Wilshere relishing the chance to take on his former England team-mate at Home Park
Wilshere relishing opportunity of going up against former England team-mate
Luton boss Jack Wilshere is relishing the prospect of going up against his former England team-mate Tom Cleverley this afternoon when the Hatters travel to Plymouth Argyle.
While Wilshere was regarded as one of the best midfielders of his generation during his playing days with Arsenal over a decade ago, Cleverley was also crafting a career for himself in the top flight, coming through at Manchester United, then going on to feature for Aston Villa, Everton and Watford. The pair were team-mates for England too, playing for the senior side on a number of occasions including starting the 2-1 win over Brazil at Wembley under Roy Hodgson back in February 2013.
With Cleverley going through a similar journey off the pitch to Wilshere once retiring, spending a year in charge at former side Watford, before he like, many others, were sacked, taking over the Pilgrims in the summer, then on the firm friendship between the two, Wilshere said: “I played with him in the (England) 21s, played with him in the first team, played against him. We had some really good battles with Arsenal against United over the years and someone who’s a good friend of mine, Danny Welbeck, is also a good friend of his, so mutual friends and someone I respect a lot.
“I think he was with the 18s with Watford for a very short time and then got offered the opportunity to take the (first) team and he took it at a young age and with a relatively short coaching career. So to throw himself in like that, in my opinion he did really well and it was probably a little bit harsh to lose his job there. But then to dive straight back, to go again, he’s a Manchester boy and he took the opportunity to go to Plymouth which is away from everything he knows, his family, but he’s really hungry to be successful, so someone I’ve got a lot of respect for.
"He’s someone that I’ve been in contact with over the last couple of years when he was at Watford to when he got the job and then he went to Plymouth. Someone I know is and will be a good coach and he will have learned so much. I’ve had a similar journey to him in terms of coaching and we always chat, me and Tom. I think that’s quite nice when you’ve got two young coaches starting your journey that you share your experiences and how you’re feeling, but we want to beat him tomorrow.”
After struggling at times in his first few months with Plymouth, losing six games in a row between October and November when his job appeared in real jeopardy, Cleverley now appears to be turning things around at Home Park, as he has engineered a run of nine wins from 13 in all competitions, climbing away from the bottom four to sit 14th in the table, six points behind Luton.
The Pilgrims have top scorer Lorent Tolaj on 15 goals for the campaign and recently added Ronan Curtis from Port Vale to bolster their squad in the transfer window, although have sold winger Bali Mumba to Huddersfield Town as well. On the opposition facing them, Wilshere continued: “It’s a tough test. I think they’re seven unbeaten and probably have bigger expectations than where they’re at at the moment, but they’ve gone through that, learned how to deal with that adversity and they seem like they’re coming out the other side.
"They’re a team that are dangerous They seem like they’ve got a really good front-line, of course Tolaj is the main one, but he’s not just the only threat they have. They have a lot of threat on the last line, so we have to be ready for that. When I went there last year with Norwich, I always feel because of the journey there is an advantage there.
"It’s not an excuse, we can’t use that, we know that going down there, what we have to do and be ready from the start and expect that we’re going to be in a game from minute one. We’ve also spoken about our away form, our last away win was Stockport, so we have to improve that and hopefully starting tomorrow.”
As Wilshere mentioned, Town go into the game themselves on the back of some disappointing away form which has stunted their efforts to get into the top six, with three defeats from four on the road, taking one point in that time, as opposed to three wins from the same number of games on home soil. Wilshere wants them to begin improving outside of Bedfordshire, adding: “When you think about our away games, Reading I thought we were excellent, I thought we dominated the game from start to finish.
"We have to take the learning from that game that yes you want to dominate the game and try and make it into how you see it, but being away from home it’s a little bit different. There’s a few different things you have to do, you have to manage momentum, you have to manage the crowd. I think decisions will go against you naturally and that’s not a criticism of refs, I just think naturally when you’re away from home and the pressure of fans, that does happen and you have to be able to manage those moments.
"I think about the Reading game and we were 2-0 down and we found that character and belief to come back, but that’s a crucial moment for us, when you’re on top you have to recognise you’re on top and keep going with that and we didn’t. Then I think about the Exeter game where we probably had most of the game and arrived in the final third but lacked quality so I think there’s clear lessons that we can take from them and hopefully take that into the game.”