Leo Castledine claims that his loan at Shrewsbury Town has given him a better understanding of senior game.
The 20-year-old left his parent club, Chelsea, to join Salop on a season-long loan in the summer.
The young player has made 14 League One appearances since relocating to Shropshire, starting 12 of them, and has scored twice.
In addition, Castledine claims that he has already benefited much from the loan experience, calling it a “massive step up” in a recent interview with football.london.
“It has opened my eyes up to the Football League a lot and how different it can be,” he stated. “I have made every effort to adjust to academy football, even though it’s a huge step up.
It’s been a pretty good experience, in my opinion, both individually and as a team. We had a rough start to the season; the first few games were difficult, and things didn’t go as planned, but I’ve always believed that the club had a solid foundation.
And I don’t see any issues in the future as long as the proper leadership and mindset are in place.
“I believe I performed fairly well. Since this was my first loan, my main goals were to perform as well as possible, demonstrate my personality and abilities as a player, as long as possible, and to support the club in any way I could.
“I was playing a lot of Premier League Two football back at Chelsea, and I think my time had come where I was ready to take the next step into men’s football and coming here to a place like Shrewsbury has been good for me.”
