Hylton contract extended
I am sure at the wish of Nathan Jones the club has re-directed part of Andy Scott’s salary to extend Danny Hylton’s player coach contract.
35-year old Hylton has rarely featured for the first team, but has been playing a role on the training ground working with the team’s strikers and in particular the youngsters of which there are many.
Hylton has spent 20 years in the game, and has played from The Championship to the Conference and his guidance and mentorship is obviously valued by Jones.
It takes more than a team, and if Hylton can provide that extra 5% as we move into the final months of the season, then all good.
He does come across well in the video within the announcement.
A positive appointment and Danny will be an asset to the coaching staff 👍
The player bit of the player-coach role is a bit intriguing. I presume it means that he may be needed at some point over the next few months and with a small squad which includes the injury prone Chuks then it makes sense to keep our options open. I suspect though it means if he jumps ship we stand to get a bit more compensation for him than we would for a plain old coach.
We have some talented players coming through but making the jump from being an Academy player to the first team squad and then to being a first team regular seems to becoming progressively harder to achieve. Of our Academy graduates only TC has been a regular/first choice starter this season, others have had their chances and are involved in match day squads but just one regular suggests that the leap is too much for some players. What has happened to Micah Mbick or Patrick Casey for example – they should be pushing for some game time but can’t even get on the bench. Either they aren’t good enough or they just don’t have the skills to survive in pro football. If they can learn these off Danny Hylton then good.
SP — That’s a really good point. I took a look a while back at some of the most recent new academy hopefuls we had knocking on the door of the first team – most are now in non-league or Scotland’s lower divisions. We have a habit of turning up a star every couple of years, but the gulf is large between U21 level and making it as a pro. Despite our much lauded academy, and it should be lauded, I think the years of being at L1 level will also take a toll on players being attracted to the academy.
Well it doesn’t appear he’s been able to help Ahadme in any way, as he still continued to run around like a headless chicken from player to player without hardly touching the ball and rarely had any effort on goal and after finally being dropped has not been seen since!! 🙂
Yes, indeed about Ahadme and the name suits him and those 2 strikers who have been scoring goals for fun have been injured and well Dixon looks like next season.