Wilshere: Arsenal Breakthrough, Wenger’s Influence & Management Future | Stick to Football EP 152

Steak to football is brought to you by our title partner, Disney Plus. Watch a lifetime of great stories on Disney Plus. Are you going to shoot in this afternoon? No, it's just this is a. He's going to shoot in. Yeah. He's going. He's going. He has to shoot. Thank you, my love. Gary, but Gary's just. That's what you do. It's bullying, really. That man wants fessant. LAUGHTER Yes, Jack. APPLAUSE My guy. You're something. The greatest. Jack. J-Wall. I thought. Hello, Gary. Hello, Gary. LAUGHTER Hello, Gary. Hello, Gary. I'm great for seeing you. I miss working with you. Do you? Can you make one for? Worked in for a few years. Where do I sit? Where's England? That one there, with England, eh? This is where you're going. And I'm not just sitting. No, no, no, no. I'm not just saying this. Do you work it, Jack? Yeah. I'm not just saying this, right? We got on well, didn't we? We did, yeah. We got on well. What did you like about him, Jack? He was just like. 'Cause he's honestly. Straight with each other. At that point, and listen, I love Roy and the way he was. Cheers. Thanks. Oh, not Roy Hudson. I love Roy Hudson. All right, all right. I do love Roy Hudson. And Gary was. He was modern. He was deep, like. We changed, do you remember what we did? We went from, like, Gerard left, Lampard left, and we went to, uh, four diamond two. Yeah. And I was playing at the base. The base of the diamond two? I was like. I've never played there before. Right. And. I remember going through clips with Peter, yeah. I remember. Right through clips with Peter, yeah. So we did. We got on well. And you used to. Little. You could arrange your passing was quite short, weren't you? No, I enjoyed playing there. And then you just played a little bit, yeah. Opened it up a little bit, and it was good. Down to you? Yeah. No, it wasn't down to me, but it was down to him. Whose idea was that to put me there? Um, I think it would have been you, 'cause Roy wouldn't move. I think Roy. If Roy was the thing open to changing, and to be fair, I think we just said that. It was what we had, really, wasn't it? If you think about me, Jordan, and. Yeah, we ran out on the side, didn't ya? Yeah, and we had, like, sort of. Yeah, he was just. I enjoyed that. We went to Switzerland, do you remember? That was a good. That was good performance. Yeah. Very good. That was the first time we played it. Yeah. We had to win that game. Yeah. Let's see. We'd gone. Lamps had gone. We won on the Monza jumps in that river at now, you're talking drinking. You do, you're jumping on the river. Right. So, no word of a lie, right? We. We're winning a Switzerland. No, this is mad, and this is a good story. Surely, was it a lake in Switzerland? No, no. Hi, Jordan. No, Roy, I'm telling you, right? This is. We were playing in Basel. There's a Basel. There's a river in Basel, wherever all the Swiss jump on, and they go down the river. Oh, that's not a bad bridge, yeah, yeah. Off the bridge, the jump off the bridge and they go down the river, right? We let them have a drink after the game, because we have to stay. You cannot have to fly back, um. Swiss, sort of. They're traffic control, clothes, it's 10 o'clock, so we had to stay over. And we let the lads have a drink, because it was a big win. It was too fair. I know, it was on, but it's not professional, isn't it? That's it. It never came out this story, did it? We were on the terrace and basically, we went in, the Colches, we went to bed. Anyway, I find out more and after the lads have jumped off the bridge, into the river, and they've gone this thing down the river at night. He's like a floating river, won't it? Yeah, because he's getting in, he's like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah." And England team are floating down the river, at basically two o'clock in the morning. Jesus, no. No, obviously not. He jumped, he jumped with ya. I can't name names. However, it was. You were that word, yeah. I was watching. It was high. It was quite high. It was, uh, it was Joe Hart's idea. It was limped up. You're not limping anywhere, you're just throwing Joe out under. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. This episode of Stick to Football is brought to you by Disney Plus. You know that you win it, like, quarter past six in the morning. Yeah, but that's pretty standard, right? Yeah, but I was shocked at that. Roy? People have said, "All they have to say about you," and you get to a point where it's kind of like, "Right, you can deal with you building Brazilians to it." And yeah, I got to that point quite early, I was saying. Venga wouldn't come in at all. Is there just a room? No, no, no. It'd be in that little doctor room when we was at Iberian now. They were beating us, and they didn't even have a coach. They just went, "And you, I bought you here to keep the ball." Not give it away, and then just moved on. He played in my team at 13. I stood next to him on the sideline, and I said, "Look, I don't get into a duel." Like, one or two times, move it around, picked up the ball. I promise you, he'd give it around. Five players, he'd squared it, and we're freeing it up. He's like, "What's up to my assistant, mate?" Jack talked to us about, "I'm going to start with management. We're going to start with the end. We're going to, sometimes, we go back to the beginning, but we're going to start at the very end of the management. How will that's going for? Are you obviously steps in? What? How's it going?" It's going well. Yeah, I mean, I think the one thing that I've learned, you have to love it. You have to love it. It consumes you. You have to have a real deep love for the game, which I do. I loved it. You know, probably because, yeah, my career, I suffered with injuries. I probably didn't have the career I wanted, and I always felt like I need to give something back. And, yeah, from day one, so I retired like on a Sunday. On Monday morning, I was in at Arsenal of the 18s, and I quickly realised that this is something that I need to get better at and work out. But I've enjoyed every step of that. How, speaking to every young manager that comes on, and obviously we've had experience from around the table, you've just come off back to back the feats. Yeah. And you've also had to postpone fixture. How do you, what are you like? I mean, everybody else is in an absolute nightmare. No, that's something that hit me hard when I first started. Not necessarily with the 18s, because results doesn't really come into it. But then I went to Norwich, and I was insistent, and we lost a lot. And then, last season, when I first took the step of being a manager, I hit me a lot. I hit me a lot, and. Yeah, it was something that I had to quickly get out of. What was it, you know, Jack? The loss. The loss is a way. The last long meal, you feel like a big responsibility. Yeah, and I always, I think we might said it. I don't come in the way to it, Thomas Frank saying about the 24-hour rule. And I remember thinking about that, and it was never 24 hours for me. It lasted longer. So, what did he say? Just let us, like, a win or a loss. Like, if 24 hours, you're never too high, or 24 hours, you're never too low. And after that 24 hours, you're done. You review it and whatever you move on. And it won't like that, won't like that. And there was some context as well, because of the club and what had been through the last two years of losing, losing, losing. And then, when you lost a game, you know, the feeling probably was going into League 1, that we're going to win every game here. And we're going to get out of this league, and that wasn't the reality. And yeah, I felt that a lot. That's something that I worked on in the summer. I'm better now. I'm better now, like, I think, if you're really clear on why, and you review everything, I think that helps. I think the people around you help as well. And we've been fortunate enough that there's not been many times where we've lost two in a row. You have to bring people back down as well, because, you know, you work really hard to get to a place, and you win games, win games, win games. And then all of a sudden, you lose two, and it's like, you go back and like, you've got to reassure people that, "No, it's fine. We're going to lose games." Like, Jamie watches a lot of League 1. It's crazy. There's a lot of chaos. Like, it's something you can't control. And, yeah, so I'm better at that, I would say. Just think about, when obviously, you're coaching, and watching you play as a football player, you will, like, complete football, take the ball. Is that your style now, the manager? Well, when I first went into the '18s, that was probably the idea I had. What I really loved about the '18s is, yeah, you've got to work with some really good players, but it's probably the other ones. The ones that are now on loan in League 2, on loan in League 1. Because the good ones, they're kind of, you know, it's like they find their way. And they're like miles and miles. And, yeah, you're just giving them the right challenge at the right time, rather than actually coaching them, like, how much better are you going to make miles at taking the ball and being someone? So that was probably my idea then, but then I quickly understood that the job is, yeah, first of all, give players to Mikkel, but then to give players a career. And I try to understand the other levels. And, yeah, I like, I want to, ideally, have a team that can take the ball and dominate the ball, because I think that's the best way to win games. However, that's not really, especially in League 1. We try, but, yeah, you have to be able to adapt. You have to have a variety of 100% at that level, because, yeah, ultimately, as well, what I think is in League 1, that we've got some really different players. We've got some good players. We've got some really good players that can take the ball. We've got some really good players that are aggressive, and you have to find the right balance for them all. What do you think, you said I watch a lot of League 1. I have done for the last few years, and when you come from a Premier League background where you're playing, where you watch probably four or five games over the weekend, it's almost like a shock to me, where you can almost, you're not quite sure if you're going to watch a game, who the good team is or supposedly, the bad, that's what I find really strange where is, when I'm in the Premier League, even if a smaller team can beat a big team, you almost feel like you know how they're going to beat them, they're going to maybe accept peace, or the top team have got a lot of possession. When you're in, when I'm watching games in League 1, basically, I watch a lot of Wiggins. Some players from Wiggins, Wiggins were bottom of the League a couple of weeks ago, went to Sheffield when they were top of the League, away from home, and should have won the game, but not in a way of sort of hanging on for the life, and that probably just summed up. Yeah, I think that got Wiggins. And we're going to, in my opinion, one of the best teams in the league in terms of how they play and what they want to do. I think you have to get the balance right in that league of playing because, yeah, you play against some teams. We played against Bradford a couple of weeks ago and they had 0.2 expected goals to be as 1-0. But they don't care. They don't care if we had 70% possession or what you have to do is, I think against those will be played Stevens. We lost the Stevens. We lost to Bradford. Stevens want absolute chaos that they want to play on balls. So then you have to go. I'll be as you are and I still play for Stevens. Yeah. And he wins it every duel. You put a ball up in it. So I feel like, like, with my team, and I feel we're going to similar that they want to play, but I feel with my team, if we go there and we start playing on balls or we start being aggressive, we're going to lose that game. So actually, when I review that game and I look at it and I go, right, we lost the game. And if you take them two goals out, which one is a foul on William Walsh and one is offside, we win the game 1-0. And actually, like, it won a great game. It's league 1. Sometimes the game is going to feel like that. And yeah, like, there was some frustration around from our fans as well that we didn't have enough for it in the game, but my argument to that would be, well, if we go there and we turn it into that type of game, same with Bradford, then you have to get the balance right because if you don't win that game, it looks terrible and it's like, oh, you just want to play, play, play. It's not the way. Yeah, I just feel like the league is like that, it's like that where I'm, I'm, stand on the side, I'm watching a game and I feel like we're in complete control here. Bradford score after five minutes and I'm thinking, these are what I'm conceived. Like, we're going to have the ball, we're going to play around, but they're completely fine with that. So, yeah, you have to get, the game management is really, really important in that league and probably like, in any league, trying to find some consistency of performances, but especially in that league, I think. But do you have to change your prints? It's a little bit jack, no, obviously gone forward because even at a young age and you're new to it, it is a little bit of survival in it for the manager because otherwise managers be losing their jobs. I know you've come from a good background where it's about coaching and development, but now you're in that game after a couple of defeats and it is survival in it. Do you feel that even already at this stage of the season? 100% 100% because, you know, people who have said before I got the job right, people say, what's your philosophy and I would be going bang, bang, bang, it's that. But it's not, it's winning like because if you don't win, you don't get time, you become under pressure, people make strange decisions and change under pressure, players change under pressure. So, you have to win, you have to survive. And then it's about, for me, is principles and philosophies is developing the individual within a playing style. So, you have to have a really clear idea and principles are important, but for example, if we're building up Roy, a principle that I would say and we have is play off the highest possible line. Now, sometimes the highest possible line might be able to go back to your goal if they close everything up and they're in a block. Sometimes it might be that they've got a really high line and you can get behind them straight away. But yeah, having a clear idea and then developing players towards that because also the other side of it, Roy as well, is that, you know, where we are as a club, we also have to develop players to sell to be able to make money and then survive. And yeah, but the main thing principles philosophy is winning games because it's. Without a club still a bit hungover even from the Premier League, would this be a few hangups without? Yeah, it definitely was when I first went in, I actually started at Lewin so I had an idea about the club and I obviously watched their journey for the years and how high they got after being so low and then probably for the first time in a lot of years, the first time where they had faced a little bit of adversity and double relegation, all of a sudden they find themselves in league one. Yeah, so going into it, I had my eyes open and I'm understanding in front of the players the first day and I'm thinking, you seem like their eyes are open, they're listening, they seem like they want to go on a journey and then the first game was Mansfield at home and yeah, I walk out in the stadium and clap the fans and get a nice reception and then straight away when the game starts, I feel like an energy in the stadium and there was some frustration and nothing, you know, from my point of view, from the players point of view, they probably understood it, they probably understood that two years ago Chelsea were coming there, Arsenal were coming there and now all of a sudden we're in league one and we're in a place where we're losing games in league one and we lost that game, we lost that game two and a half and yeah, it taught me a lot because the players, they needed a direction, they needed belief and then I feel like they needed someone that is just going to stand by that no matter what and be consistent with the messages and yeah, we went up, down, up, down and then we found a little bit of consistency at the end of the season but we're still in that place where we have to find that again and we have to fight that. So what's the expectation this year then is it simple to be in the mix to go up, yeah? Yeah, the expectation from the outside is that and from the inside as well, you know, we finished on 72 points last year and we missed out by one point in the playoffs on the last day so from my point of view and how our coach and how we work is to, I feel like we can get ten more points than we got last year which then puts us in a place where we're there or they're abouts but yeah, we need to work at that because like league one is crazy way like there's so much uncertainty and chaos in the game that, yeah, it's not because we've got good players, we don't get relegated, that's what we need to do. Can I just ask what you enjoy the most about it, isn't managing the players, is it being out on the grass? I've played a soccer with you and you could still play, do you join in training or? Sometimes, if only the small areas, once the players are on ground, what do I enjoy the most? Yeah, it changes, I love the players and generally I do, I feel like that is an important thing for any coach, any manager, that you do have to love your players and enjoy their company and enjoy spending time with them because the demands and the schedule is so much that you, yeah, you don't want them to feel like, don't get me wrong, you have high standards and when you're in the meet and room and you can challenge them but when you're outside and you're speaking to press and the media to protect them and show them that you love them. I love the players and I enjoy spending time with them, probably them winning but also I like planning a game, I do enjoy that part of it and looking at an opposition, sometimes I'm watching four games before we play them but I feel like I really enjoy that part of it. And that's why it's so intense isn't it? Did I read somewhere that you win it like quarter past six in the morning, is that what time you get in at? I don't know how I pal. When it's a long day? No, it is, absolutely. But not if you're going two days a week, just. I said we watch the real runes on Disney Plus. You know what? The real runes on Disney Plus. You know what? I want you to watch it and then when and his wife get fed up of each other. How many interviews can you do? I just want to tell you. He's one of our family. I don't tell you, no, I get it because I just love Colleen. I just adore her and the way the boys are. I just love it. I love the way Wayne is just like, yeah. It's just you're literally like a fly in the water. It doesn't feel like there's any like acting up or anything. We're going to get the real keen soon out. We're going to get them. We're going to get a cow. I think they'll come and do it. But why do people get dressed up in their host of dinner? And the host is spotless. New and normal. When people argue and they don't see us everywhere. You can't find your shoes. You can do it normal and stuff. Everyone dressed up, make a team behind them. I like this. This is us. We're just normal people. No, it's not normal. And it's all a dizzy year. John made me laugh when I went in, so I was as out right. He's got a boxing ring in his house. I've seen them at the kids, right? Yeah, he basically just says, right, they're having a good in there. Go behind the scenes with Wayne Rooney. Watch the real Rooney's a Hulu original series, new and exclusive on Disney Plus. I just wanted to say a huge thank you to SkyBet and Sky Vegas for supporting our brand new show Overlap Daily. From Friday, the 9th of October, we'll be on every weekday at 4pm with the day's biggest football stories. You'll hear the likes of Steven Gerrard, Joe Hart, Kelly Kakes, Jamie Carregor, Ashley Young, Gary Neville, Duncan Ferguson and Becky Ives across the week. Thanks for being part of it and I hope you enjoy the show. There's too many bank unions on this show. Football football football. It's what we talk about. Every day. So, starting Friday, come and join us on Overlap Daily. Every week, one day to Friday. From 4pm. Watch on Eugene. And listen, wherever you get your podcast. It's football. Football. In that order. Overlap Daily. We'll see you soon. Would you class it up as a coach or a manager? Well, when I've got the job, Gary Sweet, who's the CEO? Yeah, it's been really good to me. He looked me in my eyes deeply and said, "You're the manager of this football club." And I've obviously never experienced that one. - What does that mean compared to coach that in terms of your sort of sculpt? Are you agile recruitment and other things? - So I'm heavily involved in recruitment. Yeah, I think. And yeah, what he meant by that is, so how gluten is, you've got this training ground here, where it's just football really, and then you've got headquarters over like a three minute drive around the corner where it's, yeah, it's all like the management team and the exact team are there. So what he meant is, you're going to manage this environment, you're going to manage this training ground, which I've actually really enjoyed as well, and I had to learn pretty quickly, which I feel like you do. You know, I think X players, just because you played, and you maybe a good player doesn't mean you're going to be a good coach, but what I think it does give you is an idea of how you want an environment, it gives you an empathy for the players and what they're going through. But yeah, I like coaching as well. I do like being on a grass and trying to help the players and then give them my experience on the pitch, 'cause I feel like that's probably where my strength is at the moment. - I've always talked about this before on here about the fact of the dynamic between the CEO, the owner, the sporting director, the manager, and then the head of recruitment. - Yeah. - It's usually those four people, generally, that would have a say in sort of what comes into the football club. How's that process work with you in terms of, obviously, you would probably have a veto if you don't want to bring them in. They won't bring them in, but you're also, you won't be the anti-clapied, you're only one player or league two players, you know, being an Arsenal as an under 18 squad. So, how much do you delegate to the rest now, which you trust the rest of that team? - Yeah, so how it works out? - Alluren is CEO, Gary Sweet. I've got director of operations, James Mooney, and then me. And then, of course, we got head of recruitment, we actually changed the head of recruitment in the summer. We brought the guy from Heart's Inn, who's obviously got a good track record, it's slightly different, and there's data involved and stuff, and we've got data that we use. But, yeah, I feel like, actually, when I talk about, and when Roy asked about what the club was missing, and what we tried to do when we come in, the main thing was an identity, and we want to play like this, and we're going to recruit to this. - You don't think he had one, though? I mean, when Looting Day means the Premier League, I actually thought they had an identity. I thought, I mean, I went to watch a few games. I thought they were physical, they had the two strikers up top of the big leagues. - Yeah, that's right. - I thought, what do you mean, is the identity they had, you wanted to change me? - No, no, no, no, I don't think that. I think, well, my argument to that, as well, would be that it probably didn't work as well, then, right? They got relegated, they got relegated again. They lost a lot of them plays. You're talking about Colton Morris, I had a bio who was there when I got there, but was injured, and they lost that sort of, yeah, that identity and that spirit, right? And then, and listen, don't get me wrong, this is really hard when you get double relegation, and you still got parachute payments, and then you probably got a lot of money going to league one, to get that right, once you've lost all of that, and once you've got players there that, then someone to be there, someone to help the club, somewhere thinking, well, you know, we've got double relegation, there's relegation closing my contract, I want to go, and there was a few players like that when I walked in. We had a really good January, I fought, where we got some of them out, and, but yeah, then we had to find an identity, 'cause it was lost, I don't think, changing it, because if I went in, and, well, I mean, they obviously lost something because I was going in, and then the two relegations, yeah, as it was, was let go, so, yeah, we had to build an identity, because that one had gone. So, yeah, I think that's, if you're really clear with that, and the club back, you know, support you like they, they have done, and I'm, I'm really grateful for that, I'm grateful for the opportunity as well, because, like you said, you know, come from Academy football, then I spent six months at Norwich in the championship, but I didn't have that experience, and, you know, when I left Norwich, I was, I was sat there thinking, well, how am I going to get an opportunity? You kind of know, second season is around now at this time, but if someone sat someone in league one, where realistically was, was going to be the level I was going to go in at, what, what are they going to be looking for? They're going to be looking for someone, probably, to help them to, to survive, if not a first-time manager. So, I was really grateful for that, but then, yeah, I had to be, I had to be brave, and I had to be strong, it's saying, well, this is what I believe is the right way to do it, and we're going to have to recruit to this to see if he's going to work, and, yeah, we're still in that process, you know, we recruited eight new players in the summer. We got some really important players to stay, Jordan Clark stayed, and signed a new contract, whose Blue and Legend has been there for years, he actually went through on that journey to the Premier League League, and Walsh was important for that, as well. Casey Palmer came back, so we, we had like a core of the team, and then we had to add in players in and around that, and we've done that, and now they need time to sell. Is Liam Walsh the jackpill shirt you want to see him? Yeah, you know what, like, the coaches call him Liam Walsh, yeah. So, I don't want to talk about him, but what do the other players. What do the other players call him, son of Jack. Son of Jack, son of Jack. Yeah, no, he's excellent, he's top player. He should, he's been injured through the years, and that's probably why he's at that level, but his brain and, yeah, he's a good player. Does, does Arsenal Banger influence you, and does he have any, do you speak to him, in terms of sort of, like, your managerial style and the style of play? I wouldn't say he necessarily influences me with that, and I think that's really hard, like, I'm thinking, you're wrong, I work with some good coaches, and all different, but Arsenal had top players in England, and he would just, and Brian, who, like, almost put you in, on the pitch and in sessions, like, in situations, and say, "Go on, go and solve it," and the players would solve it, and, so I wouldn't say that, I think, maybe with, with how we work, like, always with the ball, I think that's important for players, especially, yeah, I think Arsenal's way was, it's a, it's a game of, of making decisions, decision-making, and if you can be technically clean enough, you give yourself more time to make better decisions, so probably that is something that I think, but also, I'm aware that we're in league one, and, yeah, there's slightly, different way of working, I think, you know, when I played under Arsenal, we would have the ball for 75-80% of the game, and it would be about breaking down the team, and training would represent that. But in terms of his, his management, and, like, the responsibility he gave to players and the trust, yeah, probably a little bit of that. Would he be your biggest influence, Jack, in terms of your. - Yeah, I think so, yeah. I think so, and. - There's been loads, Gary, like, I think, you know, I think I've had really good influences, I've had some influences that weren't necessarily good for me, like, in terms of the situation, I don't think David Moyes, when I was at West Ham, and he came in, and, yeah, I knew I wasn't going to play, he was pretty clear with that, but actually, I loved it. I loved the way he set the environment, the training sessions he put on. You weren't going to play because of style. The style situation that the club was in, you know, Pellegrini brought me in for a certain style, and then David Moyes come in to help the club survive. So, yeah, I knew that wasn't the case, I knew also that, my time there was probably coming to an end, so, but he was really good with me. So, yeah, and then I went to Bournemouth in 2016, and worked with Eddie Howell, and it was something that I've never seen before, you know, coming from an awesome Wenger environment to Eddie Howell on day one, he's screaming in the players' faces, and that's. I sound would never do that. So, yeah, a lot of influences. I'll send probably the biggest one. Just take us back to Eddie Howell, because people probably look at Eddie when he does his interviews, and the CM is being quite calm, but you go and listen to people, but I went up to Newcastle, spend a few hours with him, he's in tentative, and his obsession is huge, isn't it, in terms of what he wants from you? Yeah, I remember a few times, not clashing with him, but having, like, strong conversations with him and going to see him, and that coming across me, and he used to say to me, "Yeah, but Jack, I bought these players from League 2, "now we're in the Premier League, "like, they have to compete at this level every single day." And what I liked about him, as well, you know, for Bournemouth at the time, I'd come from Arsenal, that was the only place I'd ever been, and I remember my first game, it was Man City away, and we lost 5-0, I was terrible. It was terrible, and I remember coming in and dressing him after, and him, like, basically going to every player and, like, the same way things, and I was thinking, "What's he going to say to me?" He said that he just went, "And you, I bought you here to keep the ball, "not give it away," and then just moved on. (laughter) He happened with that? Oh, no. (laughter) That's the bread and butter with the King's ball. Now, he was excellent, Eddie. Yeah, actually, like, sometimes I speak to Arsenal, but I speak to Eddie more now. You speak to Eddie, what about just jamming the job and just sort of experience? Yeah, we took one of his players in the summer, Harrison Aschby, right back, we took him alone, and I had a really good conversation with him there, and, yeah, he's always someone that reaches out when something happens in my life, or I get the loot and job, he's always, one of the first ones that takes me, yeah. Did you feel a big pressure going to Bournemouth, because obviously from Arsenal, were you the one that was coming in to kind of set the standard, and was it a lot of pressure? Um, yeah, a little bit, but it was kind of, um, yeah, it was strange where it happened, you know, so at that point, Roy had just left. It was 2016 after the Euro's, um, after the Iceland game, and I went back to preseason, I was in that England squad, and maybe I shouldn't have been, because I didn't play much that season, but that's what I love, Roy, because he always had that trust in me. But then, I went back to preseason, I knew this is a really important preseason for me. Um, Sam Adledis got the England job, I had a full preseason, um, and then I started the season on the bench for Arsenal, and first England squad came out, and I wasn't in it. So I went to see Arsene, and I was said to him, Boss, I need to get back in the team, tell me what I need to do. do. Like, do I need to go on loan? He just went 'yes'. No, weren't you ready for that? No, I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready. It was like the day before deadline day. So then I went to call my agent and said, "Look, this is a situation. He was just as shocked as I was, and met a few coaches and parted you. He was at Palace, spoke to David Moise, he was at Sunland at the time, and then Eddie and Jason Tindall came into my agent's office and sold me the dream." So there was a little bit of pressure, but I also knew the expectation of what he really wanted from me. And also, I've got friends now at Bournemouth, so there was a really good group of lads I went into and they welcomed me straight away. And you could see why they were successful because they were hardworking, they were honest, and yeah, they welcomed me in. This episode of 'Stick to Football' is brought to you by Disney+ The Premier League is nearly back and so is Super 6. The £1m jackpot is waiting and it stays at £1m until someone wins it. Six matches, six score predictions, get them all right and you could become a millionaire. It's completely free to play and the next round kicks off on Saturday. 18+ TNC's apply. This episode of 'Stick to Football' is brought to you by Disney+ Take us back to Arsenal then when you're 16, Jack and you make your debut because you're a boy wonder basically at that time, aren't you? Yeah, I was, yeah. I couldn't take the ball, but you're a boy. My debut was Blackburn away and yet I was, I was good, but I didn't think it would come that quick. Remember that the preseason before that I was, so I was 16, it'd been my first year as a scholar. And I remember Bakery Sanya was coming back from injury, so the fitness coach Tony Colbert, remember Colbs. He wanted a few academy players around Bakery to get fit and ready for preseason, so it was me and Henry Lansbury. And I even remember after that first week, Tony fanking us and saying to Henry R, you'll become a preseason with us. And I was just like, yeah, fine, I'm going to my first one with the academy. That must have been 2008 and at that point it was a Euro rose, so a lot of the first team players were away and a few academy players went over and, yeah, I impressed and I was on the trip to Austria and that was a lot, that was intense. But again, I impressed, I played in the Emirates Cup, and it's funny when you're a young player, you kind of go from this young kid who's just happy to be there to really quickly then like, well, I need to play now, I want to play in. I always think that, I always think that. I didn't probably learn or realise until after I came back from Bolton that I wasn't nowhere near at that point. I think that was the season as well, where it went from five subs to seven subs which done me a favour, so I was on the bench a lot. And then we were falling up against Blackburn and you put me on for Van Persie and probably touchable twice, but no, it was a good day. But yeah, when I looked back, I wasn't ready to play in that team. Who were the midfielders you were competing with to get in at that? The Arby. Who was a joke? He was a good player, didn't he? So unfortunate. Wow, what a player. Cessk. Cessk was there. I think Flamini was there at that point as well. Right, too. The Nielsen. They brought Aaron Ramsey in. So, would Fabricass have been sort of at that time the level that you were looking at in terms of a standard? I remember when I was 12 coming through, and I was at Hellend in the academy, and Cessk making his debut as a 16-year-old and thinking, wow, that people asked me who my idol was and I played with Cessk. When I was really young, it was Joe Cole, but then when I was about 12, it was Cessk. And yeah, he was, I always, he also then gave me belief Gary that, right, if you're good enough, it doesn't really matter how old you are. I'll ask him, it's going to give you a chance. And he had to be good, don't get me wrong. And yeah, that's probably as well something that for my time coaching in the academy, there's a big difference now with the young players, because I knew that when I was 15, 16 and they did, they brought Aaron Ramsey. If you're not at the level, they're going to bring someone else in from abroad, they brought him from Arida, and they don't have the ability to do that now, which gives English powers and their players a little bit more power. But yeah, I knew that the level was really, really high. And if you weren't at that level, they're going to get someone else. Do you feel if you've been at a different club, I mean, we'll come on to sort of our England treat skillful players. We'll talk about sort of Cole Palmer, Morgan Gibbs-White, Folding, that type of, but you fit into that sort of category of skillful player. Do you feel you were looking at Arsenal? Was the manager at Arsenal around that time for to bring you in? Because you would have been quite small at the time you'd have been, you know, you'd have been so not the quickest, but technically, you're at exceptional. Yeah, I think there wasn't many English players like that, right, at that point, and then people started having a conversation around where we need more, we need players that can accept the ball, and now we've got loads. There's, you know, too many to fit into one team, probably at this current point. But yeah, probably the Arsenal was a manager, but also, yeah, and that was down to Arsenal. Arsenal played the way they did. They wanted to dominate the ball at that point as well. You know, I always think this, when I think about Arsenal and his time at Arsenal. During the early days, and certainly when I got into the teams, that was probably later days for him, but early days for me, we wouldn't do any analysis. We wouldn't do any preparation for a position. It was about us. It was about, we've got good players, we're going to take the ball, we're going to have the ball for 75% of the time, and it's about breaking down the opposition. I always feel like then, when teams started to analyse a little bit more, and they got, and they started doing better preparation, I always felt like that was them where we sort of dropped out of the top four. We didn't challenge as much, because I felt like teams were preparing better than us, and in the early days, we probably made up that with the quality of players we had, and probably against the lesser teams in the league, we still probably made that up, but we would start, I felt, less prepared than the opposition. It's interesting you say that, because it's always said that Arsenal Venga changed the dynamic of the game in the late '90s, that he brought in sports science, nutrition, what would be fitness, the way in which the coaching programmes would work, but when you speak to people from Arsenal who played on the Arsenal under Arsenal Venga, he wasn't analytical, he wasn't someone who did the coaching on the pitch. I always imagined he was like the coach on the pitch, I could pretty think of him as the professor. So you're always imagining professor, he must be a real detail guy, and what you're suggesting there is that actually Arsenal fell behind in the latter years on the sort of what will be development and sort of new methodologies, that's what you sort of say, which just stuns me in writing from a point of view of Arsenal and how people view him. Are we viewed him externally? Yeah, I think he gave me a lot of help and a lot of detail, but it was more like individual stuff, it'll be individual chats, and you wouldn't go into like positioning and stuff like that, it would be more about like your decision-making and your body shape to receive and stuff like that, but yeah, in terms of, you know, we reviewed a game, but it was, I remember it was like a TV, put the video in and you basically just showed the highlights of the goal and he would talk for it a little bit, but there wasn't, yeah, for much of the day. Yeah, there wasn't loads of meetings and stuff like that, and he was big on the nutrition side, and you sleep and everything like that, and that's obviously when people say he changed the game, and in 90s it was like a drinking culture, and people were sleeping and they were, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but the story is about when he first went into the Arsenal, he said it was a pat race with him, and he said that one of the, these are the stories that go on, stop talking to players, let him figure things out. Yeah, he came in at one time, Roy, we came, I think we were, we were one no down or something, Chef, I don't know, I was playing against him, he came in, it was his first game, or the first second game and pat rising, it's the time they're coming in, and he just started screaming and shouting everyone, and he just stopped him in his tracks to the point where we went like that, don't shout with the players, don't shout with the players, that's all he said. Then he never spoke because we had to have that, because he was the first manager that we, we had like ten minutes, ten minutes, come in, remember, turn to 15 minutes, you know, he wouldn't say anything. Yeah, who did he always the same? No one was allowed to speak for the first two, five minutes when you come in the dressing room at a half time. It was really sweet. I said it was like 12 minutes. 12 minutes, easy, 12 minutes. So he just talked the last three minutes. Yeah, and the last time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everyone would be sitting there saying that. Well, nothing. That's all going to reach up then. Sometimes you know, sometimes you would say something to somebody like you need to push in, isn't it? But everyone's just sitting there. It was, I found it very, very strange. The first time I ever saw that was with England, because I was at United, obviously, when we came in the dressing room. Why wouldn't this sat there at 12? It was quite, well, just me, Jill. The players would be talking to each other, and sometimes the manager might say, "Sit the fuck down." Yeah, so you get that, and they need to start talking. He wouldn't wait. But Sven said, "I think Sven went Sven came in." It was interesting because Steve McLaren was his number two. Sven's number two, and Steve McLaren's worked at United, and he was saying to us, "What do you think of this new thing?" And I thought, "It makes a bit of sense, actually." Because sometimes, the manager comes in, physios are trying to treat people with ice packs and sort of drinks, and people are going to the toilet, and people are walking in the subs that are late. So Sven had this thing that basically, for two or three minutes, you'd basically leave the players, leave the physios to do the jobs. I'll come in three minutes when everything's settled down, because the manager used to say to me that sometimes the physios. - He would have done it. - Yeah, but Venga wouldn't come in at all. - In the dressing room? - No, it would be in that little doctor room when we was at Iberin or wherever he was in. - They were beating us and they didn't even have a coach. But we're sitting around waiting for someone to come in like. - We're in a Texan each other, aren't we? - Yeah. - You know what I think? - But I kind of disagree with that. I know every manager is different, because I think it's nice to get hit players quickly as they're sitting down with what's going on in the game. Some of you were 10 or 15 minutes. - I don't know. - I'd like to talk to the 10 minutes, but the thing with Hulu, I did like it, almost for everyone was waiting for him to spit on. It's almost everyone's done things, bits and bobs. Maybe you're arguing with your mates or over the goal or the stuff. - Yeah, but you're chatting amongst yourselves. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Are you saying you were sitting in silence? - There was a little bit. - Yeah, but the King of Courses talked like this, but it wasn't like. - No one would stand up and. - No, right. But now, though, Jack, because when we used to come in at half-time, the analysis would be playing clicks. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Like from the. - Yeah, so, yeah, very right now, when my youth team coach was Steve Bolt, but he would come in and he would go bang, bang, bang, and then all of a sudden, I said it, and I'm sat there like, and Boldy was on the staff as well, so I'm taking that Boldy must be going, "What's going on here?" (laughing) But now, yeah, so we actually played around with this a lot, because last season, we conceded the most goals just after half-time. - Your team, yeah. - What's going on? - What we doing wrong here, so we reviewed it all, and. Yeah, it's. We've improved it, definitely now. And what I would do is, yeah, three or four minutes, I'd leave the players, like Chris Powell and my assistant, he'd go in and he'd kind of get a feel for where they're at, the physio would then speak to Chris Powell, Chris Powell, come back to me. I'm sat with the analyst and saying, like, show me this and this, and then I might go in and show them one or two things, but a lot of the time, as well, I think, you know, when you have that available to you, I think coaches can just overuse it, and sometimes it's not a tactical thing, sometimes they just need a little bit of. - Yeah, of course, yeah. - Or something like that, so. Yeah, and then I'll speak to them probably for no longer than four minutes, so let's say I'll go in after five, four, and then they've got this weird period last year, I didn't like it, where I'd stop speaking. As soon as I stop speaking, they're like, "Yeah, come on, let's go." And then they've got this period where it's like five or six minutes, so, yeah, we paid around with it. - Yeah, it wasn't there a team talk that went five or recently, it was a redden, and these were getting big two-nil, and then it's just you, like, in your one-three-two. - Yeah, you wouldn't put it out if we lost. (all laughing) - What were you snapping? - No, but it was good. - Who was sitting there? - Oh, it went five or? - It was good, down now. - Yeah, I was a bit controlled, you were a controlled. - Yeah, you snap. - I have done. - You snap to a player when we had to use a coach, you snap quite a bit. I mean, I think the reason that we'll talk about you, be a reason you're injured quite a bit was your enthusiasm and exuberance, and you sort of. - Yeah. - If your touch was bad, you'd almost follow after things, then you'd go in and. - Yeah. Yeah, but I think there's a real strength in. Snapping or being a little bit more to the point at times. I feel like you need to earn the players trust and you can't do it too much because then the players are just going, "Oh, I'm shouting again, I'm owning again." But there definitely is the right time, yeah. - They're receptive to you, they're good though. Not good, no, I'm not sure about you. - Do you know what? I've got a really, really good captain, his name's Count Asimif, and he said to me on day one, if you need to, his words, open me up in front of everyone, do it if it helps. - Wow. - Yeah, I've got a really good senior group of players who've got Nackie Wells, I've got Count Asimif, Jordan Clark, who throughout their career, Jordan Clark played for Akronton Stanley, he would have experienced all types of coaching. But then you think about the younger players, like the ones who have come from a cat-one academy, and it's very much like, "Oh, you can't do this, "you can't say that to them, so they need a different type." But you have to get the balance right with that. - You've got good staffer on job, obviously. - Yeah, help your spell. - Right, okay. - He helps a lot. I brought a guy with me from Arsenal, from the co-star Tim, his name is. I brought a guy with me who was actually on my A-license, I use a tutor. And then I inherited Kevin Pilkington, you know? - Yeah, yes. - He's like, "Oh, he's top, he's top." He talks about you all the time. (all laughing) And he's good, and Kevin Foley. So yeah, I've got, like he was a Lewin legend. Remember Kevin Foley? - That's right. - Yeah, right into the law. - So yeah, that's improved. - Yeah, yeah. - So it feels good to act there, you know? Have you got, do you feel like this team can do something? You look at me thinking, "Yeah, I feel like we can do something." - I do, and I look at the league as well, like Jamie said, and there definitely is an opportunity there. We have to improve in the final third. Like, we get there all the time, and I think we get there the second most in the league, and our XG is really low, which is, yeah, we need to improve that. Like, definitely, but there is an opportunity, and I feel like with the group of players, like they're all in, that's a nice feeling, that is a nice feeling, and yeah, and good stuff around me as well. (upbeat music) - This episode of Stick to Football is brought to you by Disney Plus. (upbeat music) - Yeah, I can actually go back to your career, and the feeling of you coming as a 16-year-old, so you're a boy wonder if it's not normal that a player comes in at such a young age. And I always think of players who so much is expected of, and because of that, I think if they all walk out sometimes, what I think, you get to put on a wheel, a cup squat at 17, so you have an almost automatic thing, "Oh my God, this is going to be off the scale." Out of the difficult is for you, sort of mentally with that expectation, as a youngster of what you're going to see, to sort of ever live up to being seen as he's going to be, as soon as he's greatest players, or as like a newly-embrady or something like that. - Yeah, to be honest, Jamie, I didn't ever really feel that. I didn't ever get there, right? Because probably of injury. Which, also at the time, when you're injured, I never felt like, I'm not going to get back to the level, whether I was a little bit naive at that time to think that, yeah, you can be injured and just come back, which I probably learned as I've got a little bit older. But also, my career was done really early, even, I think, about something for West Ham at 26. And yeah, I wasn't the same player as I was at 24, 23 at that point. And, yeah, that was hard to take, but also, it gives you an opportunity to, like, I started then, if you'd have asked me when I was going to be at 21, 22, I was going to be a coach, and I was said, no. But then at 26, and you're almost forced to think about other things. But in terms of, like, pressure and stuff, I never, generally, when I think about the players that I coached at Arsenal, they're now getting into the first team. But I don't think they think about that. They're so, like, we'll process and we need to do this, to get to that point, we need to do this, to get to that point. Yeah, you don't really think too far ahead. It's almost about, what do I need to do to get into the team? Why not, I'm in the team, what do I need to do to stay in the team? The media can bring pressure for a young industry, can't they? Yeah, that was weird. That was weird, I remember, when I was 16, playing in there, it was a carling cup at the time, against Sheffield United, and I lived in the two up, two down in Hitchin, and the next day, the Daily Mail, or outside my house, trying to speak to my mother and my dad. And that was a bit strange. And probably, as well, the most pressure I probably did feel was, when you're injured, when you're injured, you become a better player, and all of a sudden, Arsenal, and they need Jack Wilshire, and it wasn't the case. So yeah, and then probably coming back, not to the same level, but then, I'll try and say this to my players at a moment, because there is so much now outside influence, an expectation, and a social media, that you get to a point in your career, and probably in your life, where you've had everything, you've been battered, you've been caught out drinking, you've been caught out, getting into trouble, and people have said, "All they have to say about you," and you get to a point where it's kind of like, "You can deal with it, you build a resilience to it," and yeah, I got to that point quite early, I would say. From what was the injuries, Jack, what was the type of injuries you were getting, was it? Yeah, so the first one was my ankle, and the main problem was that. Oh, was that right? Yeah, I remember I was playing, it was at the end of my first season, I played about 54 games, it was load related, and people were saying, "Oh, you shouldn't have played as much." You know, it's like you tried telling a young lad, "Of course, you're really well playing for Arsenal, playing for England, that he's not going to play games, you just, yeah, I wouldn't listen to that." So, I don't blame anyone, but I played a lot of games that year, and I remember playing, it was a World Cup qualifier against Switzerland at Wembley, and I remember after the game thinking, what my ankle saw here, and trying to think back into the game, like did someone tackle me, was there a bad tackle, and I couldn't think about it. So then I went off in the off season, came back down a preseason, still had a little bit of discomfort at my ankle, and ended up getting a scan, and it was like, it was a small band called The Taylor, which no one's seen before, no one's seen, it was a snowboarders injury, where they locked in and they swore for older. And I ended up getting that pinned, and it wasn't until years later when I took the pins out, when I went to West Ham at 26, 27, and James called it a surgeon, he showed me the notes, and we was looking through notes, and let me see them, and he didn't expect me to be paying at that point. Which, yeah, which, if I'm known at the time, would have been probably a little bit different, but, yeah, that was the main issue, and then there was things that went wrong from there. There was some impact injuries as well, that I couldn't do anything about, but the main problem was my ankle was. Did the thing you wouldn't play again that after. No, they thought I would play, but not for long. Oh, okay. Yeah, not for long, yeah. Did they say that? No, they didn't say it at the time. They said it at the time. It was a constant ankle problem. No, I'd done the fuse, he'd done it, James called it. Fuse the ankle. Did it worth it? Yeah, by the time I'd done mine, yeah. I couldn't move over, right? You know, bone on bone, it was just a nightmare. for the next video. Mae'n gyda'r gwneud yng Nghymru a'r gweithio yn gweithio. Mae'n yw'r yw'n yw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw'r ymw' yw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio. Ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio. Ymw'n gweithio'r ymw'n gweithio. Ymw'n gweithio. Mae'r gwaith, mae'r gwaith yng Nghymru, mae'r gwaith yng Nghymru, mae'r g Felly, yw'n gweithio bod yn yw'n gweithio bod yw'n gweithio bod yw'n gweithio bod yw'n gweithio bod yw'n gweithio Dwi'n gwneud. Mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud. Dwi'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwneud, mae'n gwne Mae'n gweithio'r gwybod yn gweithio. Mae'n gweithio'r gwybod yn gweithio. Mae'n gweithio yn gweithio yn gweithio. Mae'n gweithio yn gweithio. Mae'n gweithio yn gweithio yn gweithio yn gweithio. yw'r gweithio i'r gallu'r gweithio ni'r gweithio ni'r gweithio ni'r gweithio ni'r gweithio ni'r g Mae'n gwaith, mae'n gwaith o'n gwaith o'n gwaith o'n gwaith o'n gwaith o' Mae'r gweithio bod yn dweud yn gweithio bod yn gweithio bod yn gweithio bod yn gweithio bod yn gweithio bod yn gweithio bod yn gwe yw'n gwaith ymw'r yw'n gwaith ymw'n gwaith ymw'n gwaith ymw'n gwaith ymw'n gwaith ymw'n gwaith Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes i'n gweithio'r oes. Mae'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n ni'n Mae'n yng Nghymru yn yw'r ysgol yn yng Nghymru yn ysgol yn Yng Nghymru yn yng Nghymru yn yng Nghymru yn Yng Nghymru yn Yng Nghymru yn Yng Nghymru yn Yng Nghymru say the sports scientists will say they're not to do that today and you have to listen to it. Is that how it works? You're in charge of that, but then that also makes you accountable. And so you can to ignore them's dangers because they're medical? Yeah, when you don't know, but that is actually probably when people ask me about my coaching career and that's one of the the things I'm most proud about is how we push that and we raise the bar and yeah, like that is, I get it, I get it and the academy is a different now, you know, I do a double session when I was coming through and if the session weren't right in the morning, Steve Bold would then take you out and he was running you. Not the fitness coach, Steve Bold was saying you get a run and you wouldn't, you'd look at him thinking there's no way I can run here, but you'd get through it and it creates something in you that you could get through that and yeah, that wasn't there. I always go back to something you said that's probably when you were there when you were with England and you were talking about, I don't know it was, it wasn't one of the coaching staffs, someone above you who's going through how many days you actually trained the players because they turned up and said I'll play the game yesterday, I've got a two-day recovery and then you'd have the day before again and then you'd be like, when are they actually on the pitch? Well, the player you play, let's say he's playing on a Sunday and then they're meeting up on the Sunday evening and then you've got a game on a Friday and this was Roy used to go crazy at this because he was the fitness coach. With England, Chris, Chris Neville. So effectively, if you're having a two-day recovery, you're not training for you to Wednesday and then Thursday is the day before again and Roy used to have got 24 hours with him so that that was a real frustration obviously, I mean you'll have had it obviously with Ireland as well Roy, where you have that, but I mean what is sort of right or wrong obviously you go off data, you go off science and you have to listen to it and we're probably looking at setting, but I think in my rescue at Chelsea, you almost felt like one of the reasons why he lost his job was that sort of internal conflict with the physios and sports scientists and you go back to when we were younger and I don't really like doing that because you know the game moves on in different ways but I remember one time when we were in the youth team, we were the reserve team as well and they had we had a youth club game on a Tuesday and a reserve game on the wedding, we used to play both nights, just played 90 minutes, but there was no ever thought that you would do that. You know what I mean and it's just like I think sometimes it's like yes you want to use the data and you don't want people to get into like 100% get that, but there's also that time of where I don't know what the balance is, you probably know they're not more being in the game, where's that thing, look sometimes you've got to push on because in the game, you can't run on the game, can you just have someone on the show and say he's going to have to come out? Chris, that principle of taking your body and training to a place that's got basically quite uncomfortable, so that the game becomes of what people get into that place uncomfortable thing. No, not as much, I think you're right, you have to get a balance right, I think there's so many people now in academies, it was a big department, the performance department and don't get me wrong, they had some really good things, my challenge and my question was do we have enough people that understand the level that they're going into, so yeah fine, Max Downman, Ethan, Miles, they're going to go on, they're going to play under Mikkel, but what about the ones who go into League 1 and you see the demands that Saturday, Tuesday, and you can't rotate, you don't have the ability to do that, so yeah that was my thing, and there was so many things within that, Jamie, like I remember a story of Don Howe, I didn't have a word with Don Howe, but I remember the physio David Wales, he was my physio and him telling me the story that he would wait for the player, the players that come in from training and say you're right, you're right, you're right, Don Howe, like grabbing him, saying don't you ever ask if they're all right, they need to go through that, now that's gone, the game's changed a little bit, but you have to get that balance right, where there was, there would be a physio or physios when the players are under it into coming in, saying you're right, and I remember having conversations with them, saying if someone would have asked me every day if my career was all right, and if I was a little bit like insecure, and I would have said nothing. You do ask you every morning now, don't they, how you feel, and you might yourself out of whatever it is, ten or whatever it might be, I mean, I love working with Don Howe, I mean, blessed he was absolutely incredible, but how would you build that mental and physical toughness in young players if they are constantly being, most managed is the wrong word, but if they're being protected against all the work, which the only way to get to a point of getting the balance, what you're obviously not going to do the day before again, but if you've got to spare a week or a few days, you do push them, and I remember one of our first games and I would do it with Ireland with Matt, and I was up night before the game where you got in the stadium, you have a little game at the end, I think we were having a game, like seven or eight minutes each way, just small so, I think I'd have to try our four minutes on the fitness courses came over to me, no, I'd manage at the decent, I've played at the decent level, and he's come over and he went, just to let you know I've just fought, they've been out of four minutes now, go easy, yeah, and I just, okay, I've got it down, I saw Matt a train I went, never, ever, ever come up to me on the train again, like, it was like six minutes each way, is that like, we want to do it in a half an hour each way, so it's just getting that balance, and bond is with your staff, yeah, that's it, sometimes it is that, but if you've got, again, it's the day before again, that's what you've got to be careful of our two days, but when you're for three weeks, you have pushed the players, of course. Max Dauman, where does that get to in terms of talent, because obviously we watched him, we see the sort of way in which he's developing, you've worked with him, where does that go? Honestly, Gary, I've nipped even the miles were good, and I love them, and they're both good at different things, and they'll play at the top top level, but Max, and I don't want to put too much pressure on them, right? But honestly, Gary, he played in my team at 13, 13, he played in the 18s, and we're playing at Southampton, who's a good academy, and we'd lost some players to 21s, so I was like, I'm going to bring Max and everyone's a bit like, I said, no, don't worry, I'm going to call his dad, I'm eating the car park, we're not about him, and like I got the car and he was like, told them he already was 13, like really confident kid, he was on the bench, and then we were winning 2-0, and I said to my assistant, Birch said, come on, let's get Max on, come on, let's get him on, so I stood next to him on the sideline, and I said, look, Max, you're playing against players at five years older than you here, but don't get into a joule, like one or two charged movie around, he's like, yeah, he picked up the ball, I promise you, he's a good round of five players, he squared it, and we're freeing it up, and I just looked at my assistant, like, I've never seen anything like it going, and then he obviously then went on with us and developed a little bit more physically, physically his numbers were a joke, like a joke, in terms of what, just hitting the metrics they use now, like your high speed running, your sprint, your total distance, they were like, Premier League level, he's 14, he's physically unbelievable, he can be what he wants, he's got a good family around him as well, but yeah, he's obviously got stuff to do, he needs to get into the team, he needs to stay into the team, where's he going to play in the end? I think he plays inside, yeah, like Urdu Guard type position. Yeah, when he played with me, we played him in all the positions in midfield, and don't go wrong, he was out under 18's football, but he was really young, and he can play in all of them, he obviously then got into the team, which is pretty normal with a young player, they get into the team on the wing, you'll probably have to do that if you want to run in the team, pound the sides, but yeah, he's very, very good. I just talked about Mikel and Arsenal in terms of, you've talked about Arsenal Venga before, but Mikel feels the absolute polar opposite in terms of everything just feels like it's designed, they're obviously, he's built a brilliant team, a title winning team, what's your thoughts in terms of how Mikel's done and the job he's done and what you've witnessed there when you've been with him? Yeah, so Mikel, I came back and I was about a club and I trained, I trained with with the first team, I was trying to stay fit, Mikel was a gaffer and I was on my A license, I was coaching in the 18's, and I was, you know, during that early spell, I wasn't there, when Mikel first came in, he kept talking about process, process, process, and he was for straight Arsenal fans, and I was probably the same as them, like what do you mean process, process, process, and when I got there, after a week I saw it, I saw it straight away, and what was he doing? He was just, don't worry, he taught me, he taught me that, so he was working with 30, 35-year-olds, 28-year-olds, no matter what coach them, they want to be coached, and I'm talking about coaching, about body position to receive, first touch, time into move, and that stuff that you'd have been taught when you was 14, 15, but he would go into it all the time, and then you'd arrive in the morning, there'd be a meeting that he was highlighting, that in the meeting, and you could see that he, all of this little individual stuff was building up into like a team structure thing, he had, he was then, similar to Eddie, similar to Eddie in terms of how intense he was, and how he would drive and push the players, and then I was fortunate enough, like to then sit in like his planning meetings, how he would organise his staff, the roles he would want from his staff, how he would plan physically, like, okay, we want to push the players, but does he run the players? Does he run the players? Yeah, yeah, how hard they worked was, I was there, I was training in it, I was like, I can't do this, I can't do this, and yeah, as much as there is loads and loads of details, probably what he taught me was like, don't, don't miss the basics, like you're receiving your first touch, and how hard you need to compete, and how hard you need to run, I mean, yeah, he was-- with the players in terms of team talks and things like that, yes. You've seen Lee, the documentary, he's a lot of that, like he, yeah, he's got high standards and what about the set pieces? You'll make Nico. I said something about him two or three years, I just, yeah, I mean, look, he's done an incredible job and continues to do an incredible job. Yeah, I think I just said that I didn't see the goalkeeping coach stand up every time a goalkeeper makes a say. I mean, I felt as though he was, yeah. I think he's proven to be fair that he's done an unbelievable job. Yeah, first of all, Nico is a top-top guy. He was. That's good to know. Yeah. No, I'm genuinely like, I remember when I was in the academy and I said to him, Nico, help help me and my staff and I do, I can meet him for us so we can sort of, I don't need to know everything. I think he's not going to give his secrets away. But can you help us? And he was. He wasn't. It wasn't always like that. You know, it's like first team in the academy. First team always really, really focused and he gave us his time. And yeah, like it's a culture, it's a culture thing, I remember. So they would use the academy players, the Mikael and the first team. But they would use them for indoors. So they would use them when they went outdoors, but they would use them for indoors. To practice the set pieces. So they'd do the first team. Yeah, so on this pitch they would be like, Mikael was taking the team through the structure thing with 10 under 18s in the shape of Westam, for example. And then on the other side, Nico was doing a walk through on set pieces. And I was thinking, imagine doing that in your day, like the players would just go like, no, we're not doing that. What's going on here? And of course, what helps is that they, they were not really successful with it and they scored loads of goals from it. Yeah, it was like a culture thing that just changed completely. It's another level to say, how long did this bend on it, would you say? They'd do 10 minutes of that and then they'd flip. So they'd experience both the structure of the team and then the set pieces. Everyone knew their role. Have you taken some of those sort of set pieces that… [laughter] The guy that I've bought with me from Arsenal, actually his last role was Nico's assistant. Okay. Yeah. So it's quite interesting. What's your set piece record like? Last year it was excellent. This year it's not great. But is that defending our attacking? I'm defending both. Both, of course. But yeah, we scored a lot from attacking. This does also go back to delivering people wanting to attack it. Delivering people. Yeah, yeah. And yeah, the other thing is these new rules, I think they have affected the players. The holding. Yeah, the holding. And it affects the players a little bit, like because they don't want to then get into it. So, I do think that's influenced it a little bit, but yeah, we need to be better with delivering stuff. I don't think Arsenal's got a goal from a set piece this year, isn't that dear? We're trying something else. We're trying. [laughter] It plays short a lot now. Yeah. We've seen just play some short stuff. We've mixed it up, James. [laughter] Quick, five questions. Best player you ever played with. Wayne Mooney. Toughest opponent. Mmm. Moose of Dembelly. Wow. I remember him, he's so tough of me. Best atmosphere you've ever had up at played in. Um. Hamfield. [laughter] Best manager. You've ever played under. Oh, I see. Favorite goal. Is it that one? The favorite goal's got to be there. No, I don't know. England one, I like that one. England left foot into the top corner. Yeah, but Joseph, did I ask someone why you. Yeah, that was nice because that was like, that's what we've worked on. That was a team one. That was a team one. Yeah. Yeah, but the England one on the edge of the boxes. Yeah, the England one. And the biggest moana that you've ever played with. Mmm. Lexi Sanchez. Is it? What's he? Yeah. Wait, in what way? If you were doing a light day, you'd want to do a hard day. If we were doing a hard day, we'd do it. [laughter] What happened? What do you think Tim at United when he came? I don't know. He shouldn't have left, should he? Really. Um. We got Mickitt Aaron, didn't we? The other way. And he was good. Um. I don't know. He was a marina, didn't he? Yeah. I don't know how Jose works, but what I would say is that someone like him would have to change for marina. And, um, yeah, he had a lot of freedom at Arsenal, where, because he would win you a game and dribble past someone, we'd allow it a little bit, whereas I'm not sure he got that there. Where will Luton be at the end of the season? [laughter] Hopefully, ten points more than last season. Nice. We'll get on with that. Jack. Great to see you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Brilliant. Thanks to our title sponsors, Disney Plus. We'll see you next time.