Cleverley discusses the 'tunnel vision mindset' top players need
As a player, Tom Cleverley made more than 250 appearances in the Premier League and Champions League.
He clocked up over 100 more in the Championship, FA Cup and League Cup, and was capped by England 13 times.
He is perfectly placed to comment upon and explain what it takes to have a career at the top level of English football.
After the Preston game, he spoke about some of that, particularly the need for your own personal levels to be consistent every day – not just matchdays.
“Not everyone is born with that sort of tunnel vision mindset of having no distractions and not allowing anything to come in your way to get to where you want to be,” he said.
“You try and teach people to have that.
“Even the way you do the warm-up on a Monday morning at training, or the way you do what you might think is the most pointless passing drill, or the way you do your gym work, or the way you do your recovery sessions.
“These things may all seem pointless, but it’s the detail, the care, the hard work and ultimately how you live your life all week – it all leads up to that 90 minutes.
“We don’t have enough that have that elite mindset yet.”
The head coach said his team don’t stop trying, but they find themselves out of games and having to chase them far too often.
“We never give up that’s for sure, because our second-half record is unbelievable,” Cleverley reflected.
“We just don’t start well enough.
“Is that the players being scared of gassing out? Is there a flatness to us?
“It’s a difficult training regime we have here, do we need to maybe put more emphasis on the start of games rather than training so hard?
“Performances like that tonight really take you back to the drawing board.
“And that’s disappointing because I want to add layers on where I think we are as a team but it looks like we need to strip it back at times.”
Cleverley was clearly bitterly disappointed with the first 45 minutes in particular.
“I think Preston are one of the most solid teams in the league and they keep a flat line of five at the back,” he said.
“So if you give yourself one goal to get back then you’re in trouble. If you give yourself two you’re almost dead.
“I didn’t recognise the players I saw in the first half and that is a worrying comment.”
The one new signing of January so far had a testing evening and was substituted at half-time.
“James Abankwah came in and did fantastically well on Saturday, and set a high bar,” Cleverley pointed out.
“He’s come back down to earth with a bit of a bang tonight but hopefully that doesn’t dent his confidence too much.
“That’s the Championship though. No challenge is ever the same.
“I will have to watch the game back and come to some sort of conclusions to how we go forward from here.”
