· December 23 2024, 20:00
Sometimes a club will sell a player on believing that they aren't going to hit the required standard and later look back in regret. Newcastle United, this summer, sold a player they knew was going to be fantastic and have to learn to live with that.
e moved to Nottingham Forest in the summer with Odysseas Vlachodimos coming the other way as the two clubs fought to comply with the Premier League's much-maligned Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR).
Nobody at Newcastle wanted Anderson to leave. The player himself didn't want to leave, but the ridiculously outdated and anti-competition rules deemed it necessary as the Magpies struggled to find serious buyers for any of the players they were willing to lose.
Now, former Manchester City star Shaun Wright-Phillips has spoken of his disbelief that Newcastle allowed the sale to happen.
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It still feels wrong seeing him in red
Shaun Wright-Phillips believes Elliot Anderson has what it takes to be a 'special player'
Shaun Wright-Phillips was speaking to SportsCasting (via Newcastle World) where he spoke about watching Elliot Anderson in action.
"Elliot Anderson at Nottingham Forest is the one player that I’m really excited to watch over the coming years. I watched him, Gibbs-White was suspended, he played in the game and he was unbelievable. I couldn’t believe Newcastle let him go. Of course, they most probably had to, but I mean, he is one player that you should try to keep your hands on and fight for.
“I think he's going to be such a special player. When I watched the game at the weekend (last weekend) against Villa, Anderson looks like he just enjoys going past people or trying to force the issue. I think in today's football, we’re missing players like him.
“A lot of teams have sequences and patterns of play but he grabs the bull by the horns in many ways and says, ‘I don't want to pass through, I'm going to get past you’. He is quite nice to watch. It's refreshing to see a player take the initiative like that.”
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Elliot Anderson likely wouldn't feature as much for Newcastle as he does for Forest
In an ideal world, Anderson would still be a Newcastle player, but the reality is still that he wouldn't be getting half as many minutes at Newcastle as he is at Nottingham Forest.
Now that Bruno Guimaraes and Sandro Tonali are gelling so well together, that only leaves one open midfield spot which is almost always going to be filled by Joelinton, but Newcastle still have Joe Willock, Sean Longstaff and Lewis Miley competing for that spot too.
Anderson's other comfortable position is left-wing, which again, is over-subscribed really, so as painful as it was to watch one of our brightest prospects go, it was a necessary evil, and ultimately one that didn't damage us too much.