THE WAY I SEE IT ‘That desire to make sure you are the best you can be makes you a winner’

IT will be interesting to see if a loan move at Fleetwood Town can reignite Tom Edwards’ career as it has helped propel Harry Souttar into the Stoke City first team. But there are pros and cons to the loan system and, in an ideal world, I’m not sure Souttar really needed 18 months away.

If Stoke had a smaller squad, he would have been training with the first team anyway, he would have been getting experience playing against first team players and he would have had a chance to prove he was better than Ryan Shawcross, Danny Batth, James Chester and Bruno Martins Indi.

You have to ask that question – and it’s one I’d be tempted to grill Nathan Jones on again as we cross paths this weekend.

But hopefully, Michael O’neill is looking at the long-term and making the necessary adjustments to make sure that Clayton Wood isn’t absolutely overflowing with senior players.

The Covid-19 situation and Financial Fair Play do mean that there is an open window for youth to prove themselves.

And it’s on the training ground that it’s done – that’s where the manager and coaches really get a chance to assess, analyse and work. A healthy club has that.

A clear pathway gives everyone underneath something to aim for. If there’s no chance of it happening, it can destroy you.

Harry Souttar has all the attributes really. The only thing missing is experience – but the rough and tumble he’s encountered further down the league has done him good.

But I look at the point Roy Keane makes about the environment he was in. He relished a dog-eat-dog atmosphere at Man United and there’s nothing like being involved in that.

Yes, David Beckham had a loan at Preston but Ryan Giggs, Gary Neville, Phil Neville and Paul Scholes didn’t need loans. Okay, they they’re great players but it was being kept close to Sir Alex Fergu Ferguson that they learned the high standards and, “If I don’t do well, I’m out!”

Tha That threat keeps you going. That desire to make sure you are t the best you can be makes you a winner.

So good luck to Tom Edwards ( right) but, as much as he’ll be hoping to benefit from Joey Barton and Clint Hill, he’s got to look at himself as well.

I remember one away game in particular, a 1-0 win at Bristol City under Gary Rowett, when he had a real partnership with Tom Ince and kept driving forward. I thought then he had the potential to hold down that right-back spot for a long time.

But compare that to his last league game at Stoke, taken off at half-time of a 0-0 draw with Reading last December.

It was so different and negative. He was passing backwards, he’d lost that confidence in his play.

There was no drive and the crowd started to get on his back.

It’s a great shame. You have these little periods in your career that test you and you have to kick on.

You have to reach your limit of what you’ve got inside your body. Whatever level you hit from there you can be proud.

PROJECT Big Picture may have been chucked out for now but it seems like football is heading in one, miserable direction.

It is depressing to hear Premier League clubs wanting to just throw away the League Cup and its traditions but such is the lure of the Champions League and all its money. The big want to get bigger and that will leave the small getting smaller.

In time there will be a European League and then eventually there will be clubs from China, the United States and Brazil. It will be dictated by sponsors and TV revenue and a rich and powerful few getting richer and more powerful.

Why would Liverpool want to play Stoke, Fulham or Sheffield United when they can play Barcelona or a team in Asia?

You will get two different answers. One from the actual fan who loves football and one from the billionaire owner who thinks about profitability.

What a world. I followed Macclesfield when I was younger and it sickens you to see the struggles they’ve had over the past couple of years. Now they have to start again right from the bottom.

The football we love, that was set up by hard-working people who put money in and dedicated lives to it has been hijacked and I don’t think we’ll get it back.