Cardiff City manager Steve Morison has laid out in detail the plan he has for "special" talent Rubin Colwill and insists he will stick to his guns over what he believes will facilitate a path to success for the Wales youngster.
Colwill has shown on more than one occasion he has the ability to produce stunning moments in a Bluebirds shirt — goals against Liverpool and QPR in recent months are evidence of that — and this week he proved it on the international stage, netting his first Wales goal in the 1-1 draw with the Czech Republic.
Naturally, it catapulted Colwill's name into the spotlight once again. The 19-year-old is a mercurial talent, but there are also deficiencies in his game which will get ironed out as the months roll by and the minutes creep under his belt. Indeed, the level of consistency shown by Manchester City youngster Tommy Doyle, who has essentially taken his spot in the side, is just one area in which Colwill could arguably improve.
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But he is still young. He is an incredibly exciting player, someone who has fans more excited over an academy product than they have been for a decade or more, but it must be remembered that he is still a teenager. The playmaker is still Cardiff's top scorer this year with six goals, but there is less of a reliance, or creative onus, on him now than there was at the start of the season or before the January transfer window.
The fact he has started only two of Cardiff's last 13 Championship games has drawn attention from some, with former Bluebirds striker Nathan Blake believing he should be given more of an opportunity, but it's difficult for him to force his way into the reckoning when results are positive and players in front of him are performing so well.
And Morison continues to be strident in his view that Colwill will be managed carefully and, if his vision goes to plan, he will be the first name on the team sheet for both club and country within the next two years.
"He needs to add in all areas of his game," Morison began. "I get a bit frustrated when I read a lot of the stuff because everyone talks about him like he’s the finished article. He's 19 years old. He has had his ups and downs, we have taken him in and out.
"I’m going to base Rubin Colwill off what Pep Guardiola did with Phil Foden. If people don't like it, fine. But while I'm in charge, that's how it's going to be. He's going to be managed correctly. He's not going to be put to the slaughter. He's not going to be dragged through the mire. It's not going to be sink-or-swim time, he is going to be managed.
"He’ll be put in, taken out. He is going to have times where he doesn't play for a few games and he will have times where he does play for a few games. The Phil Foden one took two years. Now he’s the first name on England’s team sheet. Now he’s the first name on Man City’s team sheet.
"At some point over the next 18 months or two years, [Colwill] will be the first team on not just our team sheet, maybe Wales, maybe somewhere else, I don't know. But he will definitely, 100% be managed correctly and I will not be pressured or bullied into anything by outside noise.
"After I get off this press conference I am actually going to have a talk with him about the outside noise and learning to deal with him. Because he is going to read everything that gets put out there, everyone around him will read what's put out there and what he needs to do is find the consistency and calmness within it all to understand where he is.
"Because as soon as he believes, and [the press] believe, that he is the finished article, he will have a shock. Because this game is constantly evolving, constantly moving.
"Special talents like Gareth Bale come on the scene as a really young kid and push on, look at the two years he had at Spurs – didn’t win a game! People were questioning him, people were doubting him. He came out and come back and now he’s arguably one of the best British players ever to have played the game.
"Rubin is a special talent, that's the reality of it. He has got lots of good attributes. There is not a football player in the world who hasn’t got things to work on, otherwise (Cristiano) Ronaldo wouldn't have pushed himself harder to get better all the time. At some point he would have settled.
"He needs to manage himself, [the press] need to manage him and I need to manage him from my point of view. Hopefully, we will get a player that is the lynchpin for Wales going forward. We will have a top-drawer player who will be the first name on the team sheet who we build the team around.
"Or he goes on and bypasses Cardiff, if we can't travel with him because that happens as well, and he goes on to be a top, top player. But these are the moments where he puts all those foundations in place to go on.
"It’s been an incredible rise, everything he's done so quickly. He’s a top player and he will be on the bench on Saturday – so we will see what happens."
Wales boss Rob Page has said that he took Colwill to the Euros last summer for experience, to ensure that when he is next at a major international tournament he is not overawed by the occasion. Morison believes that because of the way he has been managed and coaxed through by both Cardiff and Wales, Colwill could even play a prominent role for his country if they reached the World Cup finals in Qatar later this year.
"He could have had a summer off in Ibiza or a summer in the Euros learning and being around top, top players at that level," Morison said of Wales' decision to take him to the Euros.
"He has had that experience now rather than at the age of 25 or whatever. There was always a plan for that. It would have been a great experience for him. Now, if they get to the World Cup, he would arguably be more than just a spectator, he would have a chance to play in that.
"If Wales had their strongest team, like the Austria game, he didn’t play. It's very much like what we are doing. My strongest XI at the minute, he maybe doesn’t get in it every time. There will be games where he does. It doesn't mean he is not a top player, though.
"Gareth Bale sits on the bench for Real Madrid but then starts and carries his country to the World Cup! It's crackers!"
In typical Morison fashion, he won't be swayed or forced into playing Colwill just because there is a groundswell around him. It's actually encouraging to hear the far bigger picture.
It could quite easily be a bone of frustration for the Bluebirds boss, having to continually bat off the praise and opinion which seems to gyre around the youngster, but in fact it is quite the opposite.
"Not at all," he said when asked if there is a frustration that he has to answer questions regularly about the youngster. "It's not frustration, it's great, it’s brilliant. It’s unbelievable!
"It’s great learning for me and it's understanding... if I was a bit less like I am I would maybe be like ‘Oh my gosh I’ve got to play Rubin Colwill tomorrow. If I don't play Rubin Colwill tomorrow I will get annihilated!’ But you have to realise it’s more than just that individual. There’s a hell of a lot more to it.
"But it's fantastic. The more press we get and the players get, it shows we are doing something right. I'm never going to not want that."
