Tony Mowbray has seemingly ruled out fast-tracking in-form teenager Harry Gardiner into Sunderland's first-team despite the Black Cats' striker crisis. Mowbray was Eppleton on Monday night to watch the 19-year-old score twice - he was initially credited with a hat-trick, before his third goal was given as an own-goal - for Sunderland U21s in a 4-1 Premier League 2 victory against Stoke City.
And that meant Gardiner has now been on target in each of his last four outings for the U21s, scoring five goals in that spell, and he has scored a total of six goals in ten games this season. With Ross Stewart's season-ending injury and Ellis Simms having been recalled by Everton from his loan spell at the beginning of January, Mowbray down to the bare bones in terms of attacking options at first-team level with on-loan Leeds United youngster Joe Gelhardt - who at 20 is just a year older than Gardiner - the only first specialist striker he can call upon.
That has led to the question being asked this week as to whether Gardiner should be given a chance in the first team, particularly as Mowbray has already involved 15-year-old midfielder Chris Rigg from the bench in three FA Cup ties this season. But Mowbray is wary of throwing Gardiner in at the deep end, saying: "I think Harry has only trained once or twice with us, if that.
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We train at the same time on the same site, I don't get the opportunity to go and watch the U18s or the U21s training on a regular basis, so it would be like me just bringing up a young kid because he has scored a couple of goals, putting him in the team and then if he doesn't get a kick, if he gets bashed about and it looks like a boy against men, everyone will wonder 'what's he [Mowbray] doing?'. You have to get a feel for it.
"Just because he scored a few goals against what might have been a Stoke team made up of 18-year-olds ... you have to be careful. I understand the potential knee-jerk reaction towards a guy who has scored a few goals against Stoke's U21s - get him in the first team, he must be good - but that's not always the case.
"That's not being negative towards the young guy because it's great that he scored those goals - I was at the game and he got himself into the six-yard box and scored. Yet we had Pierre [Ekwah] playing, we had Isaac [Lihadji] playing, we had Abdoullah [Ba] playing, we had Jewi [Jewison Bennette] playing, so we had some players out there who have been around the first-team, playing against some kids from Stoke and they probably gave us the edge in the football match with the young boy up front scoring the goals that they created.
"Yet we wouldn't sit here and think that we are going to put those four lads straight into the team, they have to be integrated bit by bit and it's the same with young Gardiner. If he proves to be good enough in the long term, and he trains with the first team, then maybe so.
"I haven't seen the young man [Gardiner] since that game. He hasn't been up training with us, he's part of that development programme that the club is trying to push hard.
"We know there is some young talent coming through, the likes of Chris Rigg who also played against Stoke U21s and did very well. You have to be careful about just throwing them in, so we will generally stick with the group we've got."
Aside from the striker situation, Mowbray is grappling with a lengthening injury list with defender Aji Alese {thigh) the latest to be ruled out for the rest of the season, joining Stewart (Achilles) and skipper Corry Evans (cruciate ligament), while Elliot Embleton only has an outside chance of being involved in the run-in depending how quickly his broken ankle heals. Mowbray has a number of young players who have been involved from the bench in recent weeks such as Ekwah, Lihadji, Ba, and Bennette, and he says there may be opportunities in the weeks ahead when he can rotate his squad and involve them from the start.
He said: "That time might come, but I'm not sure that time is now when our next four games [against Norwich City, Sheffield United, Luton Town, and Burnley] are against sides in the top six. It's not the time to put in some really inexperienced footballers in the side, but the games following that might be - and we might have to drop the odd one in, of course.
"You have to be careful that you don't damage young players by putting them into games that would be very difficult to win even with your strongest team, because you don't want the narrative surrounding him to be 'he's not very good, we get beat every time he plays'. It's better that they play in a game where we are ultra-competitive and they could help the team win."
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