By Albatross
September 3 2003

Hartlepool United have agreed to let Youth Team goalkeeper Kevin Duncan go out on loan to Spennymoor United. It's a path that another young keeper has trod in the recent past, and Duncan will be looking to learn a lot from the experience. The 18 year old third year scholar will be spending a month at Spennymoor initially, hoping to gain experience in the Unibond Premier - a league that the club was promoted to last season.

Spennymoor have recently sacked their Manager Alex Mathie after a disappointing start, and replaced him with former boss Tony Lee - father of Spike - and one of Lee's first moves has been to sign the Pools youngster on loan. Spennymoor are hoping to finish in the top half of the league this season and so secure a place in the mooted Conference North that will come into being with the reorganisation of the non-league pyramid.

Duncan has been the regular keeper for the Pools youth side, and starred in a big way in the Youth Cup tie at Old Trafford a couple of years ago, when he played a big part in helping Pools push Man Utd all the way before losing in extra time; I thought he was our Man of the Match on that occasion. With his scholarship finishing in the summer, he knows he needs to show what he can do to the management in order to win a professional deal. Playing at a fairly high semi-pro level can only help Kevin.

Duncan can also be cheered by recent history. At the same stage in his career at Pools, Jim Provett also went out on loan to Spennymoor - and is now looking pretty secure as the regular first team keeper after taking his chance with both hands. Duncan will be hoping that this is another step towards emulating his predecessor in the youth team.