Kane Wilson has reflected on his time at West Bromwich Albion and how the dismissal of former boss Tony Pulis affected his development.
Wilson made his first-team debut under Pulis in the 2016 pre-season, when he was only 16 years old and studying for his GCSEs.
Wilson made his first-team debut, having impressed in multiple friendlies, against Northampton Town in the early stages of that season in the EFL Cup, having been fast-tracked as a marauding full-back. Albion were in need of a right-back at the time, having moved on from the likes of Cristian Gamboa and relying on Craig Dawson.
Wilson would eventually give way to the recruited Allan Nyom and be sent out on loan still as a burgeoning teenager, but upon his return a season later, he was greeted by a new face at the helm: Alan Pardew. Wilson, who knows he plays for Derby County after spells at Forest Green Rovers and Bristol City, knew he’d have to head out and secure more minutes elsewhere.
“West Brom wanted me to be a center-back at first because I was kind of big and good on the ball,” Wilson explained to the Derby Telegraph, “but I was also really good at running with the ball.” They then moved me to midfield until I was about 12 or 13 years old, at which point my mother and father were summoned to the academy’s headquarters. They were told that they planned to put me on the first team as soon as I was 16.
“At the time, West Brom had players like Darren Fletcher, Claudio Yacob, and some big midfielders, but they didn’t have a right back. They were like, He’s obviously good at dribbling; he can defend; can we put him there? I was fine with that if I could get to the first team, and a year and a half later, I was on the plane to Austria at 16. Pulis told me that he wanted me to learn the position.
so I was loaned out to Exeter at 17. While I was there, he then got the sack. “When I came back, everything had changed. It is pot-luck sometimes. Alan Pardew came in, and I don’t think he knew my name because I was out on loan. I came back in January and trained for a week, but he was never going to call on me because he was fighting for his job in the Premier League. I then went back out on loan again because I don’t like coasting. If I hadn’t, I would have been in the stands.”
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