AND HYDE Bruce hails beast Grealish as the real deal in Prem

STEVE BRUCE has revealed how Jack Grealish was turned into a “beast of a player” capable of playing for a top-four club.

The Newcastle boss will do battle with former club Aston Villa tomorrow and has the inside story on how Grealish got toughened up and became physically capable of running games in the top flight. When he was in charge at Villa, Bruce was trying to get the best out of the England hopeful, who has since helped fire Villa into the Premier League. A worrying kidney injury had forced Grealish into a long lay-off – so Bruce appointed one of the player’s close mates – Oli Stevenson – as his strength and conditioning coach.

Stevenson, whose own career was hampered by illness, put Grealish, 24, through months of rehab and according to the former Man United defender, he came back into the first team as a new player and hasn’t looked back since.

The Toon boss said: “He is the crown jewel and he never wanted to leave. It would be difficult for anyone to buy him with the size of contract he has.

“He could play for any team, Man U, Tottenham, Chelsea, Arsenal – any team, I rate him that highly.”

Bruce, 58, who narrowly missed taking Villa back to the Premier League amid a time of financial worry for the club, added: “I’d love to say it was all me getting Jack playing so well but it wasn’t.

“He just wants to play football – he’s an absolute football nut.

“He’s young and he’s a good-looking kid and all the rest of that, that will be written about but he wanted to play. He got a horrible injury in pre-season where he damaged a kidney badly and was in the hospital for three weeks. Then he came out and missed four or five months.

“So we employed his mate, Oli Stevenson, from the academy. He grew up with Jack and he had qualified as a strength and conditioning coach.

“That lad, Oli, single-handedly for me, changed him in the gym with what he worked on. Jack came out after six months, and physique-wise, we looked at him and went, ‘Oh my god.’

“He’s a beast now, a terrific player.” Bruce is expecting Ciaran Clark to be fit after suffering an injury playing for Ireland in the week.

And he is backing £20million forward Miguel Almiron – without a goal since joining last January – to spark the attack.

The boss said: “He’s got two in three games for Paraguay. It will happen for us too. I’m confident he’ll score soon.”