Jay Spearing believes that one current Liverpool player has the potential to ‘go as high as he wants’ in his career.
Arne Slot is already developing a knack for getting the best out of a few members of his squad who’d previously faced scrutiny at Anfield, among them Curtis Jones.
The 23-year-old has shown flashes of brilliance during his time in the Reds’ first team, but in recent weeks he’s looked a more polished and refined player who might be capable of establishing himself as an undisputed starter.
The midfielder produced an ‘excellent’ assist for Luis Diaz’s first goal in the 4-0 win over Bayer Lerverkusen on Tuesday night – in the words of Stephen Warnock on BBC Radio 5 Live – and Spearing waxed lyrical about the performance from Liverpool’s number 17 after the match.
Speaking on LFC TV, the Reds academy coach said of Jones: “His all round play, he can play as a 10, he can see passes, he can finish, score goals, can play in a pair, as a defensive midfielder, he can break up play, get out of tight situations, his passing with both feet is out of this world.
“As long as he can bring consistency with it, he’s going to cause the manager problems, and he can go as high as he wants to go.”
Now into his fifth season as a fully-fledged first-team player at Liverpool, Jones appears to be adding a consistency to his game which may have previously been lacking.
With the midfielder turning 24 in January, he’s at a point in his career where we can no longer talk in terms of him being an ‘up-and-coming prospect’, but it’s to his credit that he’s altering the narrative to being spoken about as a potentially crucial figure in Slot’s line-up.
The head coach has praised the academy graduate’s ability to adapt effortlessly to a range of different positions within the team, and he appears to have found his niche as a number 10, even if it was from a deeper position that he delivered a man-of-the-match display against Chelsea last month.
Jones’ pass to Diaz for the first goal last night was simply sublime, and if he can extrapolate his post-October international break form across the rest of the season, he could yet fulfil Spearing’s prophecy about him having the innate talent to ‘go as high as he wants’.
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