James Milner

He'd done what we all wanted to achieve and, you know, ball boying then, you know, the Champions League nights and I think Lee Bowyer's goal against Deci Milan in the last seconds and on a very wet night, you know, seeing that...

and being a season ticket holder from being really young and going with my family and as a Leeds fan you know it was a dream really being at the club and being in the academy of a team you support.

Yeah, I remember we were pretty comfortable in the game and then I thought there might be a chance I get on.

And then I think we conceded a couple of goals.

It might have been 4-1 up or 3-2, 4-2 or something like that.

And then it went to 4-3 and I didn't think I was going to get on.

And to be fair, Terry gave me the nod to go on.

I remember coming on and I think...

Lee Bowyer passed me a ball with my back to goal and I tried to pass it back and passed it to Paolo Di Canio and he put it over the bar, thank God.

And I just remember Bowyer afterwards asking, did I ever bet on four all?

Having a joke.

But yeah, that was obviously a special day and a long time ago now.

I think by that point,

I wasn't thinking too much about that really.

I think the big thing for me was at first getting in and around the Leeds first team.

I think the first time I trained with the reserves and I'm looking around and there's David Batty there and a few others and you're like, you know, these guys are my heroes and you're training with them.

And then you get sent up to train with the first team and you didn't really know.

It was sort of mid-session and you got sent over.

So that probably helped in terms of that and you just tried to...

to go and do as well as you can.