In an interview with his former teammate and ex-player/manager Troy Deeney, Luke O'Nien has spoken about the win over Norwich City and his leadership role at the club.
PERFORMING BETTER IN THE SECOND HALF
"If I knew the answer to that I'd try to change it [poorer performances in the first halves] but I was actually speaking to their staff [Norwich City] about it. I don't know if teams they tire, they cover a lot of distance and then second half they can't keep the intensity. Individually as well, we weren't quite at it. Our press wasn't quite good enough, they built with a lot of people so it was quite hard to get a man to man press. When we didn't get it right, they built out quite well. First half we came in and we weren't happy, we didn't really know what the plan was. We made a couple of changes and in the second half we got a lot more control. I think we deserved the win based on the second half."
CONVERSATIONS AT HALF TIME
"I think a big part of it was the wind, as silly as it sounds, the wind was pulling it towards their goal. It was just slightly changing the press, they committed so many bodies in the build that we had to push another body forward. It was jumping from the sides, pushing the wingers up and actually committing a bit more to the press. We did that and we had a lot of success. In possession we just needed to take a lot more care of the ball, there were a lot of turnovers in the first half. So it was just a combination of those two things."
BEING 30 AND HELPING YOUNGER PLAYERS
"I still look 15, so that kind of helps. I think the youthfulness, in a really nice innocent way comes with naivety. Which I think is a really good thing to have at this club, being such a big club that that naivety for the young players is to keep going to get on the ball while under pressure. They'll just keep doing it, so I think that is a strength for them as well. Granted, my job has shifted the longer I've spent here. I might spend more time connecting to players, I've been in that place where in my first season here I didn't get off to quite a good start. It's using that experience and having connections and it's really enjoyable. We've got a good Christmas period now and we've got to keep people grounded. The style of play that we're playing, we've got to keep keeping the style and just keep reinforcing that."
PARENTHOOD AND BEING A LEADER ON THE TEAM
"That's a great question. I didn't say my kids were being a nightmare my wife did, get that on record please for those watching. Having kids has easily been the best thing that's ever happened to me. I go home and honestly they don't care if we win, lose, draw, score an own goal, they just want me to go home and be Dad. I played with Troy [Deeney] years ago, I trained with Troy, Troy used to play. I was all in on football and that was my main focus and I found it really hard to switch off. My life just revolved around football. Kids have really given me that perspective to step back, see things a little bit clearer and realise life still happens outside of football. My kids give me more energy and I kind of bring that youthfulness into the training ground as well and try to bring things into perspective like the kids do for me. It's not just me trying to lead, the young players are stepping up and leading as well. We've got Jobe Bellingham, who I know Troy has played with and he came up with the goods today. It's not just the senior players leading, you've got Chris Rigg who's 17 I think. You can see today he's put in loads of leadership performances and he steps up at the training ground every day. There's also a lot of leadership in the group with young players and the senior players. For me personally, I've been here seven years now, the group we've got is one of the best I've seen."
JOBE BELLINGHAM DEVELOPMENT
"I love it, I spend a lot of time with him and you know what I was like back in the Watford days I went to the gym a lot and I did the extras. Having someone where, I'm in the gym and I look across and he's doing he's doing his extras it merits his work that he does at the training ground every single day. I think that's really really important, people see Jobe turn up today and score the goal but I see Jobe that stays out after training and he puts himself in these position specific areas and works on it. It's not just Jobe turning up and scoring, it's Jobe being a product of how hard he trains, how hard he works."
