i think that amount of matches for a kid his age is a good return.
Being left out and fighting your way back into the side is all part of life of a footballer isn’t it ? This experience may stand him in good stead if it happens later in his career.
This. Having to fight to get his place back won’t do him any harm at all.
It was not my intention to point the finger at anyone at Charlton regarding this issue, to indicate that our club had managed this poorly or that we should seek a positive resolution.
It appears that this is the way that a season long loan works - end of.
And will continue in this manner until the season ends.
But I was commenting on the total volte face once the Cowleys arrived. A virtually ever present player (and EFL L1Apprentice of the year 2023) was seemngly sidelined and until recently, I had assumed that he had suffered a significant injury.
However, I believe that Steve Avory clarified the situation when at the Bromley Addicks Q & A , stating that Zach has been a casualty of the increased number of loanees recruited in the January window & the limit of such players allowed in the matchday squad.
Should Zach's absence be due to a downturn in his performance, then it would be understandable but looking at the stats, I think the U's victories have halved since he's been sidelined.....
As CE posted, I understand that Steve Avory is in regular touch with Zach and we can but hope that this experience will only increase his determination to show Nathan his obvious qualities once pre season arrives.
It an example of how managerial instability impacts players.
In this case it was a loan but it could just have easily been a permanant.
ZM was loaned out by Holden to Garner.
Appleton wouldnt have seen him at all so would be unlikely to recall him but even if he'd wanted to he was himself sacked and replaced by Jones, who also has probably never seen Zach play.
Meanwhile, Garner was sacked. His replacement, Etherington, played Zach but Cowley, his 6th manager of the season, has dropped him.
Not great for Mitchell but not surprising he's not everyone's choice though no fault of his own.
I struggle to see a downside in terms of gaining insight and experience for Zach in this loan. Even a spell being dropped after a decent run of games can be learned from. I also caution against people seeing a promising player like Zach as being the immediate answer to all our problems. Let the development continue steadily is what I would be looking for.
Zach hasn't kicked a ball for anyone for 16 weeks now. He was totally left out of the matchday squad for half a dozen games because Colchester's new manager brought in another four of his own loanees and Zach was the fall guy as a result. He then sustained a hamstring injury possibly because he hadn't really had to use it in anger prior to pulling it!
A real waste of a 19 year old's development in us committing him to a whole season at Colchester when the chances are that no two managers will have the same view about their squad. The average number of managerial changes in League 2 for the last 20 years is 23. For a struggling team such as Colchester (currently 22nd having been 20th last season) the likelihood was always a lot higher - they've now had three managers this season. There is also no evidence whatsoever to suggest that Cowley would have brought him back into the fold had he not been injured in what is still a relegation battle.
I might be wrong but I think Zach only has one year left on his contract and if that is the case I really do hope that he can be persuaded to sign an extension. Let's not forget that he was captain of the U21s at the age of 17 and you don't get to do that if you don't have something about you. Can only imagine the outcry on here if Millwall comes knocking and he opts to join his brother!
Disappointing end to his loan spell much like Watson with us. He will hopefully have learnt a lot anyway and use the disappointment as a motivation. I rate him highly, his lack of pace is his one weakness.but his reading of the games looks top class. Like you say, I hope he signs an extension. No reason why he wouldn't as we have given him opportunities and he isn't yet sufficiently proven to command big wages elsewhere you would think.
I think most Lifers will know how how highly I regard Zach having followed his progress over the past couple of years. Whenever I've watched him play, his skills are abundantly clear with his composure on the ball very impressive. Rarely making a rash tackle, rarely booked & a supreme example of a young professional who has flourished through our much envied Academy .
To effectively lose a whole season at this stage in his career could be critical.
And, together with the inevitable effect of lack of minutes on the pitch /match fitness, the issue of Zach's mental health should not be dismissed.
I am 100% certain that his family will have had a huge part to play during this miserable saga & that his strength of character, evident in his game, will have helped him survive his time in Essex....But to expect this 19 year old to shrug off the past 9 months & return to "the fold" seamlessly, must be in doubt, however level headed a young man he is.
I fervently hope that both Steve Avory & Nathan Jones ensure that his "rehabilitation" is prioritised and that he is assured that his future remains at our club, where he has developed since he was 7 years old. Loyalty works both ways.....and as AA pointed out, other clubs will have been aware of this young player's attributes, especially our neighbours where his brother successfully plys his trade.
L1 Apprentice of the Year 2022-23, lest we forget.
There have been instances at Charlton when loanees have featured in matches, seemingly regardless of their form & when permanent team mates would be expected to play instead. Fans have muttered amongst themselves whether there is something in the loan agreement that ensures said player features in x number of matches whilst with us....Is this not something that should be included whenever one of ours is loaned to another club ? I'm sure that Zach would have shown Cowley what he has to offer should he have been given the chance.
I'd urge fellow Lifers to keep a close eye on this situation & to lend your support both on here and when Zach is involved in matches.
He deserves nothing less.
To lose a young player of his calibre at this stage would be senseless.
Except he has played 29 games this season. Taking part in every league game until mid January. That is way more than most 19 year old CBs will have played and so this is a very successful season for him and one he should be proud of. Having played that often he almost certainly would have hit any requirement for minutes if there had been any.
Adding that sort of requirement would also likely see loan opportunities reduce which has an affect on players careers too (ie you force a minimum number of minutes into a contract and you likely push your players to lesser teams more prepared to take the risk...).
The fact a new manager came in with a different football ethos that Zach didn't fit into would no doubt have disappointed him; but as long as the Cowley's have been good to him and treated him the right way then there is no reason to be upset with them and Zach can chalk the second part of the season down to experience. Being told you are not "route one enough" for a Cowley team shouldn't dent his confidence!
Very few football careers are a totally smooth run; footballers need mental resilience and I suspect Zach will have tougher times in his career than this unless he is very lucky.
As AA says above, the learn from all this is that a recall clause would have been wise, albeit given he played every game upto and including 17th Jan I am not sure we would have had the foresight to action it anyway.
He will not even be 20 years old until the ninth of January next year. So barely 19. I really hope people contemplate that, if only realising that males of that age are still developing physically. His family footballing background, and the fact that he has been at our academy are big pluses, however a string of league football appearances when still only 18 will also be a very significant factor in his development, and he has already had more than one manager/coach to learn from. Two notions to be cautious about, one is the idea some have that goes ‘if he is any good he should already be playing for the first team’ and ‘if he isn’t playing for our first team already he can’t be any good’. My thoughts are that this season has been a positive one for Zach looking at it overall, my worry is that his remaining contract is so short. I don’t want to watch this good young player making those trademark forward runs in a shirt of another colour.
Zach will have learnt an awful lot from this season. I've always thought that centre backs mature later than other positions anyway, as the position replies on strength and nous.
With his ball skills, he can definitely do a job in midfield
Maybe my heart has ruled my head to some degree but I would be interested to learn how the Cowleys dealt with Zach when they arrived and his situation at Colchester completely changed.
Maybe not the loss of a whole season but unless his injury impacted substantially on the 2nd half, I trust Zach was fully included as a squad member albeit not a 1st team player.
When I have seen him play he has been logged in the got something about him part of my brain. This experience won't necessarily do in too much harm, and far better than a bad injury. This is of course a crucial part of his career and I wish him the best with it.
I'm sorry if I've missed this being mentioned elsewhere but what is the point of Zach being at Colchester if he's not being used - he's not been in Colchester's squad since 13th January and missed the last six games because they have too many on loan - he might just as well come back and play for our U23s and train under Jones' guidance given that he might well be needed for us next season.
We cant recall him though can we... Could only do that in January
Depends even if we even had the option to recall him in the loan agreement.
That might well be the case - if Cowley has no intention of playing him, though, I'm not sure whether he couldn't still play for our U23s and/or train with us. We have seen that happen with players sent to Non League clubs but that might be the difference. Whatever the situation, I think that we should think carefully before sending another player to Colchester and/or a team under Cowley's management. The kid has been sent to learn by playing games not to sit in the stand watching.
"think that we should think carefully before sending another player to Colchester and/or a team under Cowley's management. The kid has been sent to learn by playing games not to sit in the stand watching."
This seems to be exactly what a vengeful Man Citeh have done - sent us Fiorini to punish us for not playing Tedic, and ultimately Charltonising him so much they almost immediately sent him back to his first club on a free...
On Mitchell, surely it should be about how much he has learnt and developed over the season rather than just the last few months.
Steve Avory is aware and said that Zak had rung him when he was first dropped to discuss the situation as he'd never been dropped before and wanted to know how to deal with it.
It's not ideal but we've not played loan players plenty of times and still are.
On Fiorini, it seems to have become accepted fact that Man City forced us to take a dud as some sort of punishment/revenge for sending back Tedic but isn't it as likely that Appleton and/or Scott wanted Fiorini, maybe as a replacement for Tedic or maybe just because they rated him, as he'd been as success under MA previously. MA certainly talked him up as a great signing at the time.
Turns out he is actually a worse signing that Tedic but our use of the loan market has been pretty poor under Scott regardless.
Subjective comment as I have not looked back, but it feels like our use of the loan market since the golden season of 2018/19 has been pretty poor. Gallagher in 2020 was obviously a star but otherwise more duds than successes!!
Definitely more misses than hits, but I think that is partly the nature of loans - low risk as you are not buying the player, and some are in as cover rather than for the First XI.
20-21 Millar, Maatsen and Shinnie were all decent 21-22 Famewo and Lee were pretty good (certainly initially dropped off towards the end) 22-23 Rak-Sakyi was one of the best we've had in recent times and Sessegnon was competitive
This year there haven't really been any stand outs.
Doesnt overly bother me to be honest... I prefer it that the likes of Bakinson | Watson | Ladapo are around IF we need them, rather than relying on them.
Nothing more irritating than trying to plan for the next season, knowing there is a strong chance we'll be without our best player(s) before the previous season has even ended.
Agree, Loans should be useful support rather than being our out and out best players. If they earn their place as a starter every week, great but I don't want 5 guaranteed starter loanees, it hinders us growing a strong side that can progress together...
Talk of loans makes me think they have to be much better that our academy players (like Zach) waiting in the wings, or why not have a peep at our own in the first team?
Not based on anything but I’m expecting Zach to be in and around the first team during preseason along with a few other academy players. They’ll then make a call whether to keep him as part of the squad or attempt to loan him out.
It’ll be interesting to see which academy players they promote as there’s no doubt they will, even if only one or two. I look forward to the annual debates about whether the players are ready, overhyped, under too much pressure etc 🙂
The young players who I think will be the least nervous are Bower, Kedwell, Mitchell, Enslin, Fullah and M'Bick. Casey I think is in a zone of his own. I think other players if around the first team will have more of a psychological battle. One difficult to assess future wise is Adigun.
The young players who I think will be the least nervous are Bower, Kedwell, Mitchell, Enslin, Fullah and M'Bick. Casey I think is in a zone of his own. I think other players if around the first team will have more of a psychological battle. One difficult to assess future wise is Adigun.
Adigun’s 21 in December, running out of time if he wants to stay here long term. Could be like Thomas, someone who works his way up the leagues. He’s on loan at Welling which might help him win a deal at that level if we release him.
The young players who I think will be the least nervous are Bower, Kedwell, Mitchell, Enslin, Fullah and M'Bick. Casey I think is in a zone of his own. I think other players if around the first team will have more of a psychological battle. One difficult to assess future wise is Adigun.
Adigun’s 21 in December, running out of time if he wants to stay here long term. Could be like Thomas, someone who works his way up the leagues. He’s on loan at Welling which might help him win a deal at that level if we release him.
Zach is still very highly though or around the club and it’s not impossible he will be in the first team next season. He is that good!
Thanks for your backing, Swisdom.
Fair bit of support from those of us who've watched him play regularly.
Honestly he’s stood out since the first time I saw him. I spent an evening raving about him at a game in Dartford and it turns out I was sat behind his mother who had heard it all. He always looks so assured on the ball and I understand he was originally a midfielder and may end up back with there at some point.
Comments
It appears that this is the way that a season long loan works - end of.
And will continue in this manner until the season ends.
But I was commenting on the total volte face once the Cowleys arrived. A virtually ever present player (and EFL L1Apprentice of the year 2023) was seemngly sidelined and until recently, I had assumed that he had suffered a significant injury.
However, I believe that Steve Avory clarified the situation when at the Bromley Addicks Q & A , stating that Zach has been a casualty of the increased number of loanees recruited in the January window & the limit of such players allowed in the matchday squad.
Should Zach's absence be due to a downturn in his performance, then it would be understandable but looking at the stats, I think the U's victories have halved since he's been sidelined.....
As CE posted, I understand that Steve Avory is in regular touch with Zach and we can but hope that this experience will only increase his determination to show Nathan his obvious qualities once pre season arrives.
In this case it was a loan but it could just have easily been a permanant.
ZM was loaned out by Holden to Garner.
Appleton wouldnt have seen him at all so would be unlikely to recall him but even if he'd wanted to he was himself sacked and replaced by Jones, who also has probably never seen Zach play.
Meanwhile, Garner was sacked. His replacement, Etherington, played Zach but Cowley, his 6th manager of the season, has dropped him.
Not great for Mitchell but not surprising he's not everyone's choice though no fault of his own.
If Zach is a casualty of that, well .... that's football. Valuable experience too and he should be able to learn from it.
Young development age players are loaned to clubs in order to toughen up, grow and mature into the game.
I also caution against people seeing a promising player like Zach as being the immediate answer to all our problems.
Let the development continue steadily is what I would be looking for.
A real waste of a 19 year old's development in us committing him to a whole season at Colchester when the chances are that no two managers will have the same view about their squad. The average number of managerial changes in League 2 for the last 20 years is 23. For a struggling team such as Colchester (currently 22nd having been 20th last season) the likelihood was always a lot higher - they've now had three managers this season. There is also no evidence whatsoever to suggest that Cowley would have brought him back into the fold had he not been injured in what is still a relegation battle.
I might be wrong but I think Zach only has one year left on his contract and if that is the case I really do hope that he can be persuaded to sign an extension. Let's not forget that he was captain of the U21s at the age of 17 and you don't get to do that if you don't have something about you. Can only imagine the outcry on here if Millwall comes knocking and he opts to join his brother!
He will hopefully have learnt a lot anyway and use the disappointment as a motivation.
I rate him highly, his lack of pace is his one weakness.but his reading of the games looks top class.
Like you say, I hope he signs an extension. No reason why he wouldn't as we have given him opportunities and he isn't yet sufficiently proven to command big wages elsewhere you would think.
To effectively lose a whole season at this stage in his career could be critical.
And, together with the inevitable effect of lack of minutes on the pitch /match fitness, the issue of Zach's mental health should not be dismissed.
I am 100% certain that his family will have had a huge part to play during this miserable saga & that his strength of character, evident in his game, will have helped him survive his time in Essex....But to expect this 19 year old to shrug off the past 9 months & return to "the fold" seamlessly, must be in doubt, however level headed a young man he is.
I fervently hope that both Steve Avory & Nathan Jones ensure that his "rehabilitation" is prioritised and that he is assured that his future remains at our club, where he has developed since he was 7 years old. Loyalty works both ways.....and as AA pointed out, other clubs will have been aware of this young player's attributes, especially our neighbours where his brother successfully plys his trade.
L1 Apprentice of the Year 2022-23, lest we forget.
There have been instances at Charlton when loanees have featured in matches, seemingly regardless of their form & when permanent team mates would be expected to play instead. Fans have muttered amongst themselves whether there is something in the loan agreement that ensures said player features in x number of matches whilst with us....Is this not something that should be included whenever one of ours is loaned to another club ? I'm sure that Zach would have shown Cowley what he has to offer should he have been given the chance.
I'd urge fellow Lifers to keep a close eye on this situation & to lend your support both on here and when Zach is involved in matches.
He deserves nothing less.
To lose a young player of his calibre at this stage would be senseless.
Adding that sort of requirement would also likely see loan opportunities reduce which has an affect on players careers too (ie you force a minimum number of minutes into a contract and you likely push your players to lesser teams more prepared to take the risk...).
The fact a new manager came in with a different football ethos that Zach didn't fit into would no doubt have disappointed him; but as long as the Cowley's have been good to him and treated him the right way then there is no reason to be upset with them and Zach can chalk the second part of the season down to experience. Being told you are not "route one enough" for a Cowley team shouldn't dent his confidence!
Very few football careers are a totally smooth run; footballers need mental resilience and I suspect Zach will have tougher times in his career than this unless he is very lucky.
As AA says above, the learn from all this is that a recall clause would have been wise, albeit given he played every game upto and including 17th Jan I am not sure we would have had the foresight to action it anyway.
So barely 19.
I really hope people contemplate that, if only realising that males of that age are still developing physically.
His family footballing background, and the fact that he has been at our academy are big pluses, however a string of league football appearances when still only 18 will also be a very significant factor in his development, and he has already had more than one manager/coach to learn from.
Two notions to be cautious about, one is the idea some have that goes ‘if he is any good he should already be playing for the first team’ and ‘if he isn’t playing for our first team already he can’t be any good’.
My thoughts are that this season has been a positive one for Zach looking at it overall, my worry is that his remaining contract is so short.
I don’t want to watch this good young player making those trademark forward runs in a shirt of another colour.
With his ball skills, he can definitely do a job in midfield
Maybe my heart has ruled my head to some degree but I would be interested to learn how the Cowleys dealt with Zach when they arrived and his situation at Colchester completely changed.
Maybe not the loss of a whole season but unless his injury impacted substantially on the 2nd half, I trust Zach was fully included as a squad member albeit not a 1st team player.
Guess we'll have to wait & see...
...but in SA & NJ, I trust.
I'd want him around for pre-season as a minimum and depends how he goes as whether we send him out on loan or not.
Casey I think is in a zone of his own.
I think other players if around the first team will have more of a psychological battle.
One difficult to assess future wise is Adigun.
Fair bit of support from those of us who've watched him play regularly.
Have to agree that he's impressed us from the first time we saw him play too.