innocuous ground possessing only three stands in the suburbs of the city. My first experience of it turned out to be both a pleasant yet eye-opening one.
What was the tweet? I had praised Dunkley – Oxford United’s excellent centre-back – amongst others, for his resolute performance in a convincing and significant 2-0 victory, a result that had propelled them to within two wins of promotion to League One.
Dunkley was conspicuously and relentlessly superb, winning headers, thwarting attacks and demonstrating a cool composure when in possession.
His performance made me think. The Saturday before I had been present at a frantic Carrow Road, witnessing the bumbling Sebastian Bassong fluff his lines in his audition to convince City fans he was a reasonable replacement for the injured Timm Klose.
As we all know, Bassong was shockingly poor that afternoon, losing possession to the terrific Jan Kirchoff in the build up to Sunderland’s decisive second goal whilst frequently being profligate and careless when he had the ball. (It’s only fair to note at this point that he was significantly better at the Emirates).
The gulf between the two defensive performances was profound: Dunkley was like a combination of the resolute Alastair Cook and the more finessed Ian Bell in footballing form, whilst Bassong represented a nervous, inept figure comparable to the hapless Adam Lyth in last summer’s Ashes.
He looked out of his depth.
Don’t get me wrong: I am acutely aware that defending against the lively Jermaine Defoe is considerably more challenging that suppressing the limited threat of Hartlepool’s attackers, a job Dunkley was able to conduct with palpable ease. But the Oxford defender genuinely looked a real talent, possessing the range of attributes required to cut it as a top centre-half.
Simply offloading Bassong in the summer and making a surprise move on Oxford’s Dunkley is not my suggestion. However, Dunkley’s performance was fundamentally microcosmic of the talent that exists amongst the lower leagues that undoubtedly needs to be gambled on to a far greater extent by teams such as Norwich City.
We all know the Jamie Vardy story. Hollywood beckons for the Leicester City talisman, whose humble beginnings at Halifax then Fleetwood have surely instilled a fervent sense of hope and inspiration into numerous lower league players. His talent was taken a punt on by Leicester City and the divisive Nigel Pearson – and the rest is history.
Should Norwich City miraculously remain in the Premier League come the summer, this concerning and augmenting sense of obliviousness to lower league ability needs to be relinquished by Alex Neil. The talent is there.
It wasn’t just Dunkley who impressed from Oxford, but also midfield’s Chris Maguire, the tenacious winger Alex McDonald and the goalscoring and enterprising Kemar Roofe.
City have attempted to scout lower league talent and subsequently attract it to Carrow Road. We recently signed James Maddison from Coventry City, whilst also bringing in the talented Ben Godfrey from York. But, rather than giving them a chance, we promptly sent Maddison out on loan and insisted the Godfrey wasn’t yet adequately prepared for first-team football.
Granted, Godfrey and Maddison are both young, and Neil’s actions that suggest their level of unpreparedness may be warranted but that’s not to say we can’t attract more experienced lower league players – such as Dunkley – who possess both the ability and sufficient time on the pitch to succeed at City.
Whilst Timm Klose’s arrival has been an unambiguous success and clear boost to our survival ambitions, our other attempts to bring in big names from either abroad or the top leagues have largely failed. Ricky van Wolfswinkel, Gary Hooper, Kyle Lafferty and most recently Steven Naismith… the list goes on.
Let’s give the lower leagues a chance. It’s not just League Two and the Conference – attempting to obtain top Championship and League One players surely has to be a policy that Neil and other Premier League managers pursue.
The signing of Ryan Bennett has been a success for Norwich, whilst Russell Martin has proved he is a dependable right-back in the top flight. Both came from lower league clubs.
We all know Norwich struggle for goals. Dieumerci Mbokani and Cameron Jerome have had their moments, but the overlooking of the likes Burnley’s Andre Gray, Huddersfield’s Nakhi Wells and Brentford’s Alan Judge by top tier managers such has been astounding.
Inevitably, not all lower league acquisitions will come to fruition in a quest for Premier League safety, but the talent does exist and gambles should be increasingly taken.
League One equally possesses a multitude of talent and ability. Whether we stay up or suffer relegation, players such as Will Grigg and Paddy Madden have scored goals consistently in the third flight and should surely be considered by Neil as well as other lower to mid table Premier League managers.
Terrific defenders are out there too, such as Dunkley and his excellent centre-back partner Jake Wright, as well as Gillingham’s young John Egan and Plymouth’s Curtis Nelson.
Not all talented lower league players will be successes for bigger clubs. Many will inevitably not possess the required ability to succeed in the top flight or Championship. But nonetheless, regardless of Norwich City’s division next season, the relinquishing of this palpable sense of apathy towards the lower leagues is surely a change we would all welcome both for our club and English football as a whole.
Gambles need to be taken in the modern game, and who knows: we may even find the next Jamie Vardy.
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Follow Will on Twitter @WilliamThomasJ
It’s all about the mentality of the player. Can they cut it, do they believe they can make it? Vardy was given that belief by Ranieri…the manager is key to such successes, a hungry individual given a chance by a bigger club. Reminds me of someone on our touchline…Although, I do believe you’re missing the obvious youth element. We spend millions upon millions on our academy and players are hitting 21/22 out on loan. They should be in the team by then and I’m not sure any of them will get their chance even if we go down. I also can’t believe you tainted your piece by suggesting Russell Martin is a premier league player in any position. That sort of sentimentality for days gone by is far more damaging to our club than not digging out talent in the lower leagues. Tell the truth, say he is toilet and needs to be moved on with Ruddy and Bassong (which have all become dirty words in Norwich – a wince always hits peoples faces when they discuss those three in public and a deafening ripple of fear and bemusement hits the the chip stall on the market). When we go down, we need a clear out of dead, diseased wood that relegation is second nature to. Hopefully some of the youth will get their chance!
Good first piece Will.
It’s an interesting recruitment policy, which merits serious consideration. Some will succeed, many probably won’t and I think, if this season has shown us one thing, the gulf between the Championship and the Premier League is huge.
We seem to have a squad that’s full of players who are more than capable in the Championship but who seem incapable of delivering consistently at the higher level.
It would therefore, in my opinion, be a big ask for a player to step up two levels from League One.
That said, should the worst happen over the next three games, we must aim to recruit the best of the best at Championship level, almost irrespective of price, if we want a swift return to the Premier the season after.
(2)Gary I do not think the gap is huge at all. Leciester stayed up last season and Burnley were not far off and performed with great credit.
Ourselves and Bournemouth are staying up this season and you will take it down to the wire. Teams that come up need to recruit wisely and with the money that is now in the Prem means that the smaller teams can compete with buying better players than before.
Mick (3) This article isn’t about who, out of the three teams promoted to the Premier League last season, had the best recruitment policy, it’s questioning whether there are unearthed gems in League One and League Two.
The answer to that question, is probably, yes, but, just like many Championship players, their ability to deliver regularly in the Premier League is questionable.
Nice debut, Will. I agree, up to a point.
It’s clear to me there IS a gulf between the Premier League and the Championship, let alone Leagues 1 and 2. For evidence, look at Alex Neil in the two leagues: he swept all before him in the Champ but – with an improved squad – has struggled to succeed in the top flight.
The physical and mental demands of coping with Premier League quality players are simply far greater than in any other division. That’s why it’s a very big ask for someone to jump from a lower league straight to the Prem – very few can do it.
By his own admission, for instance, Gary Hooper found it much more difficult to make his mark in the top flight.
Watford & Bournemouth have done exceptionally well this season – all credit to them. But it would be wrong to ignore Bournemouth’s huge financial backing or – without wanting to exaggerate it – Watford’s ability to draw on international connections.
So – yes, we should probably take more punts on lower league players. But in most cases, it’ll be important to ease them through the transition rather than throw them into the deep end.
(4) You questioned the gulf in quality between Championship and Prem. Troy Deeney came from league One! We regular feature 6-7 players from last season and so do Bournemouth. Yesterday we started with 8 players from last year.
West Ham have recruited Byram and Antonio this season. From what I have seem of them they look very good and have had no trouble stepping up in their individual performances. More recently Stoke, Southampton, Swansea and Leicester have survived in Prem with initial Championship squads. I think you are judging this on your own team and its performances.
Mick (6). Those 8 players just wheedled out a home win against possibly the worst team in PL history only with 2 ET goals and after Villa had gone down to 10 men. They outplayed you from what I saw until the sending off. 3 points yes, but not a good example of Champ. players qualities. Let’s see how Watford get on next season with the likely departures of Flores and Ighalo.
We had a great season in the top flight under Lambert with a squad of journeymen lower leaguers. I suspect that was a bit of a one off. Our efforts to ‘think big’ since have been largely very poor.
Be great to build up a new squad without big names and fancy connections but it’s very rarely done these days.
Mick (6) – Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe a substantial proportion of Watford appearances this season have been made by players you signed last summer.
I agree that Antonio has made an impact for West Ham this year, but the much-vaunted Sam Byram has made a grand total of 4 appearances.
All the other clubs you mention significantly strengthened their squads for the Premier League. Leicester, of course, survived last year only with a remarkable final run – before making brilliant investments for this season.
Mick (6) let’s not turn this into a simple “Watford vs Norwich” comparison thread.
As I said before, some players make the grade coming up from a lower level, others don’t and that analysis applies to players at all clubs.
It’s also important to judge the success of players over more than one season before they can be properly considered Premier League quality, or not.
I think we do have a good manager. It’s 5he financial backing that’s lacking. I don’t mean to be disrespectful to the present owners who have done well for us over the years but….
When we came up in 2011/12, most of that team were effectively 3rd Tier players. And we survived quite easily. Have Prem League standards improved massively since then – I suspect they have, though this doesn’t explain how Bournemouth have done so well
The Vardy story is a great one, but let’s not forget he took a season to adapt to the Championship and then the Premier so lower league signings are rarely expected to have an immediate impact. If relegated, I would expect to see Maddison & the Murphy’s having prominent roles.
I suspect the club would have had a bit of a backlash if they looked like they were targeting lower league players to ensure we survived in the Premier.
Dan R (11) – I think you’re right that Prem quality has improved since 2011.
Bournemouth deserve credit, but not quite the fawning adulation they’ve had in some quarters – their billionaire owner ensured they were among the biggest transfer window spenders.
A few players have jumped into the Premier League and made an instant impact. But they’re far outnumbered by players – from Liam Bridcutt & Lee Tomlin to Tom Ince & Patrick Bamford – who stood out in the Championship but have struggled to make any impact in the top flight.
This has created a debate with differing opinions.
(7)Yes Cosmo we were fortunate on Saturday as AV had more desire for the majority of the match and deserved a draw, but we dug out a result with a couple of bits of quality when not playing well which is what it is about at this level. There have been plenty of times when we have got nothing for our efforts (like yourselves on Saturday) when playing well so will gladly take the points and the win. Find it a bit strange that you are having a dig with this “worst team in Prem history” line when they beat yourselves comfortably earlier this season? For the record Derby & Sunderland are the two worst!
(8) I will correct you Stewart, as I say six out of seven of our highest appearance makers this season were regular players from our promotion team. West Ham beat Everton and ourselves to the signature of Byram and he has played well and will be part of their future given he is only 22.
(9) Gary, I have given you examples of other teams which back up this up but you have chosen to ignore the facts. That is your choice. From a personal point of view I think the league has become more even and that has been backed up with the results of the so called big clubs not finding it so easy as they used to.
Dan R (11) The plucky Bournemouth fairytale is revealed as the club has just been fine £7.6M for breaching the Championship FFP rules in their title winning season of 2014-15.
The club’s accounts reveal they lost £30.8M, having paid their players £30.4M that season, more than double the club’s turnover of £12.9M.
Mick (14) – you’ve named three players to substantiate your observation. Fair, play to you, that’s three more than I’ve named.
However, given that there are over 400 players currently registered with Premier League clubs, many originating from lower levels, others from overseas, there will always be some that make the grade and plenty of others, often playing only a handful of Premier League games, who don’t.
I feel like a stuck record, having said it three times, so I’m leaving it there.
Mick (14) – Thanks.
We must have different stats at our disposal. According to mine, not only have Watford’s summer 2015 signings made the majority of the club’s league appearances this season, but two of them (Capoue and Nyom) both feature in the top seven appearance makers.
Interested that you base a conclusion about Byram (“looks good and has had no trouble stepping up”) on four appearances. I agree he’s a talent – just like Bridcutt, Ince etc.
I believe its mainly about belief and strong characters and a leader
Most of our squad have been together for a number of seasons. In 2011/12 & 12/13 we had Holty in the championship last year where would we have been without Bradley Johnson. In 2013/14 no Holt and we struggled in much the same way as we have without BJ
Its not always just the quality a player brings but the guile & inspirational commitment the player brings to the team.
Klosse has been a huge loss but Alex Tettey even more so for his never say die attitude. Our players are ‘quiet’ on the pitch, we’ve lacked leadership out there and you have to ask the manager why that was not addressed?
(16) Gary,will give you another name at West Ham, Cresswell from your mates down the road. CP had seven players against Newcastle that started their careers in The Championship or lower! Swansea had five players in their line up against Liverpool that have come from lower leagues after their promotion of 2011!
(17) Stewart,all stats off our own website. 7 of our top appearance makers out of the first nine in the premier league are from our promotion team. Don’t think Everton or West Ham were ever chasing people like Bridcutt or Ince?
Mick (19) – Good and fair of you to retract your earlier ‘six out of seven’ claim.
Always dignified to admit when we’ve been wrong.