Jake Hesketh happily playing his part in Burton’s Carabao Cup adventure

Just over two years ago Jake Hesketh was among the Southampton squad waiting at Ben Gurion airport, just outside Tel Aviv. It was the day after a 0-0 draw against Hapoel Beer Sheva in the Europa League and after an overnight stay there were understandably itchy feet. Barack Obama did not get the memo, though, with Air Force One arriving and Israel rolling out the red carpet.

“We were stuck for a little bit while the US president was sat on the runway,” Hesketh says. “For about half an hour we were just looking out waiting for the plane to go. The game itself was a totally different atmosphere, a unique place. It was just a surreal couple of days. I remember all of the whistling; it was a very intimidating stadium to play in.”

The game held a mixture of emotions for Hesketh; he had made his European debut aged 19 but was substituted inside 33 minutes, a decision the then manager Claude Puel said he made to “protect” the player. His Premier League debut came two years earlier, against Manchester United at St Mary’s. Even now, Hesketh cannot help but smile as he describes the moment he replaced Dusan Tadic with half an hour to play. “It was the kind of night you dream of when you are younger,” he says. “I was born in Stockport, and a Manchester United fan, so it couldn’t have really been scripted any better. Now I look back and think maybe I was a bit too young and not quite ready. I felt like I did well but there was something missing and I wasn’t the player I am now. Sometimes you wonder what might have been, especially without an injury here or there.”

For Hesketh, now 22 and on loan at Burton Albion from Southampton, such experiences whet the appetite – “they left me wanting more” – especially after missing the bulk of last year following hamstring surgery. “That was the most frustrating time for me,” he says, overlooking the pitch at the Pirelli Stadium. “To be a year out of it, you start to think: ‘How am I going to get back there?’ It all looks miles away again.

“It’s difficult to be in and out, to feel like you’re in and around it, and then suddenly you start to question whether there will ever be another opportunity. There were times when I was out of form, the self-doubt creeps in and you do go through difficult stages, definitely. I was seeing my mates play, obviously I was really happy for them, but I was sitting there frustrated, not at not playing because that is never a guarantee, but at not even being available.”

Hesketh joined Burton at the end of August in search of first-team football, moving in with another loan recruit, his Southampton teammate Jake Flannigan, who has since returned to Hampshire with a knee injury. After 16 years of wearing red and white, Hesketh admits it took him time to settle but after a slow start the midfielder, who grew up admiring Adam Lallana, has established himself as one of Nigel Clough’s best performers.

His goal, a sweet volley against Nottingham Forest, sealed passage to the Carabao Cup quarter-finals, with the draw serving up a trip to Middlesbrough on Tuesday, Burton having also seen off Burnley and Aston Villa.

Scoring goals helped propel Hesketh towards earning a professional contract at 18, just as his peers seemed to be moving on without him. Matt Targett, a teammate since under-nines, was among those who had already had his future sorted. “I was the last one,” Hesketh says. “It got to December-January time and everyone either got a contract or got told they were leaving, and I was told they hadn’t decided yet. I spoke to Willo [the former under-18s’ coach Paul Williams] and he said: ‘You need to add more end-product. We need to make it impossible for you not to get a professional contract.’

“We did some video analysis, we went out and did extra training, worked on my finishing – hitting the back of the net whenever there was a goalkeeper available and even when there wasn’t, just hitting the corners. I ended up scoring five or six in the next couple of months and was the top goalscorer at the end of the season. Luckily I got my contract and it was a bit of relief in the end.”

His deal at Southampton runs until 2021 and his next aim is to impress Ralph Hasenhüttl either in January, when the loan is due to expire, or next summer, should his stay at Burton be extended. Over the past few months he has been in dialogue with Kelvin Davis, the interim manager before the Austrian’s appointment. “It’s nice to know they are watching because as much as I want to impress people here and prove myself to everyone, the people at Southampton are the people I probably want to impress the most because that’s the team I ultimately want to get into,” he says. “Whenever the time comes that I go back, I want to impress the new manager and put a case forward to be in his team.”

As a kid, Hesketh, who was raised in Whiteley, swayed between Portsmouth and Southampton before joining Saints aged eight, so Fratton Park was a fitting setting to score his first Burton goal in October, waltzing past four blue shirts before powering home. Among the travelling support that day were a handful of school friends from Swanmore College. “I ran over towards the away end and saw my mate running down the stairs to join the celebrations, which was funny,” Hesketh says, his smile slowly broadening.