WHAT’S NEXT FOR WILSON?

REWIND back to the start of the season and the day it was announced Cardiff City had signed Liverpool attacker Harry Wilson on loan for the season.

There was widespread euphoria among supporters of Wales’ capital city club, a genuine excitement this was the signing which was going to kick-start City’s season into action and get them motoring up towards promotion contention.

It hasn’t worked out like that, of course.

Wilson’s season, by most players’ standards, has been decent. He has contributed a sizeable 12 assists, although his goal tally of only four might leave a tinge of disappointment.

The truth is, so much was expected of him. Lest we forget, this was a 23-year-old with just one season of Premier League experience. The fact a mooted £20m price tag was dangling over his head last summer really didn’t help lower that expectation, either.

But with five games left to play in the season, his future is uncertain. So, too, is Cardiff’s plan to replace a player of his class.

Here, we look at his season with Cardiff City, what happens next for him and how the Bluebirds go about filling the sizeable void next term...

A wasted opportunity?

For all of the above, there is the lingering school of thought that Cardiff might have just wasted a huge opportunity to eke the best out of Wilson.

Although he is still relatively inexperienced and young, there was reason for the excitement which was stirred when he signed on the dotted line back in October.

This was a sign that Neil Harris was destined to make the transition into a new style of football, one which championed quick, meaningful passing and slick interplay. Harris had tried to implement it early on in the season, but the quality from the middle of the pitch was lacking and possession was conceded far too charitably.

But there was a hope Wilson would give this new style of play a real shot in the arm and help to not only lift Cardiff’s wobbly early-season form, but become the beating soul of this evolved brand of football. Indeed, the thought of him and Lee Tomlin playing in behind Kieffer Moore was a mouthwatering prospect and one which really got fans excited. Sadly, it never happened. Despite a bright enough start from Wilson himself, Harris’ new system just wasn’t working and it reached breaking point on a sad evening when Cardiff slumped to a 1-0 defeat by Coventry.

That sparked a change of system. Cardiff went two up front and started to play long balls down the channel or directly into Kieffer Moore and Wilson’s influence diminished, despite results subsequently picking up, albeit for a brief period.

When Mick McCarthy took over, Wilson was dropped for the first game and has played 90 minutes on just three occasions in that time. It’s fair to say he doesn’t hold the status now he did under Harris.

Under McCarthy we have seen an even more direct style of play. Three centre backs often bypassing the midfield and hitting it straight up to the target man. It has left little to no scope for Wilson to work his class, although he remains lethal at the set piece in terms of his crosses - his free-kicks at goal have been disappointing.

Given Wilson’s sheer class, he crow-barred his way into games even when the system didn’t necessarily facilitate it. He registered five assists and a goal in his first seven outings under McCarthy.

It has been a decent enough season, even better when you think Cardiff’s style has been disadvantageous to him. There are always some who will be left underwhelmed, though.

And what next?

Here is where it gets a little tricky.

It is broadly accepted that the Bluebirds’ play-off race is now over. They have fallen short, despite a valiant effort, and have little else to play for in these final five games.

As such, it has seen calls for Cardiff not to play Wilson, or indeed fellow loanees Sheyi Ojo or Jordi Osei-Tutu, in their final fixtures, instead the club are being urged to blood the youngsters and test them out in order to see what they are working with next season.

It is a rational thought process and McCarthy has hinted that he now has an eye on next season.

In fact, after the draw with

Blackburn last weekend, McCarthy seemed to confirm that all three loan stars would be returning to their clubs and not coming back to the Welsh capital this summer.

“I’ve been here nearly two months so you’re always evaluating it and calculating what you need, what’s not going to be here,” he said.

“We’ve got players on loan who are very unlikely they’ll be coming back and we will be losing a bit of quality there.

“The next five games, we want to win them and get points, but we will have an eye on what’s been happening next season.”

Judging by those comments, it seems McCarthy will likely turn to within to see the tools he has at his disposal for next season, but more on that later.

For Wilson, at the one end of the spectrum at least, it might well spell the end of his City career, if McCarthy does decide to make wholesale changes and completely chop it up for the last few matches.

There have been countless reports that Wilson and Ojo are among a handful of young players Liverpool are looking to off-load this summer in order to drum up some cash to bolster their squad for a Premier League title charge next term.

In truth, Wilson is a Premier League player. You plonk him into any of