ERIC Kinder says outgoing Rovers captain Jason Lowe will be regarded as a role model for the club’s Academy players for years to come.

Lowe’s long association with the club ended this week when it was announced the 25-year-old was one of six players who wouldn’t be offered new contracts.

The central midfielder leaves Rovers four short of 200 games having graduated through the ranks to captain the first team, as well as the England under-20s.

Head of Academy Kinder came across Lowe during his first spell working at the club between 1999 and 2006.

And he admits it was Lowe’s attitude to the game that set him apart and helped him progress to captaining the club at senior level.

“It was sad to see Jason Lowe go because he was a focal point of the Academy,” Kinder told the Lancashire Telegraph.

“When I was here the first time Jason was 12 years old.

“He asked the question: ‘how can I be a professional footballer?’  I told him what to do, and he did it.

“He wasn’t blessed with being the most talented player in the world, and he will accept that, but I will tell you what he’s got and that’s a big heart.

“He wanted to be a professional footballer, and if you are looking at a role model for Academy footballers to look up to then it’s probably Jason Lowe.

“It is all because of how he was so determined as a boy to become a footballer.

“If we told him that he would have had to jump off a cliff, he would have done it.”

Kinder has a picture in his office of Jose Mourinho accompanied by the words ‘desire, ambition, passion’, the three words the Portuguese boss says he looks for in a young player.

It’s a mantra that Kinder himself follows, and three things he believes Lowe had in spades.

He added: “He is the focal point of the Academy – along with David Dunn, but he came through the old system.

“When I walk people round I say there’s your role model.

“We’re not going to get the best footballers in the world, because they will go to Manchester United, Manchester City and Chelsea, so we have to get really good characters who are determined and have the desire to succeed.

“I look at that (the picture of Mourinho) every day and that came off an article that I read.  There was nothing about passing a ball, scoring goals, or being able to pass a ball, it’s down to desire, passion and ambition and if you have all of those three then you will succeed.

“Jason Lowe has all of those three and has since he was 12 years old.

“I’m sorry to see him go because for me he will always be the focal point of the Academy.”

The next job for Kinder and the club’s Academy staff is to find the latest prospects to push forward for first-team honours.

Ryan Nyambe, Scott Wharton and Willem Tomlinson all made their professional debuts last season, and Kinder added: “It’s now about finding the next one.

“Jason joined the Academy at a young age, worked his way all of the way up. Becoming a scholar at 16 is difficult and a big congratulations because that is a massive achievement.  Going from 16 to a pro at 18 is even harder but the hard one is that final step, to get from the Under-23s to the first team.

“That’s incredibly hard because you have got to be special.”