Some of Manchester United’s January loanees have struggled to make the impact they would have dreamt before leaving.
Louis Jackson is yet to get called to Tranmere’s matchday squad, while Sam Mather has only managed to get onto the bench. Elsewhere, Ethan Williams is struggling for minutes at Cheltenham.
Ethan Wheatley, meanwhile, has been absent from Walsall’s past two games – elsewhere the Dan Gore situation is one which has caught many fans’ attention.
After an eye-catching debut from Gore, his absence last weekend for Rotherham was baffling – until the manager Steve Evans’ bizarre outburst on Gore’s injury.
“He worked for two days in the team and went home from training on Friday feeling good. I got a call from the medical staff to say that he’d woken up with his foot really sore.
“It’s unbelievable. We didn’t do enough in training for him to have a sore nose let alone a sore foot. Until I hear more from the medical staff as to how it’s happened and why it’s happened then it’s … maybe God will tell me when I go to sleep tonight.”
Now further light has been cast on the situation…
Rotherham United manager Steve Evans looks on during the Sky Bet League One match between Rotherham United FC and Northampton Town FC at Aesseal Ne...
Photo by Pete Norton/Getty Images
Gore had a similar start to life with Port Vale on loan last season – when he made one appearance before spending the rest of his time there injured.
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However, it emerged on Tuesday that Gore was in fact injured with a foot injury that requires specialist attention.
Now, Evans has been speaking again, this time explaining the situation and back-tracking over these comments, as quoted by the Rotherham Advertiser.
“I was frustrated at the weekend,” he said. “We’d worked on the team for two days before Shrewsbury and it changed at 9 am on Saturday morning.
“The kid trained really well and didn’t feel a thing. He was going to play a big part for us and then, after he’d gone home, he spoke to the head of medical and said he was feeling his foot.
“That was at about 6.30/7 o’clock on Friday evening. Quite rightly, he gets medication prescribed, it gets delivered to him and he takes it. But he wakes up in the morning and his foot is more sore.
“That’s why he’s seeing someone. Nobody is more devastated than me. I worked really hard to get him here. He had three clubs above us in League One who wanted but he chose us because of the football I convinced him he would get.”
Manchester United will be confident Gore can make success of Rotherham loan
Just a few days ago, it sounded like Manchester United had sent Gore on yet another poorly decided loan.
However, the comments from Evans over the weekend seem to have come in haste as he quite clearly regrets them.
Therefore, United will still have hope that this loan will turn into a success for the 20-year-old midfielder.
Gore needs to get fit again, and hopefully, he will manage this in the next month, giving himself a good two months at least to play football before hopefully securing himself a better loan for next season.
The talented midfielder is running out of time with his United contract expiring in 2026 – so United will be closely evaluating what they want to do with him this summer.