Kieran Trippier

Steve Eyre, his academy coach at Manchester City

Kieran came in as a nine-year-old and was already one of the best players in the system. He was skilful and had an unbelievable shot. At 12, you start playing on full-sized pitches, he suddenly had more space and rose to the challenge. Eventually at 16, we moved him on the pitch from right midfield to right back and by the time he was 18, when we won the FA Youth Cup final, he had settled in there. We were as certain as we could be that he was an England international of the future. He was that good as a youngster, he really did understand the match through the coaches’ eyes. He also copied their dialogue, copied how we spoke to the rest of the team, and he was very much an ally for you on the field.