The Professor and the beanstalker

The ball....plus the world at his feet.

Last Wednesday night against Braga, Jack Wilshire’s football education came to an end.
It’s a pretty bold statement to make about an18 year-old football player who is a ‘nobody’ when you look at what he has achieved so far.
But Wilshire is no ordinary 18 year-old. Since the age of nine when he joined Arsenal from Luton Town, his precocious talent and delicate abilities have been an open secret.
With his virtuoso performance beside Fabregas - another youth prodigy – last Wednesday night, the gloves have finally come off. The cloak thrown around him is surely now cast off.
The most obvious point that emerged from Wednesday night was the fact that Wenger trusts Jack. Five games into the season, Jack has featured in all of those games and started in four. Four starts!
For Wenger, who has spent a lifetime nurturing young talent, the golden rule about players of Jack’s gifts is always finding the right time to let them go. The exact moment to release them to make their way in the world.
It is always a tricky balancing act that could make or mar a player’s career. A time that could undo all the good work and the countless hours put into nurturing them. Football - and sports likewise - is replete with child prodigies who fell victim to their own publicity and ended up on the dunghill of failure.
For Jack though, it looks certain that he has earned Wenger’s confidence. And how well the master must be pleased to have seen his pupil confirm his trust Wednesday night.
Jack turns 19 on January 1, 2011 and by then, he ought to have cemented a spot for himself in the heart of Arsenal’s senior side.
With all the uncertainty and persistent attempts by Barcelona to prise Fabregas back to Catalonia, a new midfield fulcrum is deemed a must-have now at the club. Arsenal and Wenger cannot stand in Fabregas’ way forever. If he helps us to silverware, he will feel morally justified to tell Wenger that his dues have been paid at the club and it was time to move on. Both men know it.
Which is why Wenger has had to blood Jack now and allow him learn from Fabregas.
All season so far and especially on Wednesday night, the fruits of that apprenticeship was obvious for all to see.
Jack has bottle. It’s what sets him apart from his generation. Skill on its own, is never enough to make a player great. Character, discipline and decision-making all have to come into play at some stage. So far, the young man from Hitchin (which happens to also be the birthplace of ex-Arsenal wannabee David Noble), 30minutes from London, seems to have combined all these qualities admirably.
We can talk all day about his obvious ball skills. How he always, always finds space for a pass with his wonderful left foot. How he glides across the pitch with ballet-like ease. How he fights and scraps for the ball despite his lack of inches. We can swoon and talk about that 30 yard pinpoint lob to Fabregas that led to goal No 6 against Braga. Without him applying himself to discipline, all that would go down the drain and be lost forever.
It was commendable how Wenger ignored all the petulant stories about Jack’s involvement in a pub fight weeks ago, to maintain his trust in him. Such tabloid sensationalism is the stock-in-trade of British media which has doomed many a player’s career. Cavalier considerations always override public interest and allied with society’s addiction to scandal, celebrities in sports and other spheres of life are targeted for their news value.
So often, the media thrives on and feeds this assault on people’s lives, thus creating goldfishes with no hiding place.
It’s one major reason why Wenger has been suspicious of English players. He has actually had his fingers burnt by the likes of Jermaine Pennant and David Bentley on the few occasions he has bought English.
It may smack somewhat of dictatorial tendencies on Wenger’s part, but you build a team very much in your own image if you hope to succeed as a manager. It is very well-known how avuncular, taciturn and aloof Wenger is and for him to stamp his authority on his team, he has to recruit players of like character.
All managers like who have succeeded know that basic truth. Ask Mourinho and Ferguson.
Jack, apart from his gifts, has knuckled down to earn his master’s trust. The fact that he is British would probably have made him work even harder at earning that trust. He would have looked at fellow-Englishmen like Theo, Kieran and the unfortunately-stricken Emmanuel Frimpong, to realize what was needed to make the grade in Wenger’s team.
On Wednesday night, we saw the fruits of those years of patience and servitude.
It is our fervent prayer that Jack makes it and goes on to become a legend and a future captain of Arsenal. He has it in him, if you look carefully at what he does.
Which is why an “old fox” like Wenger trusts this teenager named after the fabled beanstalker.