Mentored, then mentor

Sean Scannell joined the Crystal Palace academy at 12 and made his first-team debut at 17 — a 90th-minute winner against Sheffield Wednesday in only his second appearance.

At 18 he was named the Football League's Championship Apprentice of the Year and won Palace's Young Player of the Year. A reported club-record move took him to Huddersfield Town, where he spent six years and was part of the squad that won promotion to the Premier League at Wembley in 2017.

The years that followed were tougher — spells at Burton, Bradford, Blackpool and Grimsby, a ruptured Achilles, and being told, more than once, that he wasn't needed. He kept going: a title-winning non-league reset at Hornchurch, and then a decision to step away from the full-time game to build something that lasts.

He was mentored throughout his Palace years by Clinton Morrison — who picked him up from his house for training and looked after him when things weren't going well. That's the model. Now Sean does the same for the next generation.