Chelsea’s Mason Mount is set for a loan to Frank Lampard’s Derby County. Many will see this as a step back, but it is a better challenge.
Mason Mount lit the Eredivisie alight last season. After breaking into the squad, he became a main stay in Vitesse’s Europa League campaign and subsequent qualification for the competition in the 2018/2019 season.
When Mount was rumored to be heading to Derby County on loan, it was met with confusion, elation, and disgust by various sections of Chelsea fans. Many viewed the new loan as a step back in the young Englishman’s career.
But in reality, the loan is only a step back if Mount makes it so. In fact, assuming Mount succeeds, a loan to Derby would be a massive step forward for the young English man.
There are two important factors to consider in any loan in regards to a young players development. The first is playing time. When a player is younger than 23, they need to be somewhere that is offering them as much playing time as possible. The more playing time they get at a young age, the faster they will reach their potential. If they lacked minutes before 23, they will more or less remain the player they are.
Both Vitesse and Derby County can offer that to Mount. So on that front, there is little difference. There is an argument to be made that he would play more at Vitesse having already broken through. But Derby offers the second important factor in any loan. The player must be challenged.
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Mount will face two challenges at Derby that he would not have faced at Vitesse. The first is he must break into the team. If he is as good as advertised, that should be a simple enough task. The second challenge is the physicality.
Mount has already proved his worth as a technical player against technical sides in the Netherlands. Chelsea already knows he has that part of the game. What the Blues need to know is how Mount handles physicality. The Championship can offer that whereas Vitesse cannot. If Mount is capable of standing up to and beating physical players, he can succeed at Chelsea.
There have also been questions as to the supposed drop in quality and the loss of the Europa League. Both are mostly overblown notions. Yes, Mount will lose playing time against good opponents such as Ajax and PSV. But the quality from the top of the Eredivisie to the bottom is vast. Perhaps even greater than the midtable of the Premier League to the bottom of the Championship. And though the loss of the Europa League is a concern, it realistically would have only been six to eight matches for Vitesse. Mount will have more matches in the league alone to make up for that.
Week in and week out, Mount will be playing opponents that will challenge his own style. The quality will not change a great deal but the way that quality is used will. In is in that shift that Mount will either rise to the occasion or wilt as Lewis Baker did.
After all that, there is the chance that Derby County achieves promotion. That is where the true benefit of a Derby loan can be revealed. If Mount is already integrated into the squad, a return for a Premier League loan would be a simple task. Then he would be playing against Premier League opposition for a team that he knows well and that knows him well. That would be a fantastic chance to flourish and prove his worth.
The final quibble detractors of the Derby loan have seems to be the Euros. There is a belief that, had Mount gone back to Vitesse and then elsewhere, he would be a shoo-in for the Euros. But frankly, there is little to no reason why he would not be able to do the same after a solid season at Derby a full year out. Ruben Loftus-Cheek only truly has one professional season under his belt, yet made the World Cup squad. If Mount is good enough, he will go. If he is not, then there are plenty more chances in his future.
All of these strong points are aside from Frank Lampard and Jody Morris being at Derby. There, he will return to the tutelage of Morris while learning from the greatest Premier League midfielder of all time. Frankly, if Lampard can turn Mount into the new version of him, then the loan is well worth it.
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On the surface, Mount to Derby as opposed to elsewhere looks like a step back. But dig even a little deeper and the move begins to make perfect sense. Chelsea needed a club to develop Mount into a complete player. Derby County checks all those boxes and more so. Fans of Mount should rejoice at this loan, not lambaste it. Mount will be well taken care of by Lampard and grow immensely in the coming season.