Albion line up Latvian for development squad

3:47pm Friday 4th January 2013 in Sport By Andy Naylor

 Albion have lined up a young Latvian international as part of the process of closing the gap in quality between the development squad and first team.


  Vitalijs Maksimenko, a Latvian under 21 centre half, is poised to join the development group from Skonto Riga after training with the Seagulls.


  Boss Gus Poyet told The Argus: "From what I have seen he is a very good player who can improve with us but he needs to get used to the strength and power of English football."


  Poyet is concerned Albion do not have enough development players capable of stepping up into the first team following the departures of prospects such as Grant Hall to Spurs and Steve Cook to Bournemouth.

Comments(5)

VegasSeagull says...
4:23pm Fri 4 Jan 13

Ok so now I take a step back. This article is telling us that the Latvian lad is not a starter, now I am not saying that that is bad, but I had hoped we were thinking more of an instant role for him.

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Tommy11 says...
4:28pm Fri 4 Jan 13

VegasSeagull wrote:
Ok so now I take a step back. This article is telling us that the Latvian lad is not a starter, now I am not saying that that is bad, but I had hoped we were thinking more of an instant role for him.
I agree Vegas....from what Sky Sports were saying, I thought the lad was the business. Also I thought he was 22 and a left sided midfielder/ defender.....

Is this the same guy??

Development is important... but we need now now now...

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VegasSeagull says...
4:34pm Fri 4 Jan 13

Tommy11 wrote:
VegasSeagull wrote: Ok so now I take a step back. This article is telling us that the Latvian lad is not a starter, now I am not saying that that is bad, but I had hoped we were thinking more of an instant role for him.
I agree Vegas....from what Sky Sports were saying, I thought the lad was the business. Also I thought he was 22 and a left sided midfielder/ defender..... Is this the same guy?? Development is important... but we need now now now...
Well it looks like Dunk is on the move so maybe the lad will get his chance to show what he has.

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Jonathan Mouette says...
5:04pm Fri 4 Jan 13

So what we are saying is that Dunk hasn't in fact developed at all - not since Arsenal and c° were sniffing around last year... quite the opposite in fact. So we now off-load to Bristol City at a knock down price and bring in the Latvian guy... Der! I agree with the posts above; I thought we were shopping for now, not later. If Dunk leaves covers his place, given our incredible record for leaving the development squad developing somewhere in Lancing... Nevertheless the window has only just opened and there may be other movements before it closes again. Fingers crossed that something a tad more exciting happens soon.

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VegasSeagull says...
8:01pm Fri 4 Jan 13

Johnathan, I think the pros and cons of the Latvian lad compared to Dunk comes down to a few things.

Is one better than the other right now.
Does one appear to be progressing quicker than the other.
Is one more versatile than the other.

Obviously Gus knows Dunk inside out and I have to think that he also knows a lot about Maksimenko, this is not last minute signing.

I refuse to believe that Gus is bringing in a lad that is not better than the one he will replace, why would he.

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