Sekou Kone

[Red00012]

He hasn’t made the matchday squad in a while , is he injured ?
It’s been one hell of a loan he’d have been better off at United

 

[limerickcitykid]

He was back in Manchester watching the u18s recently so possible the loan has been cut short.

I just don’t think he is much good. If he was English and come through since he was 10, no one would talk about him. 28 pages compared to 3 for Jacob Devaney who is frankly far better.

 

[red woppit]

Let him develop at his own pace. He may not be what we are looking for, but many good professionals do develop later, so back in the under 21's for a while, then see if another loan, probably abroad, comes along.
These lads all need to be playing football at some level.

 

[Zoid]

Why is there so much fuss about a player who will never play for the team and 10 matches?

 

[Ekeke]

I thought of that, but if the club want him to succeed as a United player, I don't see how sending him to Switzerland helps with his immersion into English/Manchester life. There's definitely a good player in there, it's annoying that neither he or Collyer have pushed on this season with the overhaul in CM approaching this summer.

I expect they're hoping he fills out more physically as he gets older and that loans like this one where its less demanding are a good step towards that. I dont think we really push midfielders from the youth teams into the first team unless they are advanced physically. Its why Mainoo went in and Dan Gore didnt when they both did well in preseason. Why Collyer has had some gametime. And why McTominay was brought through.

 

[GGMUFinest]

He was back in Manchester watching the u18s recently so possible the loan has been cut short.

I just don’t think he is much good. If he was English and come through since he was 10, no one would talk about him. 28 pages compared to 3 for Jacob Devaney who is frankly far better.

If football were as simple as that, we wouldn’t watch it. Players develop at different trajectories. You’re comparing a kid from Barnsley, which is an hour’s drive from Manchester, to a kid coming from Mali a completely different world, with different food, weather, and language.

He doesn’t have the same support systems in place, like being able to pop down the road to see his family when his confidence is low or something has upset him. Devaney has all of that. A move to Scotland wouldn’t be culturally much different for him.

Kane looked lost at Spurs before he got a run of games and scored a couple of goals. Bale was the same. Football has a multitude of late bloomers. To toss a kid aside based on very limited minutes or brief appearances is completely the wrong approach.

 

[limerickcitykid]

If football were as simple as that, we wouldn’t watch it. Players develop at different trajectories. You’re comparing a kid from Barnsley, which is an hour’s drive from Manchester, to a kid coming from Mali a completely different world, with different food, weather, and language.

He doesn’t have the same support systems in place, like being able to pop down the road to see his family when his confidence is low or something has upset him. Devaney has all of that. A move to Scotland wouldn’t be culturally much different for him.

Kane looked lost at Spurs before he got a run of games and scored a couple of goals. Bale was the same. Football has a multitude of late bloomers. To toss a kid aside based on very limited minutes or brief appearances is completely the wrong approach.

Football is that simple. Better players are better at football. Devaney is better than Kone who just isn’t that good.

Bale was a senior international and playing regularly in the Championship and then Premier League at 17. Kane dominated youth football and then had a successful loan at 17. They never looked lost and always looked significantly better than Kone who again, just isn’t much good.

You can keep making excuses and wait all you want based on the fact he is from Mali and his signing was all over the papers, but it has little relevance to his ability to play football.

 

[simonhch]

If football were as simple as that, we wouldn’t watch it. Players develop at different trajectories. You’re comparing a kid from Barnsley, which is an hour’s drive from Manchester, to a kid coming from Mali a completely different world, with different food, weather, and language.

He doesn’t have the same support systems in place, like being able to pop down the road to see his family when his confidence is low or something has upset him. Devaney has all of that. A move to Scotland wouldn’t be culturally much different for him.

Kane looked lost at Spurs before he got a run of games and scored a couple of goals. Bale was the same. Football has a multitude of late bloomers. To toss a kid aside based on very limited minutes or brief appearances is completely the wrong approach.

This is a really excellent post. You have summarised the situation, not just with Kone, but with most of our younger prospects very nicely. Fans are always looking for instant judgement on the trajectory of young players. Not least expecting it to be linear. It’s starts with the hype, and ultimate ends with the tearing apart of them. We’ve seen it with so many.

Just read the Kobbie Mainoo thread. We went from hype (when he was appearing in a Euros final at 18) of him being the next big thing, to people tearing him to shreds at 20 saying he wasn’t good enough, had never been good enough, was never going to be good enough, oh and they never rated him. Many were desperate to get rid for a half decent fee. Then Carrick restores him to the team, he generally plays well, is integral in turning around the team’s form, and suddenly he is back on top again. You barely need to have half a brain to know that at 20 and 21 a player is miles from the finished article. Especially a CM. Just look at where the likes of Modric and Scholes were in their trajectory at the same age.

We can take that entire cycle and just copy and paste for nearly any young player. People called Dorgu a waste of space, a pointless signing, utter garbage etc. Carrick comes in, he plays two games in a different position, excels, and he’s being called the new Gareth Bale. I’m not making that up, that’s in his thread. They do it without any sense of irony. Fact was Dorgu is still young, still developing, has come in from a foreign league and country to a pressure cooker, but people love extreme and snap judgements.

You can get an idea of how good a player might be as they age through the groups and work through their first 2-3 years as a senior pro, but you very often don’t get a true sense of it until they hit somewhere between 23 or 24. There are clear cases at each ends of the spectrum where you know they very obviously will or won’t make it, but those are much rarer than people think, especially when we are talking about players who have already made the cut to get this far.

There are so many players who leap forwards from 21 to 24, that you would never see coming. It used to be that 23 was still deemed young. United have established so many big players for this club at around 22-23, coming into the first team regularly for the first time. And then blossoming over the next year or two. But nowadays it seems as though if you are not tearing it up by 20, you are ready for the scrap heap. It’s a shame because players didn’t suddenly change, they still need the same time to develop. It’s just this social media, saturated coverage era where we now have every internet fan commenting on the form and quality of players aged as young as 15 or 16. It’s not healthy, and their opinions are almost always completely wrong.

 

[GGMUFinest]

Football is that simple. Better players are better at football. Devaney is better than Kone who just isn’t that good.

Bale was a senior international and playing regularly in the Championship and then Premier League at 17. Kane dominated youth football and then had a successful loan at 17. They never looked lost and always looked significantly better than Kone who again, just isn’t much good.

You can keep making excuses and wait all you want based on the fact he is from Mali and his signing was all over the papers, but it has little relevance to his ability to play football.

Football development is far more nuanced than this perspective implies. Kane, for instance, endured multiple unremarkable loan spells before ascending to elite status. Likewise, Mahrez, Kanté, Semenyo, and Eze were all disregarded at various junctures of their early careers, only to later flourish at the highest level.

You need to consider cultural and environmental obstacles confronting young players adapting to a foreign setting. Development is seldom linear. Players such as Vitinha show how a shift in environment moving on from Wolves, for example can influence performance.

Applying such a rigid assessment would have prematurely dismissed many of the aforementioned players, and risks doing the same with Koné.

 

[GGMUFinest]

This is a really excellent post. You have summarised the situation, not just with Kone, but with most of our younger prospects very nicely. Fans are always looking for instant judgement on the trajectory of young players. Not least expecting it to be linear. It’s starts with the hype, and ultimate ends with the tearing apart of them. We’ve seen it with so many.

Just read the Kobbie Mainoo thread. We went from hype (when he was appearing in a Euros final at 18) of him being the next big thing, to people tearing him to shreds at 20 saying he wasn’t good enough, had never been good enough, was never going to be good enough, oh and they never rated him. Many were desperate to get rid for a half decent fee. Then Carrick restores him to the team, he generally plays well, is integral in turning around the team’s form, and suddenly he is back on top again. You barely need to have half a brain to know that at 20 and 21 a player is miles from the finished article. Especially a CM. Just look at where the likes of Modric and Scholes were in their trajectory at the same age.

We can take that entire cycle and just copy and paste for nearly any young player. People called Dorgu a waste of space, a pointless signing, utter garbage etc. Carrick comes in, he plays two games in a different position, excels, and he’s being called the new Gareth Bale. I’m not making that up, that’s in his thread. They do it without any sense of irony. Fact was Dorgu is still young, still developing, has come in from a foreign league and country to a pressure cooker, but people love extreme and snap judgements.

You can get an idea of how good a player might be as they age through the groups and work through their first 2-3 years as a senior pro, but you very often don’t get a true sense of it until they hit somewhere between 23 or 24. There are clear cases at each ends of the spectrum where you know they very obviously will or won’t make it, but those are much rarer than people think, especially when we are talking about players who have already made the cut to get this far.

There are so many players who leap forwards from 21 to 24, that you would never see coming. It used to be that 23 was still deemed young. United have established so many big players for this club at around 22-23, coming into the first team regularly for the first time. And then blossoming over the next year or two. But nowadays it seems as though if you are not tearing it up by 20, you are ready for the scrap heap. It’s a shame because players didn’t suddenly change, they still need the same time to develop. It’s just this social media, saturated coverage era where we now have every internet fan commenting on the form and quality of players aged as young as 15 or 16. It’s not healthy, and their opinions are almost always completely wrong.

Completely agree players develop at different rates. Some grow into their bodies, others take months or years to settle into a new environment. Writing someone off early is incredibly short-sighted.

They’re not robots they’re young players, often away from home for the first time, adapting to new cultures, systems, and expectations. Confidence and comfort matter.

Fans focus on output but ignore the human side. Development is physical, tactical and psychological.

And the best managers manage people, not just tactics because none of it matters if players won’t follow you.

 

[Trigestis]

Football is that simple. Better players are better at football. Devaney is better than Kone who just isn’t that good.

Bale was a senior international and playing regularly in the Championship and then Premier League at 17. Kane dominated youth football and then had a successful loan at 17. They never looked lost and always looked significantly better than Kone who again, just isn’t much good.

You can keep making excuses and wait all you want based on the fact he is from Mali and his signing was all over the papers, but it has little relevance to his ability to play football.

And Vardy was playing for Fleetwood Town in Conference until he was 25 and led Leicester to the PL title a few years later. Drogba played for Guingamp at 24 and scored 4 goals and played another season for them before he moved to Marseille. Kanté played for Caen in Ligue 2 at 23 and Mahrez scored 4 goals for Le Havre in Ligue 2 at 22. Then you can pick however many elite talents with phenomenal technique, first touch and dribbling you want who were considerably more talented than the mentioned players that vanished into oblivion and never talked about again. Player development and football isn't that simple, no.