FromTesco to Tottenham... how Willmott refused to shelve his football hopes

doing the fire alarm checks, installing the CCTV, basically fixing anything that needed it.

“I was actually working at the time when my agent rang me and said Newport were offering me a contract, but I didn’t say yes straight away. I was unsure about going back to being a professional.”

Willmott admits he had been stung in his first shot at success in the game. A promising talent and tipped for bigger things after moving from Cambridge to Luton, where he played with Andre Gray, things finally seemed to have clicked for him when he moved to Newport in 2013, helping the Exiles into the Football League and thriving in League Two.

“There had even been some talk of going to League One or the Championship in my second year, but then I suffered a nasty injury,” he explains of how he ended up disillusioned and seemingly destined for ‘the real world.’

“We were playing York and I tore the tendons in my foot off the bone and I pretty much missed the rest of the season.

“It’s funny, I got a bit of stick for pulling out of the tackle. I just thought I’d broken my toe but they showed me the scans and it was a car crash. It was pretty much hanging off and I was told that if the surgery didn’t go well, I could have been looking at retiring.”

Willmott recovered in time to play the final 40 minutes of the season, but was left wondering whether the battle for recovery had been worth it.

“I’d been offered another year by Justin Edinburgh, but when he left so did the offer,” he adds.

“Terry Butcher came in, but the budget had been cut. A couple of weeks later I had a phone call that didn’t last very long, saying I was being released. “It was tough. I felt let down.” Willmott had offers to stay in the Football League and even to try Scottish football, but shunned them to surprisingly move down two levels.

“I’d been away from home a long time and I was missing a lot of things close to me,” he explains.

“You’d get the odd fan come in to the store when I was with Tesco and there were those who took the mick because, back home, I was someone people were expecting big things from and there I was in the local Tesco,” he says.

“But it feels now as if it was something I needed. In fact, I think it would be good for a lot of young players in the game.”

It all means Wilmott is probably better placed than most to recognise the progress being made by the club he returned to at the start of the season.

The 10,000 sell-out this Sunday – an expanded capacity thanks to some temporary stands – and other monies earned from the cup run should help ensure that continues.

“And if people moan about the pitch at Rodney Parade or in League Two, then you wouldn’t believe some in the Conference South,” he laughs.

“Some are decent enough, but there’s others that are like farmers’ fields.”

County have ploughed their own furrow so often as a club but the recent success under local boy Flynn has helped create a buzz that was building long before being paired with Harry Kane and co.

“He’s great,” he says of Flynn, a friend and former teammate who has overseen the side’s resurgence since taking charge last March.

“I think it was the fact it was him and it was Newport where I felt I had unfinished business made the difference when the call came.

“It’s a good city and living in the centre of it, you have a real feel for the fans and what this means for them.

“Spurs played on TV the other day and I sat back thinking ‘I’m going to be playing against these’ and they’re beating Everton 4-0,” he laughs.

“But the excitement isn’t about playing them, it’s about having that chance to beat them, to nick a goal and make a name for ourselves. We know we can cause problems and the atmosphere will be something.”

Indeed, with a packed Rodney Parade awaiting such superstars, the winger from the superstore knows that every little helps.