On Saturday night Huddersfield Town announced the signing of Carel Eiting on a season-long loan deal from Ajax. The midfielders arrives in Huddersfield after a serious knee injury saw him miss most of the last two seasons with the Dutch giants.
Signing a player from the famous Ajax youth system is an exciting prospect and on the surface it suggests we’ve picked up a potential star player. I’m going to take a look at the positives and negatives of this new arrival at Huddersfield.
Five reasons Eiting is a good signing for Huddersfield Town
1. A signing that feels exciting
It’s hard to quantify what makes a new arrival an exciting prospect but Eiting fits that bill for me. There aren’t many players in Huddersfield Town’s current team that make you sit forward on your seat but Eiting has potential to be that kind of player.
Aaron Mooy was probably the last Town player that was a creative force in the middle of the field, he could conjure up moments of joy for fans out of thin air. That’s maybe expecting a bit too much from this young lad but the fact I’m entertaining the possibility is exciting in itself.
2. Ajax academy
The fact that Eiting is a product of years of coaching at Ajax’s academy and had made it through to their first team set up suggests he must have something about him. One of the world’s most proven academies has churned out star players for decades, so one of their alumni turning up in Huddersfield can only be good news.
Coming from Ajax means he’s also had the experience of playing for a team that expects to win. Ajax are big fish in a small pond in the Eredivisie and expect to win trophies. That kind of winning mentality is sorely missing in our dressing room, where the feeling of defeat is so familiar it’s like an old friend popping round for tea.
3. He fits in with Carlos’ system
Another benefit of coming through Ajax’s academy is that he should adapt quickly to Carlos’ style of play. The deep-lying ball player isn’t commonly used in England, where a combative defensive midfielder is more common, such as how Jonathan Hogg typically plays.
Ajax were pioneers of attractive, possession based football and still encourage that style of play today. Despite the fact Eiting is likely to play mostly in front of the defence we can expect him to be a source of creativity and someone that links up play between defence and attack.
4. He could become the heartbeat of the team
If Eiting is as good as I think he might be then I can see him being the glue that holds the rest of the team together.
I mentioned yesterday that the attacking side of Carlosball hasn’t really clicked yet and this is most likely due to the lack of a natural ball player in the middle of the pitch. Eiting could be that missing connection.
He should also provide some relief for the keeper and defensive unit by dropping deep to pick up the ball and distributing it upfield. That will hopefully mean fewer heart-in-mouth moments when Hamer or Stearman keep hold of the ball that bit too long and risk getting caught in possession.
It’s a lot of responsibility for a young player but Austerfield is the only other player at the club who looks close to being able to fill this role. So it’s better to entrust this duty to a 22-year-old rather than an 18-year-old.
5. Highlights video show real quality
By now we all know that highlights videos on YouTube are unreliable sources to judge players from. Yet I’ve let myself get excited by this young man’s highlight reel.
His skill with set pieces, natural passing ability and eye for a tackle are all tantalising. Rather than bang on about the video, here it is for you to see for yourself:
Five reasons Eiting’s move to Huddersfield might not work out
1. No option to buy announced
Dutch football blogs had circulated that this loan deal would have an option to buy included within it but no such clause has been announced by either club.
It’s possible that the clubs did agree a potential fee for next summer but chose not to let this be known publicly. But I suspect Ajax don’t want to commit themselves to letting Eiting go in case he tears up the Championship this season and dramatically increases in value.
It’s a shame that we don’t look likely to be able to bring Eiting here permanently as we’ll be left with another gap in the squad to fill next summer. Town’s reliance on loans last season has made this transfer window particularly tricky because of the number of players we’ve turned over.
2. Dodgy knees and intensive training don’t mix
Eiting is coming to Town because injuries have limited his chances of getting a run in Ajax’s first team. The hope is that a year away from Amsterdam will give him the opportunity to play some games and get back to fitness.
Unfortunately it seems his knees are made of wet cardboard and could break down any second. Pair this with the intense new training regime at Town and it’s easy to imagine our exciting loanee may just end up spending a year in a different treatment room.
It may be that we give Eiting a special training regime to protect his poppadom-strength knee joints but I’m not sure this will happen. The double training sessions and murderball exercise are part of the plan to get the team up to speed, so Carel will have to try adapt to the new environment.
https://twitter.com/htafcdreams/status/1307694638061555712?s=19
3. The intensity of the Championship
If Eiting survives training without injury he’s then got to contend with the rigours of the Championship. Both the physicality and the relentless schedule will put pressure on him.
It’s easy enough to look like a player when the opposition sit off and let you do what you like. Grizzled Championship midfielders will be lining up to crunch the Ajax wonderkid to see what he’s made of (hopefully more than wet cardboard and poppadoms).
There will need to be a speed of thought and action if Eiting is to play expansive football from deep in midfield. Any dithering or reluctance will be punished and lead to possession being lost in a dangerous area of the pitch.
4. A lack of experience
Carel Eiting is in his early twenties but has not played a great deal of first team football. Most of his experience has come from the youth team, which is just not the same as the level he’ll experience in the Championship.
Our squad is already lacking experience, so bringing in a player that hasn’t played much men’s football adds to that inexperience. The hope is that he’s so good that it doesn’t particularly matter. Nobody was complaining about Smith Rowe’s lack of experience last season because he was operating at a level above everyone else on the pitch, hopefully we’ll be saying the same about Eiting.
5. He’s blocking the pathway for our youth
The club are on record as saying that they don’t want to bring in loan players at the expense of our academy lads. What’s the point of developing another team’s player when we’ve got our own that are chomping at the bit to get into the first team? The obvious answer is that Eiting is a significant step up from the lads we currently have available in the youth setup. I don’t know if that’s true but I assume it must be, otherwise we wouldn’t have brought Eiting to Town.
Josh Austerfield, Ben Jackson and Matty Daly are all players from the academy that could feature in the midfield this season but could now see their opportunities limited. All three look like exciting prospects but will need time and careful management to become first-team regulars. In fact, Eiting’s arrival may give us the numbers to allow one or two of these youngsters to go out on loan to gain some experience.
TerrierSpirit.com opinion on Carel Eiting’s loan move to Huddersfield
I’m excited about this new arrival at Huddersfield Town and am looking forward to see what he can achieve. All transfers are a risk and this one carries more risks than usual but there’s also huge potential on the other side for this playmaker from Ajax to transform Huddersfield Town’s fortunes.
Obviously there are deep-lying issues with the club right now that will take time to be addressed and more signings are needed at the top end of the pitch to give us a chance. Even so, this feels like an important piece of the jigsaw has been filled and we’re a step closer to being able to play “Carlosball” properly.