Opinion: Barnsley must be prepared to cash in on 21-year-old in the summer following Blackburn & Nottingham Forest January interest

Barnsley could be performing another great escape from the Championship relegation zone – just like they did two years ago.

It was under Gerhard Struber where the Tykes were bottom of the second tier with two matches to go in the 2019-20 season, however victories over Nottingham Forest and away at Brentford pulled them out of the bottom three.

One of the scorers in that 2-1 win against the Bees was Callum Styles, a youngster who had just started to make an impact for the club having signed in 2018 from Bury.

Having played 15 matches in the season prior to those two last wins, Struber decided to switch to wing-backs and utilise Styles as one on the left for the first time ever – and he hasn’t looked back since.

Under Valerien Ismael the following season, Styles matured and was a key influence as the Yorkshire side reached the Championship play-offs against all odds – scoring four goals and assisting a further four along the way.

Things have been a lot different this season for Barnsley – they have been wretched form and Styles has suffered from being moved around in different systems, having constantly been rotated from the wing-back spot he made his own the previous season to going back to his roots in central midfield under Markus Schopp.

Poya Asbaghi also didn’t seem to have fully figured him out, but the ‘Bury Baggio’ has now found a permanent spot on the right side of a front three – it was from that position where the 21-year-old scored just his second goal of the season against Hull City last week.

It was almost a surprise that he didn’t depart though for a bigger club in January, although we now know that several outfits did try their very best to pluck Styles from a relegation battle in that transfer window.

Per