Barnet FC yesterday announced the signing of right-back Jordan Cropper on a permanent deal ahead of the game against Oxford City.
Dean Brennan has turned to the man who played nine times for the Bees last season whilst on loan from Grimsby Town, after a string of injuries to the Bees’ key defensive players.
Cropper’s career so far has been slightly unorthodox and plagued by injuries. He came through the youth ranks as a right-back at Nottingham Forest, but he started his senior career as a striker, making one appearance for Ilkeston as a 17-year-old before being snapped up on an academy contract by Premier League Burnley.
The 23-year-old was at the Clarets for four and a half seasons and during that time he transitioned back into playing on the right-hand side of defence. The young defender played in the Lancashire side’s under-23 side and was named in the first-team squad for a couple of Premier League matches, but he never made a first-team appearance for Sean Dyche’s team.
Dyche did, however, help to materialise a loan move to his former side, Chesterfield, in 2019. The long-throw specialist went on to make eight league appearances and score one goal for Chesterfield in the second half of the 2019/20 season and he was re-signed on a season-long loan for the following year.
He started the 20/21 season well as he scored two goals and was a regular in the team, but a change of manager meant he dropped down the pecking order and was recalled in January having made 12 more appearances for the Spireites. Injury struggles followed and he was released by Burnley that summer.
Cropper managed to find himself a new club in March 2022 as he joined Grimsby Town. Again, he wasn’t the first-choice, but injuries meant he got a run of games towards the end of the season and his long throw was key in helping the Mariners to win the National League Playoffs.
This prompted a one-year contract extension at Grimsby, but only made seven appearances in all competitions last season before being loaned to the Bees. There, he played nine times as Brennan’s side finished in fifth place and he impressed fans with his swashbuckling style of play.
Writer’s View
Cropper was someone who thoroughly impressed Barnet fans at the back end of last season and a fair few were calling for him to be signed on a permanent deal in the summer. However, issues with his location and injury record meant that the deal wasn’t seen as viable at the time.
Now, however, with the defender still without a club and Barnet missing the likes of Danny Collinge, Ben Coker and Adebola Oluwo in defence (with Reece Hall-Johnson and Ben Wynter also both nursing injuries), it seems as if the stars have aligned and Cropper is back in black and amber.
He is certainly an excellent full-back and he has much more to his game than the long-throw which has got him a lot of exposure. If he can put his injury issues behind him, he will be a top-quality addition to what already looks to be a stacked squad.
It will be interesting to see how Brennan manages having three right-backs in a squad which is already full of defenders. Many are speculating that Moussa Diarra will leave on a permanent basis once his loan at Dartford expires and one or two more may even have to go, depending on the severity of the injuries which Oluwo and co. have picked up.
However, the problem of having to pick between Ben Wynter, Reece Hall-Johnson and Jordan Cropper at right-back is a problem that every other manager in the National League would love to have and this signing indicates that Brennan’s men are looking to push Chesterfield all the way this season.
