‘I want to be a footballer, not a ball boy’ – Oakley Cannonier on his passion to become a player in his own right | OneFootball

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Empire of the Kop

·28 January 2022

‘I want to be a footballer, not a ball boy’ – Oakley Cannonier on his passion to become a player in his own right

Article image:‘I want to be a footballer, not a ball boy’ – Oakley Cannonier on his passion to become a player in his own right

Oakley Cannonier already has his name in Liverpool legend for his actions that aided Trent Alexander-Arnold’s quickly taken corner against Barcelona.

Our 2019 ball boy was a 14-year-old that was part of the academy set-up as he created the move the led to Divock Origi scoring the famous winning goal.


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The young striker is now determined to make his name as a player in his own right and has spoken with the club’s website to share his thoughts on the famous night.

The 17-year-old said: ‘It does make me feel proud, it is a massive moment, but I want to be a footballer, not a ball boy.

‘I picked that spot for the atmosphere and stuff, I’d done some games before, like Dortmund when Lovren scored the header – Lovren slid in that corner where I was.

‘I’ve had good luck when it comes to ball-boying, to be fair!

‘Liverpool were obviously getting beat, so the assistant manager told our coach Carl that the ball needs to be in rapid for the intensity of the game and stuff because we were 3-0 down.

‘Everything had to be quick and you had to get the ball back on the pitch.

‘I went to school the next day and all the Liverpool fans in our school were just coming up to me and going, ‘You won us the game!’ I had to go in a different room because there were so many people coming up to me.

‘It still is a bit mad. People getting in touch on social media calling me a Liverpool legend.

‘But if you look at what Trent’s done with Liverpool’s first team and won stuff with them, I’d love to do that.

‘I don’t want to just be like a ball-boy legend, you know what I mean?

“I trained with the first team a few weeks ago and the boss came up to me and he was like, ‘I just need to thank you’ for what I did!’.

It’s great to hear that even Jurgen Klopp had to say something to the youngster who moved to the Reds from Leeds United, it will be a story that will follow him round for the rest of his life.

Let’s hope that he can make a name for himself as a footballer and not just for throwing a ball to our No.66.

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