Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
COAD RED FOR TICKETS
Reds fan Conor can’t wait to take on his former club – and neither can his family and friends...
CONOR COADY counts up the number of ticket requests in his head, as his family and friends get ready to join the red invasion of Molineux tonight. “Tickets? God, yeah! Through the roof,” laughs the Wolves captain. “I’ve asked for 13 tickets… so a few of the boys are going mad. But I’ve managed to wangle a few from here and there. Family are sorted, kids are coming, so it’s all good.” This is the game that 25-year-old Coady has been looking forward to ever since leading Wolves to promotion to the Premier League.
A boyhood Liverpool nut, Coady signed for them as a seven-yearold and was brought up the Anfield way. But it has been Wolves boss Nuno Espirito Santo who has provided the finishing touches to one of the Premier League’s most elegant defenders. That upbringing is there for all to see as Coady is composed, likes to bring the ball out of defence, and has fitted perfectly into Wolves and their style of play.
There is no hiding the fact Coady is a Liverpool fan, but he has taken the best parts of his time there (below, left) into making him the player he is today.
He will no doubt run into Jamie Carragher, the Sky TV pundit and Liverpool legend, who always offers him advice.
“It was such a good club to play for, growing up. It was a huge club and it helped me so much, not just as a player but as a person as well,” said Coady.
“I spent a season or two based at Melwood, when I was playing for the reserves but training with the first team, and it was unbelievable to see how they worked, how they trained, and how they did things. You can’t not learn from them.
“It was more Steven Gerrard as a match winner. Jamie was someone who I looked at as to how to organise, how to defend and how composed he was, how good he was at reading the games.
“Whenever I see Jamie, he is always full of encouragement and he is brilliant now, isn’t he? You see him on the TV, talking about football; you could listen to him all day.”
It was a difficult decision for Coady to leave Liverpool, but it was former Reds boss Brendan Rodgers who helped him choose the path to make sure he would become a Premier League defender – even if not for his boyhood heroes.
Coady had a loan spell at Sheffield United, a year at Huddersfield, and when Wolves came in there was no hesitation. He said: “When you’re at a club like Liverpool, it’s always about what you can do with the ball.
“Playing and moving with the ball – you can see that now with
Jurgen Klopp and his full-throttle football.
“Liverpool helped me develop for that as well.
Everything I learned was down to them.
But it was so hard for me.
“I had
Steven
Gerrard