Since joining Southampton in a £6.8 million move from FC Köln, Damion Downs has started just one Championship match for the Saints. It is painfully obvious that Will Still does not rate the USA men's international striker that highly.
The 21-year-old American, born in Germany, arrived at St Mary's full of potential. He'd already played a few games in the Bundesliga and scoring ten goals in 2. Bundesliga suggested that he was no slouch. So what has been going wrong?
Pre-season was already well under way when Downs arrived at the club and he flew out to join the squad on their Spanish camp almost immediately. The American found the back of the net against La Liga side, Espanyol. A minute into injury time he ran on to a through ball from Jay Robinson before slamming the ball into the bottom left hand corner.
That goal was a glimpse of the power and the pace that Downs has. The finish was pretty stunning too.
Sadly Downs was unable to follow up on his performance against Espanyol in Southampton's final pre-season match at home to Brighton and Hove Albion. He looked like a player who was adjusting to his surroundings and learning his place in Still's system.
Downs is a better player than his poor run of form suggests
Left out of the starting eleven for the first match of the season, against newly promoted Wrexham, Downs was introduced to the action late on with the Saints a goal down. He spurned a golden opportunity to get the Saints level before providing the assist for Jack Stephen's last gasp winner.
Downs was handed another opportunity to impress in the EFL cup match away at Northampton. On a sweltering evening, the American did little to impress the manager, or the travelling fans, missing another golden chance from a few yards out.
Following a brief injury, Downs played bit-part roles in the home defeat to Stoke and the away draw at Watford.
The arrivals of Finn Azaz, Leo Scienza and Tom Fellows may have contributed to Downs being dropped from the squad completely for the south coast derby but it was already obvious that he was falling down Still's pecking order.
The striker who came in from the cold
Surprisingly, Still brought the American straight back in to the starting eleven for the trip to Hull City where, on a cold and wet afternoon in Yorkshire, the Saints turned in their worst performance of the season up until that point.
At Anfield, in the EFL Cup third round, Downs came on for Archer in a tactical substitution that didn't really pay off. Saints had looked good in the first half and nearly took the lead before Alexander Isak scored his first goal for Liverpool. Downs' introduction after 51 minutes made little difference to the outcome and he did little to boost Still's opinion of him.
Still's reaction was to drop Damion Downs from the squad for the next two matches, at home to Middlesbrough and away at Sheffield United.
Off the pitch, Downs was dealing with online abuse on his social media channels. Still showed his support of the young player, describing Downs' treatment on Instagram as “sad.”
Ross Stewart's injury at Derby, in the following Championship match, handed the American thirty minutes to impress at Pride Park. He didn't. Saints threw away another point and Still's faith in Downs fell through the floor.
An unused sub against Swansea and Blackburn, Downs' only twelve minutes of the last three games have come away at Bristol City where, to be fair, he looked quite lively and made some good runs into dangerous spaces. Had the midfield players been brave enough to make a forward pass, he could have been in on goal a couple of times.
City's manager, Gerhard Struber, managed Damion Downs at FC Köln and he didn't hold back in his praise of the striker.
"He is a player with outstanding transition power, he has pace, he smells moments and he is so young. He is a player with outstanding potential," Struber told the Daily Echo.
The manager's faith in Downs has gone
Since arriving at Southampton, Downs has lost his place in the USA men's team and fallen out of favour with his manager. His form has fallen off a cliff since joining the Saints and it's impossible to understand why.
Will Still must take some of the blame. Downs has been in and out of the squad, brought into the starting eleven from the wilderness and then unceremoniously dropped after one poor performance. Downs must be confused at the way that he is being treated by Still.
However, given the poor form of Cameron Archer and the injury to Ross Stewart, surely now is the time to turn to the American a give him a run of games to prove himself. In Cologne, he was trusted, gained momentum and profited from being given game time.
But, it's difficult to see the manager putting his faith in Downs and playing him more regularly. He's clearly a player the manager doesn't trust fully. And, with his job on the line, he's unlikely to turn to the American any time soon.