Last updated at 11:28, Saturday, 03 July 2010

Now his fourth free transfer of the summer is fresh out of the wrapper, Greg Abbott and his backroom staff can bend their minds to another unresolved issue: getting the best out of a player who cost Carlisle United serious dosh.

Kevan Hurst

Along with Frank Simek’s arrival from Sheffield Wednesday, Kevan Hurst’s return for pre-season after so much injury trauma was among the most heartening sights available at Brunton Park this week.

Yet the submission here is that drawing the maximum potential from the 24-year-old may be as much a matter for the tactics board as it is the training pitch.

What United have to do in 2010/11 is stack up some regular evidence that Hurst was worth every groat of the £145,000 deal that spirited him from Scunthorpe to Cumbria in August last year. The returns from his first campaign here, when he was restricted by a knee problem, were decent but not spectacular.

In this pre-season and the approaching league campaign, we ought to learn whether the winger has now been freed from last term’s physical chains, or whether his sometimes toiling output on the flank is still something which requires attention.

Take this as the unreconstructed opinion of a scribbler if you like, but is there not a reasonable argument for ripping Hurst away from his right-wing velcro and employing his talents further infield?

Adam Clayton’s return to Manchester City and Graham Kavanagh’s departure from the front line have left a gap in Abbott’s squad for a central schemer who can receive and distribute the ball effectively in the rival half. Marc Bridge-Wilkinson remains a lockpicker of considerable experience but if Carlisle’s manager is seeking an alternative, the solution may be already on his roster.

It may, in fact, suit Hurst’s particular attributes to tuck him inside, where his comfort in possession will become a greater asset, rather than send him chasing down the fringes of the field. Lacerating pace is not in his repertoire. ‘Good feet’, to coin an old coaching phrase, certainly are, along with decent ball-retention in congested areas, and a raider’s instinct that is sometimes nullified by the need to keep him wide, bending crosses into the penalty area.

This isn’t a theory without data to back it up. Rewind to Carlisle United’s FA Cup victory over Norwich City last season: the only occasion from August to May when Hurst was asked to fill a central slot.

What followed was perhaps the Blues’ most complete performance of the entire campaign and it was a curious quirk of that 60-game epic that the experiment wasn’t repeated.

Memory one from that misty November evening is Vincent Pericard’s bizarre scorpion volley which put United 1-0 up. But fast on its heels is the sight of Hurst breaking from midfield, arriving on the edge of the area and sweeping home Carlisle’s second goal.

Here was the player’s own appraisal of his central role after the 3-1 chasing of Paul Lambert’s champions-elect: “I feel I can play there. Sometimes on the wing you don’t get involved in games but in the central position you are always in and around the ball.

“I had to feel my way into it to start with but in the second half especially I felt comfortable there.”

It therefore took a man presumed to be an out-and-out winger little more than 45 minutes against League One’s best team to feel contentedly effective in a different position. This says two things. One, that the presumption that English players do not have the smarts to shift from one point on the pitch to another (witnessed excruciatingly at the World Cup) is not strictly accurate. Two, that Hurst might very well be worth another look in that infield role during Carlisle’s month of pre-season friendlies.

At times last season United pulverised teams down the flanks, chiefly through Matty Robson’s left-wing velocity. At others, their lack of a creative Plan B through the middle was exposed, at least until Clayton arrived in town.

If the Manchester City prospect can be whistled back up the country this summer, then all well and good. Another option would be to hunt down a speedy right-sided player (such as Ben Marshall, who may be ripe for another loan spell here) who would allow Abbott to test out Hurst as a creative, attack-minded middle man alongside the grafters, Tom Taiwo and Paul Thirlwell.

Injuries may have thwarted such a scheme in the later months of last season. That explanation takes a hike now that Abbott’s squad are all fit and fresh after the summer break. Managerial stubbornness should also be an excuse that does not speak its name, after Richard Keogh and Ian Harte slashed away at received wisdom on their best positions last season with successful shifts to right-back and centre-half respectively on Abbott’s watch.

There is nothing to say that Kevan Hurst could not adapt with similar results. And nothing to say he is not more versatile than he has so far been given the chance to prove. The feeling that United supporters have not seen the best of their £145,000 man is attached to the suspicion that his best is very good. And if July is not the time to seek out new ways of showing his best more frequently, then when is?

First published at 08:58, Saturday, 03 July 2010
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk