Stockport County moved quick with Burnley loanee to fill pre-season gap: View | OneFootball

The Hatters' recruitment team wasted no time bringing in the necessary reinforcements

Stockport County's recruitment this season has been among the best of any team at their level, but early pre-season signs suggested there was still one glaring gap to fill.

The Hatters had bolstered their squad in almost every department, mostly with young, high-potential players. But a summer injury picked up by last season's star striker Tanto Olaofe left the club notably short up front.

That this could become a problem was clear by the club's second pre-season game, where they failed to breach the defence of a National League outfit Oldham Athletic.

Less than a week later, County have already addressed the issue, agreeing a season-long loan for young Burnley striker Michael Mellon.

The 20-year-old has spent the majority of his youth career with Burnley, where his father, Micky Mellon (who is coincidentally Oldham's current manager) was a player from 1999 to 2001.

Having outgrown youth football, the younger Mellon broke into the senior game with a loan move to Morecambe in January 2023. He returned for a second stint the following season, before ending the campaign with Scottish side Dundee FC.

The Scotland U21 international has scored goals everywhere he's been so far, but his most intriguing stint was his second spell with the Shrimps, where he netted 13 goals in 22 League Two appearances.

Being so effective at that level at such a young age suggests he's ready for potentially more than one step up, so the fact the Hatters have managed to attract him to their League One project is something of a coup.

Mellon should reduce the burden on the rest of the strikers

County suffered an ongoing injury crisis throughout the majority of last term, so they know from experience that they need more than one strong player for each position in the starting XI.

Olaofe was the Hatters' main source of goals in 2023/24, scoring 20 times in the league. With the departure of former captain Paddy Madden, there were just three permanent fixtures in the striking department, with Olaofe alongside Kyle Wootton and Jack Stretton.

Wootton missed the first portion of the season and still managed eight goals and seven assists, a respectable return in the circumstances, but as the focal point of the attack, the jury is still out on his League One return.

Stretton spent the entirety of last season on the sidelines with an ACL injury and, as ever with such a serious injury, nobody can predict quite how he'll return from it.

Journalist Sam Byrne said there was "no real goalmouth action of note for County" in their friendly against Oldham. It's hard to read too much into a non-competitive game that featured two different line-ups in each half and included trialists, but it may have been an early sign that the Hatters were just one injury away from being a rather blunt attacking force.

The signing of Mellon should reduce that burden on the trio, with the now-quartet of striking power able to support each other as they find their feet in the third tier.

The Burnley man could feed into County's wider transfer strategy

The Hatters' new strategy of signing young players with high ceilings to generate funds would appear irrelevant in this temporary switch, but Mellon's contract situation means it could come into play depending on how things play out.

The young striker signed a three-and-a-half-year professional deal with the Lancashire club in 2022, which will expire next summer, around the same time that his County loan deal will also conclude.

A strong spell at Edgeley Park could lead to a January recall and a fresh round of negotiations, but the lack of any new contract being confirmed in Burnley's announcement of the loan deal suggests his permanent future could come into play in the second half of the season.

That will very much be a secondary issue. First up is how Mellon can contribute to the attacking unit now. His early showings, particularly at Morecambe, suggest he can come in and immediately reduce the goalscoring burden on the rest of the strikers, making this an efficiently executed and smart move from County's recruitment department.