Done Deal: Arsenal legend, Patrick Vierra is happy Arsenal has closed in on world-class player that will bring leadership to Arsenal like him

Done Deal: Arsenal legend, Patrick Vierra is happy Arsenal has closed in on world-class player that will bring leadership to Arsenal like him

Terry Westley would always hear Declan Rice before he saw him. West Ham United’s academy players used to treat their warm-up drill, focusing on short, sharp, slick passing movements in a tight space, as a casual exercise in showboating, taunting the elected piggy in the middle. “They could be soul-destroying because people pissed about, flicking the ball, trying nutmegs,” Westley, the club’s former academy director, says.

It wasn’t long after Rice joined West Ham that the atmosphere in training began to change. Still reeling from rejection at Chelsea, he approached even the warm-up with an intensity that Westley had rarely witnessed in decades. “He couldn’t abide sloppy training or people being late,” he says. “You’d hear him driving excellence from the very start. I remember

Terry Westley would always hear Declan Rice before he saw him. West Ham United’s academy players used to treat their warm-up drill, focusing on short, sharp, slick passing movements in a tight space, as a casual exercise in showboating, taunting the elected piggy in the middle. “They could be soul-destroying because people pissed about, flicking the ball, trying nutmegs,” Westley, the club’s former academy director, says.

It wasn’t long after Rice joined West Ham that the atmosphere in training began to change. Still reeling from rejection at Chelsea, he approached even the warm-up with an intensity that Westley had rarely witnessed in decades. “He couldn’t abide sloppy training or people being late,” he says. “You’d hear him driving excellence from the very start. I remember

Terry Westley would always hear Declan Rice before he saw him. West Ham United’s academy players used to treat their warm-up drill, focusing on short, sharp, slick passing movements in a tight space, as a casual exercise in showboating, taunting the elected piggy in the middle. “They could be soul-destroying because people pissed about, flicking the ball, trying nutmegs,” Westley, the club’s former academy director, says.

It wasn’t long after Rice joined West Ham that the atmosphere in training began to change. Still reeling from rejection at Chelsea, he approached even the warm-up with an intensity that Westley had rarely witnessed in decades. “He couldn’t abide sloppy training or people being late,” he says. “You’d hear him driving excellence from the very start. I remember