‘I was in the changing room crying, I burst into tears because I knew what that moment meant and how it had escaped me.” This was Shayon Harrison in the aftermath of what should have been the best night of his life, a Tottenham first-team debut at Anfield aged 19.
Six and a half years on, his first ever game as a professional it is still what defines his career. Harrison came off the bench in the League Cup fourth round-tie and had a chance to equalise – but he miscontrolled an Érik Lamela cross, allowing Simon Mignolet to collect, and Spurs went on to lose.
He would not play for Spurs’ first team again. Now 25, the Hornsey-born striker is playing in his fourth country, leading the promotion charge for Poli Iasi in Romania’s second tier. “It seems like lightyears away,” Harrison says. “[Mauricio] Pochettino put his arm around me and comforted me as much as he could.
I feel everything had been leading up to that moment; I had been with the first team for quite a while, travelling to games, training with them on a regular basis and then the opportunity was presented to me.