Jake Young

Absolute good fortune, RT.

but he’s not scored 20 by fluke and we’ll gladly take him back with open arms.

the fact he had a bust up with a manager no longer here rather than with teammates and fans, makes a return easier to facilitate.

 

Quite possibly. At what point in jan can we recall? 1st of the month to play on NYD?

if he plays a minute for us then it ends any talk of L1 clubs buying him, so they better be making moves now to bring him in right at the start of the window if they want him

 

We have to re call him and force Swindon's hand , this will maybe alert other clubs to his availability.
He never actually looked a world beater here, but different manager and style, who knows?
Would this push Smith down the pecking order, who looks to have found his scoring boots at last and hopefully improves with a good run in the team.
Do we take the money if available and re invest elsewhere in the team or get the lad back in the fold to see how he goes?
Interesting few weeks coming up.

 

Three options as my limited intelligence sees it.
He stays at Swindon due to them making a bid we can't refuse.
A bid comes in from another party that again can't be turned down.
He comes back to Bradford, either because the above aren't met or because Alexander sees him as part of the plans moving forward.

So boils down to either Swindon value him enough to put in a realistic bid, can't see that happening as it seems they haven't got a pot to piss in. Or someone else has been monitoring him since the goals have been going in and need a scorer to further their ambitions. Either a wealthy league 2 club or someone needing goals for a promotion push in league 1.
I'll be honest i can't see either of those scenarios happening, i think he comes back to us effectively as a new player starting from scratch, erasing his time here under Hughes.

 

Why are we forcing Swindon’s hand? They have zero options unless their benefactor shells out another large pot of money. It’s tough luck on them , no different to any loan player dealings with a Jan withdrawal clause. Wright last season a classic example. Kemp will be another!

 

We can recall from 00:01 on New Years Day, but even if we trigger it on Jan 1st he wont be playing NYD. GA will have them training to a shape and setup with a certain 11 in mind, he doesn't seem the type to throw in a player he's never seen before. And Young will likely already be down south with the Swindon squad on Jan 1st. Reckon the earliest we will see Young is the home game to Crawley on Jan 6th, coincidentally the team that Swindon are facing on NYD in what could be Youngs last game depending on when we recall.

For me, we recall Jan 1st, training on Jan 2nd there should be a meeting with Young and Alexander. Iron out everything that needs ironing out. If Young is set on his City career being over, leave him out and see who bids. Give him January to see if anyone in L1/CH is willing to play a decent 6 figure sum. If he wants to stay, I'd still hold off slightly as it seems a bit brainless to play him Jan 6th at home and narrow down the market to just Swindon for the following 3+ weeks. Even if he wants to stay, having the option of a good money offer coming in for a player who was deemed surplus to requirements 4 or 5 months back seems like smart business.

 

Is Kemp not on loan from Mk as well, if they lose both on Jan 1 st it will probably kill their season.
The owner their will need to do something, that's why i said force their hand, dig down the sofa and cough up or fall away from the playoff's. They can not be that lucky in the loan market again , come January.

 

Always the danger when loaning players is that there is a chance their good form could see them leave prematurely. Don't think Swindon or Young himself would have expected the success he's had, in hindsight had Swindon really rated him then a token gesture bid instead of a loan deal could have well seen them pick a player clearly not in the plans at Bradford at the time.

 

He can be informed before that he will be returning on the 1st, so not with the Swindon squad after the previous games.

 

I don’t think you can recall on Jan 1st. There is a specific window within January when he can be recalled - I think only a matter of a few days. You can definitely tell us you will be recalling him come what May, but the actual date won’t be the 1st.

 

It's the 1st to the 15th

 

This.^^^

 

Unless it's specified in the loan agreement, clubs can recall a player throughout the entire month according to the EFL rules for this season. I think the loaning club more often than not try to put a recall clause date in by, apparently its usually the middle Monday of January in previous seasons. But in the EFL rules, it does say a player can be recalled at any point during the window by the parent club unless an agreed date has been set. I'd imagine there is a date laid out in there. Quick google of this kind of think in the past with us, it's roughly the first 2 weeks of the Jan window, assuming both clubs have agreed to add a date.

 

Swindon play FGR at home on 29th Dec then Crawley away on NYD, yep.

I don’t know what the training schedule is for players in between Xmas and the New Year, but could we not just tell him to come back after the Forest Green game for a chat with the manager and then he trains with us before NYD?

I presume the restrictions and timings are on game time, not training ground time too?

players often return to parent club for injury treatment, can build up fitness, then come back to loan club etc?

 

I don't know why it is up for debate.

Recall him and use him. As simple as that TBH.

1) we own him
2) we pay him
3) Hughes has gone

 

Does it say a lot about our current faith in this clubs dealings, that a fair chunk of fans would snap up say £250-300K for Young? When I'd imagine a lot of other clubs would want a fair amount more.

Salford for example, they have slapped an £800K price tag on Luke Bolton after Barnsley wanted him in the summer and are expected to look again in Jan. Harrogate waited for their £500K valuation on Armstrong who isn't exactly prolific. But the comparison I find interesting this window is Ali Al-Hamadi. The Wimbledon striker is having a good season just like Young but not to the same levels, both a similar age and both expected to land into another squad at some point in January.

But Al-Hamadi isn't expected to leave Wimbledon for anything less than £1m next month. In this calendar year, he has scored 19 L2 goals and notched 6 assists from 38 games, a great return but not at the level of goals per minute that Young has accumulated. A journalist for the Mirror has said that his source (lets face it, Ali's agent) has said there is interest from Watford, Sunderland, Hull, Cardiff, Bristol City, and Stoke for the next window. Is there a reason we couldn't expect even half that? Both players have contracts expiring Summer 2025 with one year add-ons in play for both. Both players with sudden goal scoring runs after fairly shallow goal returns in their young careers before hand. If all those listed clubs are looking for an young and in-form forward, surely Jake should be also on those radars this window?

 

If ‘Eoin Doyle’ hadn’t happened, it wouldn’t even be up for debate, no.

Different manager, different set up, though. Doyle was a square peg in a round hole then but Young has played centrally in a two (apparently) so there’s good reason to justify this recall. With Doyle it was merely to save embarrassment.

Not many clubs in L2 can bring in a 20 goal striker in January so cheaply.

 

Agree, Dennis.

my worst fear is we recall him with no intention of playing him, sell him, but Rupp repays (some of) his loan with it or keeps in club to use for off-the-field costs to prevent a budget shortfall - if one is on the horizon….. then we’d neither get the chance to see him in a GA team or see any funds reinvested in the playing squad.

Maybe its just a cynical view, but it would be in line with the ‘sustainability’ mantra.