Blackburn Rovers manager Tony Mowbray has suggested that Harvey Elliott needs to start adding more goals to his game for Rovers over the coming weeks, while he also believes he has a bright future at Liverpool.

Elliott joined Blackburn on a season-long loan deal from Liverpool towards the end of the summer transfer window, and the 17-year-old has been delivering some very encouraging displays for Rovers during his opening six Championship appearances. The Englishman has so far managed to score one goal and provide three assists.

The 17-year-old arrived at Ewood Park with a growing reputation as one of the most promising young talents in the country. So far he has shown signs of living up to that especially with his creativity having averaged a highly impressive 2.8 key passes per game (Sofascore). Where he could improve is in getting goals himself.

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Speaking to the Lancashire Telegraph, Mowbray outlined that Elliott needs to show more of a selfish streak to his game in the final third if he is going to really become a top player, while he also believes that the 17-year-old will be a major asset for Liverpool in the coming years.

He said: “I’ve been talking to him and I think he needs to be a bit more selfish in the box.

“Having spoken to the staff at Liverpool, they feel as if he sees himself as an assist-maker rather than a goalscorer. And ultimately, any top, top player, you have to look at their statistics as the season unfolds. How many assists, how many goals do you get?

“If he is going to play up front for us, at the moment, he’s playing in the front three, if in 20 games, he’s only had three assists and one goal, it’s probably not going to be enough for Liverpool to look at him and think he can come in our team and do this.”

He continued: “He’ll be a huge asset for Liverpool and I’m sure they wanted to make sure he’ll be in the right environment and if they don’t they’d take him out of it.”

The verdict

Elliott is clearly a player with an awful lot of potential and ability and Blackburn have done very well to convince Liverpool to send him out on loan to them for the season. Mowbray has shown that is able to get the 17-year-old into the sorts of areas of the field where he can do some real damage in the final third.

The 17-year-old has helped to really improve Blackburn’s ability to create chances in the final third, and you can see him striking up an excellent partnership with the prolific Adam Armstrong during the rest of the campaign. As Mowbray suggested he will surely have a bright future ahead of him at Anfield for Jurgen Klopp’s side.

However, if the 17-year-old can also start to have more confidence in his abilities to score goals as well as create them, then the sky really will be the limit for him. He seems to be a little hesitant to take on shots himself at times, but that should change as the campaign progresses