Luca Stephenson reckons Liverpool see the obvious advantage of sending their young talent on-loan to the Scottish Premiership.

The versatile defender is the latest of the young Reds to head north, where he is currently impressing with high-flying Dundee United. It is nothing new to the Anfield club who have sent the likes of Danny Ward and Leighton Clarkson up to Aberdeen and Owen Beck had success on the other side of the road at Dundee last season. Stephenson spent the last campaign at Barrow but as soon as he returned they immediately started making plans for him to head to Scotland.

He explained: “I went back to Liverpool at the end of last year and I did a bit of a loan review. In the end of May last year, so before the window was even open, probably before many teams had started thinking about which players to sign, it was in the front of Liverpool's mind that my next step was to come up here. I think they’d seen how well Leighton had done during his loan, Owen obviously came up on loan.

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"They've done well and got in the spotlight and I think Liverpool have seen first hand how good this league can be for young players. If they do well they can either stay up here or go back to Liverpool and go out on another loan like Owen going to the Championship with Blackburn. They're not afraid to kind of chuck players in up here whereas maybe other clubs haven't had the success Liverpool have had and maybe won't do it as much.”

Stephenson is hoping to make a similar impact to Beck. The defender impressed at Dundee and was then recalled in January and given his Liverpool debut before he returned to Dens Park, although injury blighted his second spell. Stephenson admitted: “Yeah, look you've seen how well he did last year (in terms of goals and assists). I think it's a massive part of his game.

“It gets you out there with goals and assists. You can have a six, seven out of ten game but you had a couple of assists in there and you had a goal in there and it kind of gets you in the limelight and at the front of people's attention. I think that was massive in terms of what Owen did last year.

"He had steady games but he adds that goal and that assist and it’s what pushes you to the front of people's minds. If you have somebody who can give you a six out of ten every week and add goals and add assists from wing backs, full backs, wherever it's going to be it's going to be massive for the manager going forward. When he went back to Liverpool the manager's going to see him and say ‘a left-back scoring goals in the Scottish Premiership, it's massive’ He got recalled for Liverpool in January, played a couple of games for the first team and then came back out. It would have helped him that he was scoring goals and picking up assists that he could go back and play.”

Stephenson has played full-back and against Motherwell at the weekend he was moved back into the centre of the park. The 21-year-old knows it is all about gaining experience with Jim Goodwin’s side.

He insisted: Last year at Barrow it was more more being a bit more defensive and sitting behind the ball and defending. Here the gaffer wants me in the top line, he wants me attacking, creating things and these are all new things for me. I’m sure I'll give my all throughout the season as well.”