The next thing on the agenda for young Newcastle striker Andrew Carroll is a massive test of his character, which comes to all players (and people) at some time in their young lives.
Carroll was kicked out of the England Under-19 squad last Sunday morning for failing to meet a curfew, and sent home immediately with two other players.
That means he will miss two potential caps for the England Under-21 side, but we would expect he will still be recalled for the next set of games.
Andrew Carroll – has fallen off the rails and now needs to recover – quickly
Now Andy is back at Preston, but after being sent off and missing 3 Preston games, it turns out he has lost his place on the Preston team. He wasn’t even included in the squad of 16 for Preston’s 2-1 defeat at Ipswich on October 6th, Preston’s last game.
Andy must now fight for his place with the likes of Paul Gallagher, Karl Hawley, Patrick Agyemang and Neil Mellor, and we’ll be watching closely to see how he does. No doubt Big Sam is aware of the situation, and we would have expected Sam to have been in contact with Andy over the last few days. We all know that if success comes too early to some youngsters, there is a tendency for them to get big-headed and carried away with it all, and it’s then they are in real danger of wrecking their careers. We expect Sam to steer Andrew on the right course.
But there’s not much Big Sam can do other than to keep Andy on the straight and narrow and encourage him to concentrate on his football. Carroll will report back to the Preston training ground at Springfields today with the rest of the squad, to prepare for Saturday’s important trip to Sheffield United.
Andy has yet to play really well at Deepdale, although it doesn’t help that Preston are surprisingly struggling against relegation, with just 9 points from their first 10 games, with a mere 11 goals scored in that time. They are currently 4th bottom of the league.
Preston manager Simpson has told the highly-rated youngster he will have to fight to get his place back at Preston, and we’ll have to wait and see at how Carroll handles this. We’ll be watching this situation very closely in the coming months. One thing we also have to remember is that young Andrew is still just 18 years-old and doesn’t turn 19 until January. Plenty of time for the 6’3″ youngster to get back on track and have a great career at Newcastle United. We all fall off the rails at times – but we just have to get back on – and get on with the job. We believe that’s just exactly what Andrew will do.
Comments always welcome.
9 comments so far
Bill f
Oct 17, 2007 at 11:55 AM
Comment #1Bottom line is if he is good enough he will play for England, Bentley did worse and was picked for the squad and will get a game at some point. Blimey when you see the antics of some previous players he’s done nowt by comparision.
yemozone
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:03 PM
Comment #2Dont know why it took too long.
yemozone
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:05 PM
Comment #3that was for sammy lee
leo
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:35 PM
Comment #4haha sammy has gone, hope he doesnt come to newcastle. we took alot of their coaching staff at bolton, but not sammy lee please
look at what the liverpool winger did, cant remember his name for some reason, but he nearly went to jail, and still plays every so often for england.
Dingo
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:44 PM
Comment #5its pennant leo adn he was drink drivinig and crashing
leo
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:50 PM
Comment #6exactly. wor carrol stays up late and its all arms up in the air but that little ponce drinks drives and crashes and he plays in england setup… he will be future font line for newcastle.
im afraid that preston is the wrong club for andy and should come back in january and move to a more suitable club, or work in the reserves.
Bill f
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:57 PM
Comment #7Leo I have been having just that nightmare where we did and he ended up as our Manager. Talk About cold sweats.
leo
Oct 17, 2007 at 12:58 PM
Comment #8seriously though, it wouldnt be like sam wouldnt think about it, so there is risk there, he could come in as assistant… chills me to the bone
judith
Oct 18, 2007 at 4:27 PM
Comment #9andrew time to get urself sorted ,made a daft few mistakes nowt that can be sorted ,dont throw all that hard work away we’re all hear for you ,you should know that jf