How long for? Thought he could maybe get a league 1 team.
To some degree I think for youth team players it's about getting the right club rather than necessarily the level (League 1 versus League 2 for example).
I think some people under estimate how hard it is for aa youth player to leave the relatively sanitised environment of the academy and go to play for a lower league team. The level of skill, experience and physicality is so much higher than anything they will have experienced playing a youth team game.
It's also a different dressing room environment. You are no longer the big fish in the small pond of an U18 or U23 top PL side. You are now a young pro, the least inexperienced in the dressing room, who needs to prove themselves to seasoned professionals. Some of which know they, and the club they play for, need to perform because their livelihoods depend on it so a certain degree. That adds a lot of pressure for a young player to quite quickly adjust to a different level and different type of football. There's no long settling in period. You need to perform straight away or you are out the team. We've seen a fair few of our prospects fall foul of this in previous seasons despite being talented players.
For Balagizi it's a big test going to Crawley. If he's likely to be Liverpool level then he needs to go there, play regularly and impact in a big way. That's harder said than done even at League 2 level for a relatively high level prospect. For me, any player still in their teens who can do that has a chance.
It's why the likes of Elliott at Blackburn is so impressive as a 17 year old. Same with Carvalho at Fulham. Players who can shine at Championship level at 17 and 18 despite their likely physical disadvantage are pretty much nailed on to be PL footballers if they keep working hard and don't get injured. The Q then becomes where about in the PL they can play regularly.
For 99% of players at PL academies, the question when they are 17-19 is whether they'll earn a living in professional football as a player at any level. Let's be honest, that's the question for the vast majority of our youth team players. It's not really 'will they make it at Liverpool?' It's more 'will they still be playing professionally in 5 years? 10years?'. As talented as he is, Balagizi is more in that 2nd category rather than the 1st at this point. A really successful spell at Crawley probably opens up the possibility of Liverpool games
in the future and potentially makes the question about whether he'll make it at Liverpool more pertinent.
