One of the strange late deadline day dealings for Southampton was Jake Hesketh who surprisingly made the loan switch out to League Two side MK Dons.
The 22-year-old midfielder had had a very good spell out with League One side Burton Albion in the first part of the year, and having returned in January many expected that he would end up back at the Pirelli Stadium to close out the campaign if manager Ralph Hasenhuttl didn’t see a place for him in the first team set up just yet.
Burton manager Nigel Clough has been speaking about Hesketh this week and he confirmed that the club did want him back but Southampton decided to change the terms and that meant Hesketh had to step down to League Two.
“We said all along that we’d like to keep Jake Hesketh on the same deal. Southampton wanted something different and wanted a bit of money for him, and unfortunately for Jake, he has ended up stepping down to League Two. I’d have thought that, having had such a good first half of the season in League One, Southampton would’ve wanted him to at least stay at this level. We just thought the benefit that Southampton and Jake were getting from him being with us wasn’t worth a little bit of finances that Southampton were asking for.”
Clough went on to reference the Premier League riches as more than offsetting a ‘few quid’ but the club still have to balance their own books, and it’s an interesting take on his criticism, as you could easily throw back Jake’s worth and benefit to them and why wasn’t that worth a ‘few quid’.
The lad will still get good game time and MK Dons offer him the experience of a promotion push as well, which is a different mentality that he can learn from, so I don’t believe he’ll miss out on a development front either.
