How to become a better player

BILLY BREMNER: former Leeds powerhouse and inspiration for the young John Sheridan

WATCH, listen and learn is the John Sheridan guide to player self-improvement.

Athletic’s manager wants his young players to do what he did as an aspiring pro at Leeds United.

The former Republic of Ireland international, who went to two World Cups, recalls how he would closely observe a pair of Elland Road legends to make best use of his own talents as a raw teenager in the early 1980s.

“When I was a kid, I just used to watch players. Billy Bremner and Eddie Gray never had to say a word to me. I just watched them. I would look and think, why does he do that and how does he make that look so easy? That’s how you learn. Eddie Gray’s touch was unbelievable and so was Billy Bremner’s awareness.

“I didn’t look at players who could run really quickly, because I wasn’t really quick. Billy Bremner and Eddie Gray helped me in my game. I was nowhere near those two as a player, but that’s how I learned.”

Loan duo Aaron Amadi-Holloway (23), who injured an ankle against Chesterfield this week, and Matt Palmer (21) are both still effectively apprentices in League One, having never played regularly at this level before Sheridan.

Both are aspiring, impressive talents. Amadi-Holloway’s deal at Wycombe runs out at the end of this campaign and the same is true of Palmer, whose parent club Burton appears set for the Championship.

Sheridan sees plenty of scope for these two players and others to improve and flourish.

“Jurgen Klopp was saying it makes him mad when players don’t listen and it is something I have said so many times,” said Sheridan, referring to the Liverpool manager.

“People used to take the mickey out of me, asking what I was going on about. But that is a top manager saying it.

“It frustrates you so much. Sir Alex Ferguson said, if I have to tell a player five or six times then I don’t play him — or I get rid of him. It’s annoying. You tell them for a reason — don’t do this, take two touches here — and it is to hopefully improve them as a player. It isn’t to make them worse, or I wouldn’t be a football manager.

“Aaron is one of those. He may be thinking he’s doing the right thing and the same is true for Jake Cassidy and Curtis Main.

“It’s all positions. They might think they are doing the right thing, but managers know what they are talking about. I wonder does Aaron watch someone like, say, Olivier Giroud at Arsenal? Does Matt Palmer watch the top midfielders? To me, that’s how you learn the most in football.”