A scout with a heavyweight CV and an eagle eye for a player fires up his laptop, does a quick search through the system and quotes a few top lines on Charlie Hughes, the England Under-20 centre-back creating quite a stir in League One.
“Good in the air, strong, consistently wins his duels. Ticks the box on distribution – creates time on the ball,” it says. He is flagged up as one to monitor, his mentality noted. “Can play at a higher level.”
It is not an isolated opinion. 20-year-old Hughes has attracted plenty of attention, with Premier League talent spotters regularly checking in at the DW Stadium to run the rule over a player who says he models his game on Virgil van Dijk and Sergio Ramos.
West Ham are firm admirers while Ipswich Town, pushing for promotion to the top tier, have also been credited with an interest. Brentford, whose talent ID is close to best in class in the Premier League, are also understood to be maintaining a watching brief.
But Hughes is a Wigan Athletic success story and a short time in his company hints at why he is destined for the top. Just as he does on the pitch, Hughes projects a quiet authority alongside a commendable maturity. If there is any evidence that the hype and speculation is going to his head it is very well hidden indeed.
“I just want to let my football do the talking,” he says, midway through our interview when asked about his Wigan future. For the record he comes across as totally committed to the Latics.
Coaches marvel at his desire to learn and he says he has leant on seasoned, senior teammates like Max Power and last season’s centre-back partner Jack Whatmough for advice.
“I’m trying to improve every day, to train well and play well and be the best version of myself,” he says.
“I stay away from social media and don’t really read anything about my future and see just see it as noise. I don’t allow myself to tune into that stuff and get big-headed. Football is such a rollercoaster and things can change very quickly.”
Hughes should know, having crammed plenty into his nascent football career already. He spent time in the Manchester City academy before moving to Liverpool, where he was a teammate of Conor Bradley in the age groups.
His father Adrian was a professional footballer himself, a centre-back with Preston North End whose career was curtailed by injury. He has been a huge support, able to offer advice along his journey.
Rejection at Melwood was never going to be terminal to his aspirations.
“At that stage it was about playing with a smile on my face. Those setbacks as a youngster, you just sort of take it,” he recalls.
“I have always grown up being around older lads so I’ve always taken their advice and I used to speak to a lot of the older ones.
“I have always tried to push on by doing more so when it happened that’s what I did. If I get a setback I’m in the gym doing more or I’m on the pitch trying to do more. I want to try and improve and I’d always pull the coach and ask him questions, that’s in my nature.”
His hometown side Wigan moved in and he joined a club that “felt like a family”, offering a fast-track route into the Under-21s and the first team. That path was cleared by the club’s financial and ownership difficulties, which required a firesale of first-team players and preceded relegation from the Championship last season.
Hughes was handed a chance and prospered but the club was struggling. Players were paid late on six occasions last season, technically a breach of contract that would have allowed them a chance to walk away for nothing. They started this season on minus eight points as punishment for the club’s previous owners failing to deposit funds to cover the wage bill.
They were difficult days and given there were no shortage of potential suitors, Hughes might have been forgiven for walking away. There was never a chance of that, he says.
“It was a tough time what the club was going through.
“The respect the club and staff had for the players, you come to the conclusion that you’ve been at the club for so long, you’ve come through the academy, they looked after me – I felt it was a no brainer to stick around and improve as a player and person here.”
Hughes is speaking to i as part of the EFL’s youth development week in which the league highlight the crucial role its clubs play in developing players – not just for their own teams but also for Premier League clubs and England sides.
Last season academy players made more than 5,000 appearances across the league. An impressive 161 players were handed debuts in 2022/3 and already this season academy graduates have made more than 3,400 appearances. These serve as timely reminders at a point when the Premier League are stalling over a financial settlement with the league.
Wigan’s impressive commitment to youth means they are leading the way across the entire EFL. 40 per cent of their team is made up of academy graduates, who have played a cumulative 13,000 minutes in League One.
That has brought a closeness to this tightly-knit, talented group, and hopes are high that, starting from a level playing field next season, the team can challenge for promotion.
“We’re more like a family than teammates,” Hughes says.
“We’re growing together and there’s some players in there who can make this group really special. This team has a really bright future.”
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