Aberdeen target Leighton Clarkson’s prodigious footballing abilities put him “head and shoulders” above his team-mates – even at primary school age.
This is how Ross Hibbert, of Lancashire grassroots club Clitheroe Wolves, remembers Clarkson’s early steps in the game.
Dons fans live in hope last season’s loan sensation, who is set to leave English Premier League giants Liverpool, will choose to return to Pittodrie permanently over the summer and re-join Barry Robson’s Reds on their upcoming European tour.
A deal in principle has been agreed for the 21-year-old midfield playmaker, who turned out 38 times in all competitions for Aberdeen in 2022-23, laying on seven assists and scoring six goals – most of which were spectacular.
However, with the decision over his next move in Clarkson’s hands, he has been mulling over his options while holidaying in Mykonos, Greece, with Dons players Shayden Morris and Jayden Richardson, and most recently Ibiza, as English Championship and League One suitors also vie for his signature.
Not for the first time, the maestro hinted at a Reds return over the weekend when he sent a cryptic message to a supporter on social media:
Better be a permanent deal @LeightonC20 pic.twitter.com/Gl1Qc06TPs
— 🤯 (@GlassOut1) June 9, 2023
Clarkson ‘was technically brilliant at seven or eight’
Clarkson’s hometown of Clitheroe has a population of around 20,000, with Blackburn 10 miles to the south, and Manchester a further 20 miles down the road.
Clitheroe Wolves are one of – if not the biggest – grassroots football club in north-west England, with more than 70 teams encompassing a full boys’ and girls’ pathway, walking football and disability sides.
Players who have come through at the club and made it as professionals include ex-Rangers striker Joe Garner (who currently coaches his daughter’s Wolves age-group team), and midfielders Dom Telford, of Crawley, and Adam Barton, who played for both Partick Thistle and Dundee United.
There are also younger prospects currently in nearby sides’ academies.
However, according to Hibbert – Clitheroe Wolves’ chairman of 15 years and now-full-time club manager – Clarkson was always going to be the “best out of the lot”, with his “huge talent” immediately obvious at an age where he had barely started school.
Hibbert said: “He came to us as a five/six-year-old. It was just from primary school, when kids start wanting to play football.
“In those days, we used to take them at five or six and we’d have a summer with them – a pre-Wolves group on a Saturday, and Leighton just came along with his mates one day.
“I wasn’t involved hugely in the organising of the pre-Wolves at that time. Another guy, Warren Jackson, was his original coach, and then Stephen Thornber came in and they managed it together. They were the coaches who took Leighton in those early ages.
“You could see he had huge talent straight away really, as soon as he arrived.
“He was only a little lad, but I remember watching Leighton from under-7s and he was just head and shoulders above any of them (in terms of ability).
“He was technically brilliant in the way he read the game even at seven or eight. His individual skills, his passing ability… He just stood out.
“Kids at that age, they don’t want to give the ball away – but no one could get it off him anyway!
“He had the vision and ability to bring other players into the game.”
Hibbert insists the kernel of the vision and incisive, defence-tormenting passing Aberdeen fans were treated to by Clarkson in the 2022/23 season – and his ability from free-kicks – have “always been there”.
He added: “He scored a lot of goals, although he was probably more of an attacking player at seven-a-sides than where he plays now. I don’t know where he’s played most for Aberdeen, but probably as a sitting midfielder more than anything.
“But he does have goals in his game, as you’ve seen, with his free-kicks – the free-kicks, vision and passing have always been there.”
“He played for our under-7s, 8s, 9s, and then he went to Blackburn Rovers for a while, did well, then Liverpool picked him up.
“With players like that, you don’t keep hold of them for long because scouts are sniffing about. A lot of the big clubs, including Manchester United, were looking at him because of how talented he was.”
At Liverpool, by the time he was 16, Clarkson had been called up to Steven Gerrard’s U18s squad – where the Anfield side’s legendary captain helped him hone his midfield toolbox and sharpen his dead-ball abilities.
Clarkson looked to be en route from the Liverpool academy straight to a football stratosphere well beyond Aberdeen’s orbit, playing 78 minutes as Barry Lewtas’ Liverpool U23s won the FA Youth Cup in 2019 (“in the second half they dropped him back and his passing was unbelievable”, recalled Hibbert).
Appearances for Liverpool’s first-team followed, including starting a 1-1 Champions League group stage draw with Midjtylland in December 2020.
From 2020, he was training with a Liverpool squad who had already won Europe’s premier club competition and who would soon win the English Premier League, with Anfield boss Jurgen Klopp comparing Clarkson’s midfield style to Germany legend Phillipp Lahm.
However, a 2021-22 loan spell at the club Clarkson grew up supporting, Blackburn Rovers, did not go “to plan”, to use the player’s words, as he made just seven appearances while Tony Mowbray’s side pushed for promotion from the Championship, before being recalled by Liverpool in January.
Hibbert is also a Rovers fan, and after the Ewood Park bump in the road, was thrilled Clarkson found an environment with the Dons where he had a platform to show off his remarkable talents and potential again, saying: “At Blackburn, they tried to play him a little bit higher, and I don’t think it suited his game as much.
“He didn’t struggle at Blackburn, but he probably just didn’t get the opportunities he deserved at that time.
“I’m a Blackburn fan, so it was sad it didn’t work out for him there.
“But obviously now he’s gone up to Aberdeen and thrived in that environment. It’s amazing to see he’s done so well.
“I haven’t been up (to Aberdeen), but I’ve watched quite a few games on TV.
“Anytime I’ve had an opportunity to watch him live, I have done. I’ve seen a lot of the goals he’s scored and I’m surprised he didn’t get goal of the season – he’s scored some crackers.
“The first goal (against St Mirren), which he struck from about 25 yards, was just unbelievable.”
🚀 🤯
WHAT. A. GOAL
👏🏽 Leighton Clarkson.#StandFree | #cinchPrem pic.twitter.com/4mz4FIP3bL
— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 7, 2022
Clarkson bought Clitheroe U18s a kit and footballs as thanks for access to pitches for training
Hibbert revealed, despite playing his football further away from home than ever before last season, Clarkson and his family’s connection to both Clitheroe and the Wolves remains strong.
His father Wes and mum Lindsey remain in Lancashire – in fact, Hibbert went to school with Clarkson’s uncle, Ant, and says both he and Wes were also “very good” players.
Since moving to Liverpool’s academy, Clarkson has continued to help his former club by donating memorabilia and attending events like trophy days – “he gives shirts and he gives boots”.
Meanwhile, for their part, Clitheroe Wolves – who were hoping to have some match-worn Aberdeen gear to raffle off at their most-recent trophy days over the weekend – have been able to provide their illustrious ex-player with access to their Highmoor Park facility when he has needed it, including during the pandemic-enforced shutdown of football and before his arrival at the Dons.
Hibbert said: “He was running around our ground – which is probably about a mile-lap – on his fitness regime. Then he’d get a few balls out and do some free-kicks, and do a bit of work with his dad when he could.
“Last summer he text me again asking if he could use the pitches for a bit of fitness work.
“He brought me a card and a bottle of wine, donated a kit to the U18s for last season and bought us a loads of footballs out of his own pocket as a thank you.
“We didn’t ask him for any of that, he just did it – that’s the kind of lad that he is.
“So he still does a lot for us.
“You have that connection – we helped get him on the ladder and he respects that.”
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