The rise of Aaron Wan-Bissaka was meteoric. From youth team player to Manchester United's starting XI in little over a year.
Much is made of the benefit of going out on loan to compliment the education you get from academy football. The former Crystal Palace youngster managed to make light work of the transition to first team football without a move away from south London. Though, he was helped by a number of first team injuries, and some impressive training sessions lining up against Wilfried Zaha
Former Eagles midfielder Shaun Derry, recently appointed professional development coach within the club's academy has pointed out even the rapid ascent of Wan Bissaka was given the benefit of lower league football despite the 21-year-old never leaving the Eagles on loan.
Derry may have missed out on training Wan-Bissaka at Beckenham but was afforded the opportunity to watch the youngster before his big break while in charge of League Two side Cambridge United.
He said: "Aaron and Noor [Husin] they came to Cambridge. The window had shut, we couldn't sign anybody but we spoke about them coming out of this environment and coming to a League Two environment.
"We took them to Cambridge, Aaron was a right winger at the time. We were looking for a right winger at the time. Aaron came, I think he spent four days with us, he was late, we had no food after training because we didn't have any food at the training ground, we had no gym. We had one spin bike, one of the pedals was hanging off, that was our gym. The grass was horrendous, it really was and I remember thinking, 'the only value he's going to get from this four days experience is what it looks like, where he doesn't want to be.'
"'Why would I want to go and play at Cambridge when they haven't x, y and z. I'm guessing, I don't know, he come back and he went straight through the roof and that adds value as well having different experiences and we were probably going to be more concerned trying to sign Noor than Aaron at the time. He came back, found a new position, worked tirelessly every day and it's history isn't it."
