Blackpool boss makes honest admission on Celtic prodigy in comparison to Birmingham City & Cardiff City men

Neil Critchley has cast doubts on Karamoko Dembele’s current ability to complete a full 90 minutes for Blackpool, but says he will support him in his development.

Dembele is regarded as one of the most explosive players in the squad, and is a player who the Bloomfield Road faithful get excited by when he’s in possession of the ball. The 20-year-old burst onto the scene at a young age having made his under-20’s debut for Celtic at just 13-years-old, and since then he’s attracted attention from the early promise he’s shown in his career.

He is on a season-long loan from French side Brest, but has yet to to complete a full match for Blackpool. The closest he has got to completing a game is in the 3-1 defeat to Derby County in which he registered an assist.

In the seven league games he’s played so far he’s only had two starts - including Tuesday night’s win against Cheltenham. The challenge now is for the 20-year-old to start more games for the Seasiders and then turn those appearances in the starting XI into full 90-minute appearances - something which Critchley believes the exciting attacker is still unable to contribute at this moment in time.

Critchley said: "If you look at his pathway and his development, his career and the games he has played, he's not played loads or had many starts.

"It's not been consistent where he's churning out 90 minutes every game, you have to understand where he's at and help him on that. You have to help him build up that side of his game, that's the journey of a young player. He's 20 and the next step for him now is to start playing and start games on a more consistent basis and try to finish games as well."

"It's not going to be right away from minute one where he's going to play 90 minutes every single game. You have to sometimes put them in, and sometimes take them out, similar with Kylian (Kouassi).

"You have to understand I'd love to watch Kaddy play for 90 minutes every single week, same as Kylian and the other young players but they're just not quite ready yet. They're not 28, 29 or 30, they've not had those 400 league games and it's a bit different for them, and sometimes supporters and myself are all impatient and we want to see them. We want to keep them on the pitch but then you might risk an injury or being burned out and we don't want that."

The London-born winger has got two goals and an assist in the nine game's he's played for the club so far, and has mainly played on the right-side of the attack. He was moved into a more central role as an attacking midfielder against Cheltenham Town on Tuesday night, and that resulted in him getting on the scoresheet where he played a total of 66 minutes.

His ability to excite fans and take on defenders has been likened to those who have come before him. Josh Bowler and Keshi Anderson, both now playing in the Championship for Cardiff City and Birmingham City respectively had the ability to change games, and cause problems for the full-backs from the flank, and be a problem when on the offensive.

A player of Dembele’s ability is more suited to being on the offensive, but there has been work into improving his defensive attributes. At 20-years-old, Dembele has time on his side to improve elements of his game such as defending but his current boss does not want to restrict his natural game which is his exuberant dribbling.

Critchley added: “You have to give them freedom, you do but playing for his team in France, and a lot of up-bringing was on the right-hand side of the pitch. If you speak to him about his journey, he said he’s improved his defensive side of the game while he’s been in France which I agree with.

“You don’t want to stifle him, it’s a bit like when we had Josh Bowler and Keshi Anderson here, you’ve got to give them a certain amount of freedom to let them go and express themselves. They know in certain areas of the pitch they need to secure the ball and keep it, but in the final third it’s like ‘go on then’ and get on with it, go and do what you’re good at.

“You have to know they’ll make mistakes doing that but you’ve got to encourage them to keep doing it. Kaddy is beautiful to watch, when he does some of the things that he can do, he gets the supporters off their seat and everyone likes seeing that, myself included. I get excited like the supporters when Kaddy gets on the ball.”