Pep Guardiola has given James McAtee clear instruction over Sheffield United loan

James McAtee says ‘good conversations’ have taken place with his parent club Manchestr City about the progress of his Sheffield United loan.

The 20-year-old midfielder is highly rated and agreed to spend the season at Bramall Lane in a bid to further his development.

Although he had featured from the bench on a handful of occasions for the first team at Man City, this is his first real taste of competitive senior football and he is now starting to benefit.

He revealed last week how he believes it was a ‘great decision’ to join United and how he is now starting to get to grips with the demands of football at this level.

He returned to the starting line-up for Saturday’s 1-0 win over Huddersfield, which was his sixth league start and 16th Championship appearance.

His goal in the 3-3 draw at home to Blackpool remains his only strike in Sheffield United colours, and he also has an assist to his name following a lovely cross for Rhian Brewster in the defeat at Stoke City.

Those two goal involvements came in back-to-back starts in October and was a nice purple patch for the youngster, who knows if he wants to break into the City first team as a creative midfielder he needs plenty of those.

Indeed, that is Pep Guardiola’s message to his young midfielder.

The City boss is not only keen to see him add his name to the scoresheet, but he wants to see him be able to deliver when it matters in the big games. An examination any City player has to pass.

“His message was that he wants to see me in the big games being able to play like I do when I was with the Under-23s, scoring goals,” McAtee told Yorkshire Live. “That’s what he wants to see.

“My agent went in last week to see City and had the conversation about how it’s going and what we would like to do and how we are going to see next season. It was a good conversation.

“The loan manager has also visited, checking up on me and going through my games. That visit came off the back of two games where they weren’t my best, so he was just saying ‘keep your head up’ and stuff like that.

“But no one’s come after I have had a few good games, so hopefully they can come back soon!”