DON’T BLAME STARLETS FOR WANTING TO CASH IN

IT’S easy to criticise young players for chasing big-money moves, especially when they end up festering on a Premier League bench.

But the sad decline of Miles Addison provides a compelling counter-argument.

It is now nine years since Addison made his debut for Derby, a 17-year-old kid barely out of school but already sporting the build of a heavyweight boxer.

By 19, he was wearing the captain’s armband, playing for England Under-21s and drawing Premier League scouts to Pride Park. Stoke even offered to stump up £2m.

“He’s massive, he’s strong, he’s a workaholic in training,” said then-Rams boss Paul Jewell, who rejected the bid.“Now he’s showing he can score goals. He’s been a light in a dark tunnel and he’s got a great future.”

Yet today, Addison is unemployed, released by Premier League-bound Bournemouth, his career wrecked by perpetual foot injuries that even surgery couldn’t fix.

Not once in the last seven years has the 26-year-old made it through a season without some ailment laying him low, the latest a knee injury while on loan at Blackpool.

Now a man once hailed as England class is struggling simply to make a living from the game.

“If I can stay fit, I know I am more than capable of playing in League One,” he said.“That is where I want to be. But I know it will be hard. People are waiting to hear about another Miles Addison injury and when you look back at my career I cannot blame them.”