Newcastle United poached one of West Ham's most promising players a couple of years ago and fans thought we'd found our successor to Kieran Trippier after the £5 million signing.
Harrison Ashby joined Newcastle with a lot of hype behind him as West Ham fans had placed the youngster on quite a pedestal.
However, not long after Ashby's arrival, Newcastle forked out £32 million on Tino Livramento who plays in the same position and is of a similar age.
That must have been devastating for Ashby who will have seen his first-team chances slip away from him in an instant.
And so it came to pass that Kieran Trippier remained first-choice right-back, deputised by Livramento last season, and now those roles have been reversed this season.
That still left Ashby out on a limb and after spending last season out on loan at Swansea, the 23-year-old is once again on loan in the Championship, this time with QPR.
Things seem to be going well for him at Loftus Road, though, as he was selected in SofaScore's Championship Team of the Week this week with an impressive 7.8 out of 10 for his contribution to QPR's 0-2 away win over Cardiff.
Despite all the promise, it does look like Ashby's opportunities to force his way into Eddie Howe's thoughts are becoming less frequent.
He has impressed in spells during pre-season but that's never been followed up by a spot in the first-team and with Tino Livramento doing so well, Ashby will be waiting to see what happens with Trippier in January and how well Emil Krafth recovers from his latest setback.
In truth, it doesn't look good for Ashby which is a huge shame as I'd backed him to be the natural replacement for Tripps.
PL | GD | PTS | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Liverpool
|
12 | 16 | 31 |
2 |
Manchester City
|
12 | 5 | 23 |
3 |
Chelsea
|
12 | 9 | 22 |
4 |
Arsenal
|
12 | 9 | 22 |
5 |
Brighton
|
12 | 5 | 22 |
6 |
Tottenham Hotspur
|
12 | 14 | 19 |
7 |
Nottingham Forest
|
12 | 2 | 19 |
8 |
Aston Villa
|
12 | 0 | 19 |
9 |
Fulham
|
12 | 0 | 18 |
10 |
Newcastle United
|
12 | 0 | 18 |
11 |
Brentford
|
12 | 0 | 17 |
12 |
Manchester United
|
12 | 0 | 16 |
13 |
Bournemouth
|
12 | -1 | 15 |
14 |
West Ham United
|
12 | -4 | 15 |
15 |
Everton
|
12 | -7 | 11 |
16 |
Leicester
|
12 | -8 | 10 |
17 |
Wolves
|
12 | -8 | 9 |
18 |
Ipswich
|
12 | -10 | 9 |
19 |
Crystal Palace
|
12 | -7 | 8 |
20 |
Southampton
|
12 | -15 | 4 |