Cameron Carter-Vickers at Celtic

His career is like Bill Murray's character, Phil Connors, in Groundhogs Day.

He keeps waking up and he's off to join a new crappy Championship club.

 

Water usually finds its level.....

 

As someone who closely follows the Dynamo I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. It’s the worst run club in MLS.

 

True, but not all water is part of the loan army. You can find your level, but at least be part of something that you can help grow and invest in for the long term.

The loan army cycle might have helped CCV early in his career but I think it's long since run its course. Now it is not only not helping, but it is probably setting him back.

Just because he's not an elite player doesn't mean he can't find some place that he's invested in and, even more importantly, some place that is invested in him.

 

Forgive my devil's advocacy.

It's hard to know how good you are when you're a youth player making your way up the ladder. You certainly should have confidence in yourself. That's the challenge facing youth.

If you go to a loan army team, there is the very small chance that you find a spot quickly (thinking Alphonso Davies here) but even if in all likelihood you aren't at that level, the concept should be that they will get you playing time at the appropriate lower level.

Carter Vickers did go to the low-Championship level and I think the challenge is that he didn't stand out there. Is it likely true that all things being equal, the team would prefer one of their own players? Yeah, but the expectation was that Cameron would be noticeably better and stand out at this lower level. Unfortunately, neither he nor Miazga really stood out as much better.

Now that we've got some history that it's the right level for them, I do think they both should find a permanent home either in the Championship or MLS.

I'd be interested to see if you think their careers would be significantly different if they went directly to a low-end major league team or a high end Championship team right away because their development would have been front and center.

thanks.

 

So would you tell a player to avoid a transfer to a team that buys and loans at this point, unless that player is clearly in the first team plans immediately? For guys like Miazga, CCV, that defender whose name I forget on Man Citeh's books, this doesn't seem to be all that good for their development other than on paper.

 

The basic problem remains: CCV is just not that good.

 

Erik Palmer brown?

 

it may just be semantics- and i could just be wrong (certainly never out of the question)- but i dont know that the "loan army" tag applies to him. miazga, palmer-brown, etc knew what they were signing up for- he came up through tottenhams ranks. when did he sign his most recent contract? is he still on his first full pro contract?

cause it seems when that happened he was generally considered (at least according to us soccer writers) close to the first team. he made a handful of cup appearances, preseason matches. there werent rumors of clearing out guys to make room for him or anything but he was "breaking in" to some small degree.

but whatever combination of other guys returning from injuries, players bought, other youth players coming good, him platauing- and here we, what? three years later?

not a huge deal, i just think thats distinctly different than signing with a big club when youre not realistically close to that level.

 

I think it's mostly a bad idea for younger guys to sign with the biggest teams and basically commit to being in the loan army, though there can be exceptions. I still think that while things haven't worked out ideally for Miazga, the only way he was getting out of MLS was for a big club to pay the transfer. Guys like him and Steffen, who are very good MLS players and important to their MLS teams, aren't going to be affordable for the mid-tier Euro clubs where they might get a real shot at playing time, so their only option seems to be catching the eye of one of the bigger teams for a transfer and then impressing while out on loan so as to secure a move to a team more their level.

Whereas EPB was on a free and chose to sign with Man City...which is just dumb.

 

This whole "loan army" idea has little to do with soccer and much to do with moving money around. Those kids are used like change to complete transactions, so they are moved as collateral for other deals (that don't always have anything to do with soccer).

 

At this point I’d rather see him just land in MLS. He’s not that young anymore at 22 years of age and I’d place my bet on McKenzie having a better career than CCV.

 

1-0 win, no CCV, still 7 points from safety.

 

Ya know my heart keeps tellin' me
"C's not a kid at twenty-three"
"Ya sign too high, you just get loaned"
"Ya loan too long, you just get boned"

 

As Stoke learned, the trick is not playing him.

 

He did start a game against Cardiff City on the 8th, but that was a 0-1 home loss.

 

First game in a long time when he's getting praised by the fans.

 

1-0 final, Luton now 4 points from safety behind Stoke, who they play on the 29th.

 

We didn't miss anything TBH.