Football writer Seb Stafford-Bloor has opined that it will be a big mistake for Tottenham to loan out Ryan Sessegnon this summer.
The young Englishman joined Spurs from Fulham last summer and he was expected to walk straight into their first team after impressing for the Cottagers in the Championship and in the Premier League.
As Jose Mourinho targets established players in different positions in his team, the special one has been tipped to send out Sessegnon on loan to further his development in the coming campaign.
Several teams like Ajax have been linked with a move for him this summer, however, Stafford-Bloor believes it will be a big mistake for him to leave them temporarily.
He argued that players like him develop better when they are kept at the club and allowed to get used to the environment and that sending him out on loan is a sure way to ensure that he doesn’t succeed at the club.
He said to the Football Writers Podcast: “I think it’s important to understand what Sessegnon is. He’s a component within a side. He’s a very, very smart footballer, he is someone that reads the play very well, he’s someone that moves to the right positions at the right time.
“At Spurs, he’s had so little opportunity to rediscover his equilibrium. Literally, in terms of minutes on the pitch, he hasn’t had an opportunity to play consistently with the cornerstone pieces of Tottenham’s side – with [Harry] Kane, [Heung-min] Son, [Toby] Alderweireld, any of the full-backs – so he’s in this situation where without being an individualist player, it’s very difficult for someone like him whose confidence has taken a hit and whose ego has been bruised, it’s going to be very difficult for someone like him to make his case from the outside.
“The solution in this situation is always ‘well just loan them out somewhere and help him rediscover himself’. And it’s not the solution. That’s just out of sight, out of mind. If you want a player like Sessegnon to succeed at a club like Spurs, he has to stay at Spurs and you have to integrate him.
“I remember seeing him with the England age-group teams, and he’s a fantastic footballer. He’s a very impressive individual. And he will succeed if the conditions around him are adjusted to suit him and I think it would be a very serious mistake for Spurs to bounce him out because it doesn’t serve their long-term interests. It’s the fast way to ensuring that he won’t succeed at the club.”
Stafford-Bloor makes some good points but the reality is that if Sessegnon does not fit in with Mourinho’s plans then it would be far better to loan him out as opposed to him wasting away on the bench or on the fringes.