Harrison Armstrong captains England U19s to victory over Ukraine

We need to retain him and develop more young players like him.

Remember a summer or two ago, Man City were supposedly trying to get him for £10M or something?

With Armstrong's development in mind there would be no need to step into the market.

Ultimately he has to earn his place in our team; he does that by improving his game to a level matching or beyond James Garner or Merlin Rohl. It's very hard to make that improvement if you're not playing regular minutes and so ironically his best chance of playing for us is to leave us, temporarily at least. He has the opportunity to establish himself as one of the best midfielders in the Championship and if he can do that then he gives himself a shot of starting for Everton next season.

Whatever Heckingbottom's thinking, PNE looks an opportunity for Harrison to work his way into some serious minutes. 3,000 shouldn't be too much across the 42 games still to go.

Moyes would rather blow £Millions on foreign unknowns than give a 'homegrown' the chance to do 'a Colin Harvey'!

He's not quite ready for the Premier League, like Branthwaite before him. He needs games to finish his education.

And I don't think the U21s have anything on the slate for next week either.

Why should he not play minutes for us?

Last season and since the start for us he already looks like he will hold his own and you could argue he is the most complete of all our midfielders in terms of his attributes.

Even forgetting his talent, look at his competition. If he were competing with Pickford, Grealish, Branthwaite or Ndiaye you could understand if he went to Germany for a season.

But in midfield we have many doubts.

Gana is the only cert but at his age his decline will be instant as he relies on energy. That could in 3 months time or 3 years,

KDH is not good enough defensively

Garner is not that much superior to him now and will be needed this season and especially in the short term as our 2nd choice full back on both sides.

Rohl could be hit or miss and few Bundesliga signings tear it up straight away. Indeed he wasn't always a regular for Freiberg.

Tim is in the the same boat as Harrison.

There is a free spot to play alongside Gana...let the best man win. I would ask this question. Gana comes off injured next week. Who do you want to come on? Would you think it a mistake if you see Moyes had chose Armstrong?

It would mean: Röhl is shite; Gana gets old in six months; Garner becomes a permanent full-back; and Dewsbury-Hall offers nothing, ever, defensively.

Weigh that up against Armstrong getting loads of time at Preston, building his confidence, maturing mentally and physically, and coming back next season to be a first choice.

For an 18-year-old, he's skilful, physically strong, and capable of coming off the bench to make an impact. I don't understand why he's loaned out, did he not learn enough with Derby last season?

I sincerely hope we can take him back in January, with the players heading to Africa?

Yes, he could have an absolute worldie and go into the World Cup squad. Or he has some poor games and costs some defeats. That could set back his career back.

He is a good player. I watched him carefully against Mansfield. Overall a good game, but there was a good 10-15 minutes at the end of the first half where he faded out the game. And they're League One.

Put him up against a Rodri etc and I think you'll see he needs a period of time to develop.

It worked for Branthwaite, and it could leave us with a first-choice centre-midfielder for next season who'll be just 19 or 20. We need him to learn and make his mistakes in the Championship.

I am not suggesting that all these scenarios need to happen for Harrison to get game time, I am just highlighting with his talent there are no real barriers for him to be a regular starter or a regular contributor.

I don't see him as your typical academy player – I see him in the same way as I did Anthony Gordon. Sometimes I feel players learn from better players about decision making etc and I'm not always sure dropping to the Championship is as beneficial as many make out. Gordon himself prospered when he came back to Everton rather than getting emptied in the Championship.

If you look at our squad, you need a minimum of 4 central midfielders and optimally 5. Dewsbury-Hallis a Number 10, like Alcaraz. I would already prefer Armstrong as a midfielder now as we lost the game against Leeds when Moyes moved him there as Stach began to run riot and could have had a hat-trick.

When you look at the composition of our squad, we have 4 wide men and 2 Number 10s (including Dewsbury-Hall). This leaves Gana (who will be away in January), Garner, Iroegbunam and Röhl battling for 2 places.

The point about Garner is that Mykolenko is out again and Aznou has hardly trained. Moreover ,on the other side, should Dibling do well (always comes inside), then Garner would work better in tandem than O'Brien. I suspect and hope that Seamus and Nathan are only used in emergencies.

Put it this way, Andy: I would much prefer even now to see Gana and Armstrong start with Garner at right-back (if O'Brien is out or at centre-back) than playing Garner central and starting the other 2 at right-back.

We are in 3 competitions and not a lot of numbers and if we could have loaned one more out I would have chosen Patterson over Armstrong as the former is not good enough for Everton while young Armstrong is really impressive and composed for his age.