Luca Ercolani taking his coaching badges

“As soon as I started my rehab, one of my first thoughts was to think about anything that could keep me motivated and busy throughout the day,” he explained to us. “I was doing my rehab in the morning, until the early hours of the afternoon, but then soon came back home and didn’t have anything to do in the first couple of weeks.

“My focus was to get back playing as soon as possible but I realised I needed to do something to stay motivated. I spoke to the staff, to Chris McCready, and decided to work on my personal development and complete my coaching badges.

“It was something I didn’t know about but, as soon as I started to review our sessions – we can watch our training sessions – I found it very interesting, watching the team back and myself as an individual. In the past, in the 2017/18 season, I was with Kieran McKenna and he always told me he thought I had a special instinct for maybe a future in coaching, after my playing career. I listened to him and said why not? The Academy is offering for me to do it and it was just a big pleasure for me.

“Kieran helped me at the start. He encouraged me to start it but I also met Michael [Carrick] and Lee Grant when doing it last year. I watched a couple of Lee’s sessions at the pitches and Michael helped me with a bit of my session, with Neil Bailey, the PFA instructor for coaching. So I had good people around to help me.