Exclusive Interview: Craig Eastmond, Arsenal's unlikely starlet

28 January 2010

DEBUT DREAM . . . Craig Eastmond was given a surprise Premier League debut at Bolton earlier this month

AMONG the legions of young talent in Arsene Wenger's Arsenal academy, the name of Craig Eastmond rarely warrants a mention.

Teenage team-mates such as Jack Wilshere, Aaron Ramsey and Fran Merida seem to grab the headlines more readily than the 19-year-old midfielder from south London.

READY . . . Eastmond is keen to figure in Arsenal's upcoming run of big matches

But while others may steal the limelight, it is the boy from Battersea who has quietly but impressively made rapid progress this season.

That progress was underlined earlier this month when Arsene Wenger handed Eastmond his first Premier League start - an honour that Wilshere, among many others, is still waiting for - in the 2-0 win over Bolton at the Reebok Stadium.

"I was very surprised to start at Bolton," the young Gunner tells the Gazette. "I had been training hard during the week and I knew there were a few injuries, but it was still a surprise.

"I thought I would make the squad, but I didn't think I would start in the Premier League so when the boss said I was starting it was a good surprise."

A member of Steve Bould's FA Youth Cup-winning Under-18s side last season, Eastmond has almost bypassed the reserves and made his debut for the first team in the 2-1 Carling Cup win over Liverpool in October.

"I took my chance against Liverpool," the youngster reflects. "I showed I was confident in what I could do and that I could go out there and do it, and that is what you have to do if you get the chance."

Eastmond may have reached the first team level a little sooner than he expected, but now he very much intends to stay there.

"You have to keep working, there are always people behind you looking to take your place," he points out.

"The first team players here play very technically, they don't play long ball, it's technical and you have to be able to fit in and play that way.

"But you know if you don't make it at Arsenal you could still make it a high level somewhere else or in the Championship like a lot of other players have."

That last point makes Eastmond sound refreshingly down to earth, which he is. The youngest of six brothers, he has learned from the experience of two of them, Darren and Gavin, who played at youth level for Wimbledon and Millwall respectively but did not make the step up to a professional career.

Eastmond also started at Millwall, but was snapped up by Arsenal as an 11-year-old, joined the club full-time when he left school in 2007 and then as a professional only last summer.

His fledgling Arsenal career has rocketed since then and he was given a new contract earlier this month before starting at Bolton and again in the FA Cup at Stoke on Sunday.

If his season stopped now, Eastmond could be happy with his work, but he is not finished yet and believes Wenger's policy of a club-wide formation is paying off for him.

"The boss likes everyone at the club to play the way the first team does with the 4-3-3 and it helps," he adds.

"Obviously if it's not working in a game you can change it, but we play with that system in all games.

"In the reserves I have been playing the holding role, but in the Youth Cup last season I played at right-back," says Eastmond, who dropped into that role again for the final 25 minutes at the Britannia Sta-dium on Sunday.

"The next stage is to stay around the first team," he continues. "If you can do that you improve, you adapt all the time and get used to playing in the Premier League."

Jay Emmanuel-Thomas became the seventh member of last season's Under-18s who have played for the first team this season when he started at Stoke on Sunday. And Eastmond feels that group have a spirit of togetherness born of their success that also saw them claim the Academy League title.

"It's good to have a winning mentality and we have that from the Youth Cup last year. You never know when you are going to get pushed up from the reserves to the first team.

"To go straight to the first team is so important. We are playing for points now, proper points, and we have to play at the top level all of the time."

So how is he finding life with the big names of the first team, suddenly rubbing shoulders with Fabregas, Gallas and Arshavin?

"Every time I have travelled with the first team so far it has felt different," he says.

"Obviously some of them speak their own language, some of them speak English as well, you just have to talk them in English and I learn little bits of their languages too.

"I make little jokes in their languages too, it's good to do that, we are all learning. It's good to be like that on and off the pitch.

"Kieran Gibbs last season was a big inspiration, when he'd been in the first team we'd get feedback off him, of what it was like so it would help us when we got there."

Whatever Gibbs passed on to his young team-mate has clearly paid off, and now Eastmond is raring for more experience if Wenger comes calling.

And he will be happy even if that comes in any of the trio of big clashes over the next fortnight against Manchester United, Chelsea and then Liverpool.

"I want to play any game in the first team," he confirms. "I feel I am ready for it now. I would be nervous to play one of these big games but I would be ready for it too.