Football as a sport has no shortage of feel-good stories when it comes to underdogs overperforming expectations (Leicester City winning the Premier League in the 2015/16 season) or in terms of players developing in the non-league or lower league and going on to have extremely successful careers (Jamie Vardy was a key part of that Leicester City season). While in previous years, the 1980s and 1990s for example we would see players playing non-league football before getting picked up by top-flight clubs. These players would typically be working second jobs, and back then the financial incentives for making the step up in league quality were not what it is now. When Stuart Pearce made the move from non-league to Nottingham Forest, for example, he continued to advertise his services as an electrician in the matchday program.
Fast forward to today and we still see a lot of players making the transition from non-league football to the football league in England, although the environment in the non-leagues has significantly changed. There are clubs now in the non-league, especially in the National League, that maintain professional status and there have been instances of players actually dropping down to clubs at that level because they are offering better wages. There will always be talent within football that can be described as sleeping and players will be released from league clubs before going in to make an impact at the professional level later on in their career.
That is the case with the subject of this scout report as the 20-year-old Fleetwood Town midfielder Paddy Lane was released as a 15-year-old by Blackburn Rovers before dropping out of league football to play for the likes of Hyde United and Farsley Celtic before being signed by Fleetwood Town to join their side in League One. Fast forward to the end of the 2021/22 season and Lane has been called up to the senior international set-up by Northern Ireland and been named as the League One young player of the year by the EFL. Not bad for a player who had to work a series of part-time jobs to supplement his income as he played regular non-league football.
Recent weeks have seen Lane linked to transfers to the lines of West Ham United in the Premier League, and Stoke City in the Championship, and it feels like a matter of time before Lane is the next player to leave Fleetwood Town to move up the football pyramid.
This tactical analysis will be an analysis of Lanes data across the 2021/22 season while looking at some of his key strengths as a player and where he fits into his sides tactics.
Data Analysis
