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James Milner has no agent, doesn’t drink and trains harder than anyone – no wonder the Aston Villa midfielder is being talked of as a future leader of his country

Monday mornings in the staff room at Horsforth school in Leeds invariably involve animated analysis of an old boy’s latest weekend television appearance.

“We love talking about James Milner,” Steven Weeks, the head of maths, says. “Everybody’s thrilled by his achievements with Aston Villa and England; some of my colleagues have even kept bits of his old work.”

It is nearly eight years since Milner swapped the classroom for the local football team where, almost immediately, Terry Venables catapulted the 16-year-old into the Leeds United first team – the manager later described it as a rare high point of his spell at Elland Road. At the time Milner’s father, Peter, a quantity surveyor, and his mother, Lesley, an estate agent, feared the boy might be wasting 11 GCSEs while Weeks lamented the loss of one of Horsforth’s brighter mathematical brains. “I’d have loved James to stay on and do A level, he was extremely able,” he says. “But I accept his football taking him a little further than maths might have done.”

Indeed Milner’s mastery of the game’s most intricately advanced geometry promises to carry the versatile Villa midfielder to South Africa for this summer’s World Cup finals. Fabio Capello is not known for adopting favourites but all the indications are that a 24-year-old whose immaculate middle-class manners conceal a zealous inner drive is the Italian’s star pupil.

The first clue arrived in December 2008, eight months before he won his first senior cap in a friendly against Holland. “The player I like is Milner,” Capello said. “He is the future, my future.” Milner has another chance to impress Capello in today’s Carling Cup final, and can expect to be back on the Wembley pitch for Wednesday’s international against Egypt. He has featured in the past six England matches.

Weeks is not surprised Milner is doing so well. “James is still exactly the same really nice, calm, quiet, totally unassuming, popular lad he was at school but I always thought that, inside, he had the sort of controlled aggression that takes people to the very top.”

Significantly, England’s approving coach deflected some of the rather sordid unpleasantness surrounding John Terry’s loss of the national captaincy by offering journalists an ode to a genuine role model. “Milner is a fantastic player,” Capello said. “He has improved more than any other player in the squad. He is intelligent on the pitch, can make good passes, assists for goals and score himself.”

He can also play a variety of roles, a point emphasised by Martin O’Neill after Milner’s man-of-the-match performance in Villa’s 3-0 win over Hull in December. He set up Villa’s first goal with a sublime pass to Richard Dunne, then scored the second with a delightful lob. Afterwards O’Neill reminded Capello that the versatile Milner was outstanding in several positions and was just what England need in South Africa. The two-footed prodigy can not only operate in central midfield, on both wings and behind a main striker, but as a full-back. It has even been suggested that, in the wake of Ashley Cole’s broken ankle, Milner might yet make a World Cup left-back.

If that seems a waste of the former England Under-21 winger’s attacking gifts, all-rounders rarely come more spherical. As good at arts as sciences at school, he also excelled in cross country running, 100m sprints and cricket.

“James’s really is Mr Perfect, he’s an A-star person,” says Glenn Roeder, one of his managers during a turbulent spell at Newcastle where, tellingly, Milner ignored an 11-year age gap to strike up a friendship with the goalkeeper Steve Harper, a former Open University student.

“He said ‘no thanks’ to Newcastle’s brat pack,” Roeder recalls. “James can seem a goody two shoes but he deserves every bit of success going. Unlike the vast majority of professional footballers he works to his maximum and extracts every last ounce of ability.

“Most professional footballers, England internationals included, know they could have worked harder and been better but not James. Frank Lampard is the only other player I’ve managed who does as much extra training.”

During Milner’s Tyneside days he frequently crossed paths with Jonny Wilkinson. The England rugby union star, then with Newcastle Falcons, used to borrow United’s indoor training facility and, sometimes watched admiringly by the young winger, would spend hours fine-tuning his kicking.

At first glance the similarities between the pair are striking. Milner seems touched with the young Wilkinson’s obsessive perfectionism and almost romantic idealism about his chosen path. He grew up dreaming of playing in a World Cup finals and regards remaining strictly teetotal while spending numerous early nights watching DVDs of Friends as a worthwhile sacrifice at glory’s altar.

Typically, when Peter Taylor managed Milner at England Under-21 level his principal problem was dragging him out of the gym. “James would be in there all hours,” Taylor says. “I’d tell the fitness coach, ‘He’ll be too exhausted to play’.”

While other Under-21s compared designer watches, Milner regularly toiled alone on the training field. “I couldn’t find a vice,” says Taylor, who gave him many of his record 46 under-21 caps. “The only area where he may have defied me was when I’d tell him to just work with light weights in the gym but I’m pretty sure he used the heavy ones.”

Back at the Sutton Coldfield home he shares with his girlfriend, Milner’s existence is not, however, quite as reclusive as Wilkinson’s once was and definitely encompasses more of a hinterland. “I do leave my house and go out sometimes,” he says. “I like a round of golf, and a quiet Italian or Chinese meal out.” Milner was recently photographed looking slightly out of place during a rare post-midnight visit to London’s Whisky Mist nightclub on a team jolly.

“You can paint parallels with Jonny Wilkinson but they aren’t quite right,” says Mick McGuire, Milner’s long-standing friend and former representative. “James is not your standard young lad and he is a perfectionist in training but, off the field, he’s nowhere near as fanatical or meticulous about things. Where James is different from a lot of footballers is that, although he understands the importance of money, he’s not that interested in developing commercial opportunities. He doesn’t want to be distracted from playing.”

Milner is also extraordinarily loyal. Despite an enduring closeness to McGuire, when the Professional Footballers’ Association’s former deputy chief executive left the players’ union last year – amid considerable acrimony – he felt it would somehow be “not right” to drop the PFA as his representatives in order to follow a key mentor.

“James was always a bit unusual,” explains Eddie Gray, who coached him at Leeds. “His background was slightly different to a lot of players and he never got distracted by the usual temptations. He always loved the game more than anything that went with it. Even as a teenager James knew he was very fortunate to have natural talent.”

Like Weeks, Gray noted Milner’s “inner hunger” and laughed off suggestions he was too nice, or too middle-class. “James will always listen but he’s a strong character who knows his own mind,” he says. “His one aim in life has always been to be the best footballer he can. His right foot was initially stronger but he just worked hard on his left and made himself two-footed.

“Apart from being naturally talented, he was also very tough. He’s extremely brave, he’d constantly throw himself into challenges and he could run for ever. Knowing James, he won’t just be content with being in England’s World Cup squad, he’ll want to shake things up and get in the first XI. He’s got great self-belief.”

It all seems light years since Graeme Souness – one of his 11 club managers – sneeringly opined that Newcastle would “not win anything with a team of James Milners”. The Scot underestimated a startling capacity for self-improvement. “James is my all-time favourite Under-21,” Taylor says. “Blimey, if all players were like him the job would be pure joy. Coaching James was a pleasure but, at first, there was a problem with his end product, his crossing wasn’t quite right.

“Unlike a lot of players, though, James really listened to advice and acted on it – he was a very serious boy, old for his age. His crossing improved immensely but I moved him to central midfield, albeit in a 4-3-3 formation where he could hurt teams with his excellent passing range and shooting.”

McGuire suspects the centre will prove his best position. “People have consistently written James off, they’ve said he wasn’t quick enough to go past people and his final ball wasn’t good enough but he’s kept proving them wrong,” he says.

“In central midfield he’s spotting openings people thought he didn’t have the vision to see but a lot of his development in the last year or so has been down to playing for Martin O’Neill at Aston Villa. A few clubs were interested in James but I was desperate to get him into Villa, I knew Martin would give him extraordinary confidence.”

Recent comments from O’Neill confirm McGuire’s hunch has paid off. In spades. “James is getting into little areas outside the box and giving us passes which weren’t part of our game – or his – a year ago,” Villa’s manager said. “James is a character and a half who has grown greatly in confidence with the ball since arriving here. He’s moved his game on to a new level. He’s seeing the pass now and moving into better positions.

“James could play in central midfield for England – absolutely. Playing there for us in the Premier League you’d think he owned the place.”

Certainly if Milner, whose goals tend to be of the spectacular variety, does not yet make late Lampard-esque dashes into the box before scoring from 10 yards, he has thoroughly eclipsed Villa’s previously much vaunted Ashley Young.

The only regret is that he joined in 2008 rather than in 2006 when, thinking he was on the brink of signing for O’Neill the then winger drove to Birmingham only to be turned back at the gates of Villa’s training ground after Mark Viduka’s mooted move to St James’ Park collapsed.

“It was Freddy Shepherd’s [Newcastle's then chairman] decision to sell him, I always wanted to keep James but I don’t think he believed me,” Roeder recalls. “A lot of players would have mentally gone under in similar circumstances but he simply got on with it.”

Such deceptively understated determination forms a recurring theme. “We sometimes see James when he visits his family,” Weeks says. “He’ll go down to the local park and watch the kids enjoy a kickabout, then he’ll have keepy-uppy contests with them.”

The resultant image is of a young man still deeply in love with football, reassuringly nice – and, above all, achingly competitive. “I’ve told James he’ll end up as England captain,” McGuire says. “He just laughs at me but I’m convinced it will happen.”

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• Milner wants Doha friendly to be dress rehearsal for 2010 final
• Villa midfielder aiming to secure place in squad for South Africa

James Milner believes Saturday’s friendly international against Brazil in Doha will be the ideal yardstick to demonstrate whether England should be considered serious World Cup contenders next summer.

Fabio Capello’s side qualified for the 2010 finals in South Africa in impressive fashion with two games to spare, and won nine of their qualifying matches.

Milner sees the clash with the former world champions as a chance to see how good England are in reality and the winger would dearly love for the game to be a dress rehearsal for the final in eight months’ time.

The 23-year-old said: “This is a great preparation game. You obviously want to play the best teams before a major tournament.

“If I was lucky enough to get on the field against a team like Brazil it would be fantastic, but it is all preparation for the summer. There are not too many better teams to test yourself against, and see how ready you are for a World Cup, than playing Brazil.

“They have been fantastic over the years and it would be nice to play them in the final next summer.”

Milner has forced his way into Capello’s plans after showing excellent form for Aston Villa since his club record £12m switch from Newcastle 15 months ago, and he knows he must make every minute count for club and country if he is secure a seat on the plane to South Africa.

He said: “The World Cup is a long way away. It is a nice thing to have at the end of the domestic season and definitely something to aim for.

“I am not thinking about that too much at the moment. I am taking each game as it comes and playing as well as I can for Villa. That is what gets you into the England squad.

“I need to keep working hard, keep improving with Villa, and playing good football. I do believe every minute on the pitch is important, not just for England but week in and week out in the Premier League.

“You are playing against top-class players week in and week out. If you are lucky enough to get called into the England squad, and get the chance to get on the field, you’ve got to do well and prove that you should be chosen again. But then all the players want to keep improving and staking a claim to be in the squad.”

Milner is delighted to have made the breakthrough at full level for his country and was even used as a left-back by Capello in the latter stages of the win over Belarus last month.

He said: “When you are working as hard as you can all the way through your career, and have played a lot of Under-21 games, to get the full caps is obviously nice.

“It is your aim to play for England and now I’ve done that three or four times and the next aim is to stay in the squad and stay in the team. It’s nice to move that goal on one more time and stepping up a level to keep getting in the squads and pushing for a place in the team.

“I don’t think it adds to my confidence. It might change the way other people feel about you but obviously you’ve got that self-belief and confidence in your ability.”

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My normal email has been broken by some penpushing eejit, so slowemail.farce@googlemail.com will have to do

4.50pm: OK, we’re under way. And it’s just like the proper telly, this. Cheap set with eye-bleeding backdrop? CHECK. Tedious montage of scrappy goals set to unnecessarily loud popular music? CHECK. AC Jimbo trousering another cheque? CHECK. “Welcome to one of the most eagerly awaited England transmissions in years,” says The Internet’s James Richardson with a twinkle in his eye. Transmissions? He’s keeping it old-school here. How’s he going to archly refer to this programme next? A telecast?

Michael Carrick is given his first appearance in this campaign, Gareth Barry being told to do one as a result: Green, Johnson, A Cole, Gerrard, Ferdinand, Terry, Lennon, Lampard, Heskey, Rooney, Carrick.
Subs: James, Bridge, Upson, Barry, Milner, C Cole, Agbonlahor.

“The” Ukraine: Pyatov, Kucher, Kobin, Rakitskiy, Khacheridi, Gai, Tymoschuk, Nazarenko, Rotan, Shevchenko, Milevskiy.
Subs: Shovkovskiy, Yarmolenko, Gusev, Voronin, Seleznyov, Shevchuk, Mykhalyk.

Anything the BBC could do in 1937, we can do better in 2009:

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So does this represent progress? No. No it doesn’t. Where’s OUR Imagination in Wood-Carvings? OUR “Old Kentucky”? OUR “Fancy That!”?

THE INTERNET (Vision: 6.67 Metres; Sound: 7.23 Metres)
5.15: Ukraine v England

October 10 2009, and more broadcasting history is about to be made, with the first England game streamed exclusively live on the internet. Today’s listings…

TELEVISION (Vision: 6.67 Metres; Sound: 7.23 Metres)
11.0 – 12.0: Film for Demonstration Purposes
3.0: “Fancy That!”
3.30: British Movietonews
3.40: Football at the Arsenal
3.55-4.0: Cartoon Film, “Wayward Canary”
9.0: Hutch (Leslie Hutchinson)
9.10: Imagination in Wood-Carvings by Polly Hill Clarke
9.20: Gaumont-British News.
9.30-10.0: “Old Kentucky.”

September 16 1937, and BBC staff, sick to the rear pegs of transmitting hour upon hour of light operas, experimental plays and Lord Reith’s union-bashing diatribes, decide to do something for the common punter instead. Rolling a length of Special Wire down the hill from the BBC’s Ally Pally HQ to the Arsenal Stadium in nearby Highbury, they transmit footage of Arsenal’s reserve side kicking a ball around in training with some members of the first team. Not for the last time in its existence, the Corporation was laying itself open to the charge of producing programmes only of interest to 17 people in the Islington area – but no matter, because broadcasting history had been made: the world’s first-ever live televised football match! The day’s listings in full, as reported by the Manchester Guardian…

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• James Milner called into squad as replacement
• Cole pledges to silence England boo-boys

Michael Carrick has withdrawn from the England squad for the World Cup qualifiers against Kazakhstan and Andorra with a foot injury. The Manchester United midfielder reported to the England team hotel last night and was assessed by the side’s medical staff before being released for treatment. James Milner, a member of the Under-21 squad for this month’s European Championships in Sweden, has been called up as a replacement.

Ashley Cole, meanwhile, intends to replicate his Chelsea form on the international stage to try to win over those England fans who have barracked him at Wembley. The full-back, who became the first player since the 1890s to claim a fifth FA Cup winners’ medal on Saturday, has benefited this season from being pain-free in his ankle after carrying an injury first suffered while at Arsenal during his first two campaigns at Stamford Bridge. A mistake against the Kazakhs last October led to the visitors’ goal in England’s 5–1 win, prompting a section of the home support to boo Cole’s every touch thereafter.

Events off the pitch have also harmed his reputation but Cole is confident he can win over the doubters. “Everyone knows it wasn’t about football, so there is nothing I could do,” he said.

“I feel like I am enjoying my football the most I have for a while, and if I play well then I will change people’s minds. It’s life, isn’t it? I don’t think I was the worst player on the pitch in that match, but there you go. I hope it turns now. I will get on with it and, hopefully I will change a few minds.I just want to win things, and to win something with England.

If I score the winning goal for England at the World Cup maybe they will like me again. There are times when you don’t like playing football, just as you wouldn’t like any job, and there were certainly times when I didn’t enjoy it. But I feel fit now. This is the best I’ve felt, at Chelsea and at Arsenal.I have played in the Premier League with a smile on my face, and I hope to do that too with England.”

Cole underwent surgery to repair the ankle injury and, over the course of this campaign, he has steadily regained his best form. “I’ve got two ankles I can run on, that’s the reason I’m playing well,” added the full-back. “I can run up and down again and I can kick the ball again. That’s the difference.

When I first came to Chelsea I couldn’t kick the ball and it was pointless me playing really. But I tried to play through the pain for the manager who bought me [Josée Mourinho].

The Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, has approved the deal for exclusively English football teams to represent Great Britain at the London 2012 Olympics. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland gave Fifa their agreement to take no part in the Olympics and for England to make up Team GB. The way is now clear for the British Olympic Association to announce that England will represent Team GB in the men’s and women’s tournaments.

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