Dundee new boy’s words of wisdom from Mourinho

Not many players have only two senior appearances to their name – one a Champions League knockout game and the second a Scottish Championship clash at Stark’s Park.

However, that’s the first team career to date of Dundee’s Malachi FaganWalcott, who joined the Dark Blues on loan from Tottenham last week.

And he’s determined to add to it during his spell at Dens Park as he aims to get over a knee injury that’s kept him out of action since last summer.

The 18-year-old was a late substitute for Serge Aurier as Spurs headed out of Europe’s premier competition at RB Leipzig’s Red Bull Arena last season.

Fagan-Walcott took to the pitch with two-time Champions League winning manager Jose Mourinho’s words of wisdom in his ears in front of 42,000 people.

“When I came on in that game it was unreal, it felt like a dream,” he said.

“Coming out for the warm up, seeing the stadium and the fans, I expected to wake up.

“When they told me to go and warm up, I was nervous and my heart was pumping then the manager spoke to me before I came on.

“He just said: ‘Go on and show them who you are,’ and that took the nerves away.

“He’s very good to work for, he’s a nice person as well as a manager so he knows what players need.

“He will say something and you might think he’s getting at you, but you look back and see he’s trying to help you.

“He had me training with the first team and made me do extra to push me.”

The England Under-17 international enjoyed the step up from Under-23 football to the Spurs first team last season, learning from the likes of Tanguy Ndombele, Steven Bergwijn and Dele Alli.

Harry Kane and Heungmin Son were injured at the time, but Fagan-Walcott says it was a great challenge to make the step up from youth football.

Now he’s looking to experience a new kind of test in Scotland’s second tier and reckons he’ll learn more in Dundee’s first team than he ever would in Under-23 football.

“Training with Spurs’ first team is incredible because it’s on a different level to what I’d been used to,” he said.

“The intensity, concentration and technique is much higher than it is when you’re with the Under-23s. When you go over to the first team side you see how the standard is so much higher.

“You can’t delay anything and it makes you a better player, you have to stand up or you won’t cope with it. Who are the best players in training? It’s difficult because they are all good, but Tanguy Ndombele is technically so good.

“You think you can get the ball off him but you can’t, he’s so quick.

“They are all good, big, strong and have great ability.

“You learn from training with players like that but I think I’ll learn more here at Dundee in the next few months. It’s going to be completely different, it’s going to be a man’s game up here playing against big strikers.

“I’m going to need to learn how to win headers and be aware of what’s going on around me.

“In training at Spurs you don’t see the ball hoofed, you will get it to either side of you and that’s what you need to be alert to.

“But in real games it’s going to be coming over my head and I’ll have to learn to cope with that.

“I’ll learn a different side of football up here than I’ve learned at Spurs and that will only benefit me for the future.”

Fagan-Walcott admits his debut last week at Raith Rovers didn’t go the way he’d hoped but he was delighted to be back out on the pitch after a lengthy lay-off. He added: “It has been good, everyone has been very welcoming and I enjoyed making my debut.

“It felt great being out there playing again, the only negative thing was the result.

“I’d been injured since June, I tore my meniscus so was out for five months but came back against West Ham a few weeks ago.

“The academy manager at Spurs told me that Dundee were interested so after speaking to my family I decided this was a good move for me.

“I did a bit of research on the club, I knew about the rivalry with United but I looked into the club a bit more.

“So everything seemed good for me and I felt coming to Scotland would be a nice fit.”