A BLADE FORGED IN SPAIN
IN 2018, Sportsmail’s Secret Scout filed his report on Jack O’Connell… ‘ Fast on his way to becoming a top Championship player. Value: £2million’.
‘ Yeah, I saw that,’ says the Sheffield United defender. ‘I’ve always had to prove people wrong, no matter what level I’m at. But whenever they’ve said, “It’s time to step up”, I have.’
Our scout’s observations were actually very complimentary, even if a zero was missing from O’Connell’s current valuation.
At 17, though, O’Connell was at sixth form in Liverpool, training alone at 6am and again after school. On a Saturday morning he would play for Litherland RemYCA’s youth team and, after lunch, the seniors. He played on a Sunday morning, too.
‘I wasn’t a superstar as a kid. I was training and playing all day, every day because I thought, “I’ve got to do this just to keep up”. In fact, it made me better than most of the lads my age.’
A trial at Blackburn saw him offered an academy contract. Loan spells at League Two Rotherham, York and Rochdale followed before a £200,000 move to Brentford. ‘Hand on heart, not once did I think, “This is me, a lower-league footballer for ever”. I always knew I’d play in the Premier League.’
Not that the top flight beckoned when Chris Wilder made him one of his first signings at Bramall Lane in the summer of 2016. After four games the Blades were bottom of League One, losing 2-1 at millwall with O’Connell’s handball leading to a late penalty.
He takes up the story, as the team bus crawled away from South London.
‘All of a sudden the gaffer told the driver to stop outside an offlicence. He gave Billy Sharp a hundred quid and said, “Go and get some bevvies”.
‘I’d never seen a manager do that, especially after a defeat. He said, “We’re in this together, let’s get out of it together”. We were promoted that season. So my handball was the turning point!’
‘I WAS only nine when my mum said we’re moving to malaga,’ says O’Connell, now 26. ‘I was like, “No way, I’ve got my mates here, and what about my football?”.’
Four years later, and with O’Connell fluent in Spanish and converted from left-winger to ball-playing midfielder, his mum decided it was time to return to merseyside. He laughs: ‘I was like, “No way, I’ve got my mates here, and what about my football?”.’
The experience changed him as a person and player.
‘Without Spain I wouldn’t be the player I am today. In Liverpool it was about running fast, kicking it far and tacking hard.
‘In Spain, it was the opposite — keeping the ball, thinking about tactics. We even ate fruit!’
If that explains O’Connell’s ease on the ball, his stamina can be attributed to a marathon-running mum. ‘We didn’t have a dad so, when mum went running, we had to follow on our bikes. We used to do a 10-mile ride every night — that keeps you fit!’
There were season-tickets at malaga, too. ‘I remember the Real madrid game when michael Owen scored and my mum celebrated — the malaga fans were screaming at her! But I loved it, the whole experience has massively shaped me.’
Watch O’Connell play and you understand how, and how he morphs from rugged stopper to graceful winger as one of Wilder’s ‘overlapping centre backs’.
‘Four years and teams still don’t know how to stop us! I would hate to play against it, your head would be all over the place. We were told it wouldn’t work in the Championship. everyone keeps writing us off and we keep proving them wrong.’
He wants to prove something to his girlfriend, too, the Lyon left back Alex Greenwood.
‘She reminds me she’s an england international… it would be nice if we both had that. But she’s got a wand of a left foot. She says I can’t cross the ball like her. Sadly, the garden isn’t big enough for her to teach me!’
Boxing was part of the couple’s lockdown regime — ‘She’s handy,’ says O’Connell — and he also completed a degree in sports science. ‘I’ve told our fitness guys I’ll be taking their job when I retire!’
But such thoughts are a long way off. O’Connell is halfway through a journey that has taken him from Sunday League to the Premier League and hopefully beyond. Perhaps it’s time the Secret Scout paid another visit to Bramall Lane.
● Southampton v Sheffield United, kick-off tomorrow 4pm, LIVE on Sky Sports Mix from 3pm.