NEARLY 24 years after he broke his first Premier League record, James Milner is on the verge of another. If the Leeds-born player makes it onto the pitch for Brighton and Hove Albion at Brentford on Saturday it will be his 654th appearance in the division – no one has made more since the top-flight reinvented itself in 1992.
To be breaking records at both ends of the age scale is incredible – the 40-year-old is the Premier League's second-youngest and second-oldest goalscorer – yet right from the start there were signs Leeds United had a player who could have a long career at the top of the game, not just one that shone brightly, then fizzled out.
The Premier League's 10 youngest scorers are a mixed bag. Below Milner sit Wayne Rooney, Cesc Fabregas and Michael Owen. You will remember the names. What will Rio Ngumoha, Lewis Miley and Ethan Nwaneri achieve once out of their teens?
James Vaughan had a good career which took in Huddersfield Town and Bradford City, but his goal for Everton against Crystal Palace on April 10, 2005, breaking Milner's record by 86 days, was one of only seven in the Premier League. Andy Turner, who passed through Doncaster Rovers, Huddersfield and Rotherham United amongst many others and Federcio Macheda (another Doncaster loanee) got four each.
YOIUNG PROSPECT: James Milner was 16 when he made his Leeds United debut (Image: Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)placeholder image
YOIUNG PROSPECT: James Milner was 16 when he made his Leeds United debut (Image: Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)
Milner is the only player to win every major English trophy with more than one club, completing the clean sweep with Manchester City and Liverpool. Neither had won the Premier League, and their last First Division titles were in the distant past.
Television pundit Lucy Ward taught Milner sports studies at Thomas Danby College. He would go on to be an international footballer, she Leeds United's education and welfare officer.
"If you'd said to me in 2002 he'll still be playing when he's 40 and he'll play for England I would have gone, 'Yeah I can see that,'" says the former striker.
"It's a lottery with a lot of players – injury, opportunity – but he was single-minded, humble, he had a desire to do everything right, including when he was being taught.
NEW LEVELS: James Milner became a central midfielder for Martin O'Neil at Aston Villa (Image: Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)placeholder image
NEW LEVELS: James Milner became a central midfielder for Martin O'Neil at Aston Villa (Image: Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)
“If you're lazy in the classroom you won't be able to hide that on the pitch. I used to say to the kids I know what you're like on the pitch just from the way that you respond to doing work in the classroom. He just wanted to do well in everything he did.
"He didn't change, which was difficult for him because he probably had about four or five managers in the first couple of seasons.
"I ended up 17 years teaching or as head of education and I saw hundreds, probably thousands of young men and there weren't any better than his attitude."
Milner has spoken of the importance of the "old school" values he was imbued with coming through at Leeds but there was one he ignored – "win or lose, on the booze".
NATIONAL SERVICE: James Milner won a record 46 England Under-21 caps - then 61 for the senior side (Image: Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)placeholder image
NATIONAL SERVICE: James Milner won a record 46 England Under-21 caps - then 61 for the senior side (Image: Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)
"Football was still in a sort of drinking culture," explains Ward. “To be able to say no to your peers because he didn't drink was and is probably the hardest thing you could ever do as a 16-, 17-, 18-year-old."
Milner was 16 years, 309 days old when he replaced Jason Wilcox to make his Leeds debut at West Ham United’s unforgiving Upton Park. In his fourth game, on Boxing Day 2002, he broke the record Rooney set two weeks earlier as the Premier League's youngest scorer by just four days. Two days later he skipped past World Cup-winner Marcel Desailly to score a wonderful goal against hated rivals Chelsea.
Within a year-and-a-half he was gone, sold to Newcastle United as the Whites went into a financial meltdown.
BIG WINNER: James Milner helped break Liverpool's Premier League duck - just as he had at Manchester City (Image: Paul Ellis/Pool via Getty Images)placeholder image
BIG WINNER: James Milner helped break Liverpool's Premier League duck - just as he had at Manchester City (Image: Paul Ellis/Pool via Getty Images)
"Football was him, Leeds was him and his family," says Ward. "I think he would have preferred to play for Leeds again at some point but it's not yet transpired."
Joining Newcastle in 2004 would have tested Milner's tee-totalism. It was the era of the Magpies "brat pack", a group of young players infamous for off-field misbehaviour. Milner was 18 when he joined.
"I used to make sure he was alright and go around to his house to play darts but he was always a model professional," recalls then-team-mate Steve Harper. “As a teenager he had to play in front of a big, expectant crowd but it didn’t faze him."
And just because he did not drink did not mean he would not join in in other ways.
"His darts nickname was Machine Gun Milner," recalls Harper. "He was the best in all the darts tournaments we had. I was No 2 seed. I remember him playing darts against Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor and he started with 100, 100, 100."
Having had a taste of loan football at Aston Villa, in 2008 Milner put in a transfer request when they came back for him. It was at Villa Park the left winger began his transition into an all-rounder as Martin O'Neill moved him into central midfield.
STILL GOING: James Milner is set to break the record for Premier League appearances should he get on to the pitch with Brighton & Hove Albion today - his career started in spectacular fashion aged just 16 at Leeds United. Picture: Cody Froggatt/PAplaceholder image
STILL GOING: James Milner is set to break the record for Premier League appearances should he get on to the pitch with Brighton & Hove Albion today - his career started in spectacular fashion aged just 16 at Leeds United. Picture: Cody Froggatt/PA
“When you play wide you depend on other people giving you the ball to get into the game but when you have got that determination and energy, you might as well use it in the centre of the field," reasoned O’Neill.
Later Milner had spells in both full-back positions. He is in the Premier League's all-time top 10 both for assists and tackles.
"His willingness to do that and sometimes be a seven out of ten in a position which the manager needs you is probably a more valuable performance than you'd expect," argues Ward. "At his peak he was probably the best all-round player. He could do everything at a similar level. He could pass it, he could run, he could shoot, he could track. There's a lot of players who there's a couple of things they're weak at but I don't think there were many he was."
At Villa, though, he was exceptional. In 2009-10, after 12 goals and 16 assists in 49 games, he was PFA Young Player of the Year despite over 300 career appearances.
A player fast-tracked into the Premier League at 16 did not make his England debut until 23 after a record 46 Under-21 caps.
"That tells you everything about him," says Ward. "At no point did he go, 'This is beneath me.' I read he retired from England as young players were coming through and he didn't want to stop that path."
Sixty-one caps was arguably too few looking at what Milner did before retiring in 2016, and what he went on to, but it felt at times England’s early 20th Century team was for the flashiest, not always the best.
His Newcastle manager Graeme Souness came to regret saying "you don't win anything with a team of James Milners" – a point more about experience than talent – but it shows how he was underappreciated.
"Because he doesn't put himself out there I think people probably underestimate what he's achieved," argues Ward. “Look what he's done, who he's played against, how he's kept his career going."
Milner moved on once more in 2010, and again it was him pushing for it, but the standing ovation when substituted in his final Villa game, with a £26m move to Manchester City public knowledge, spoke volumes. So did O'Neill's resignation.
He won City's first title since 1968, then second, two FA Cups and a League Cup.
“Show me another who does all the things that Milner does well," said manager Manuel Pellegrini. "It’s very difficult to find another Milner — an intelligent player with big balls and a massive heart.”
Liverpool stepped in when his contract expired in 2015 and made him vice-captain.
"He set the rules, set the standards, and made sure that we all kept to them," said Jurgen Klopp, who became their manager in October. Milner won the club's annual lactate threshold fitness test every pre-season – and more importantly the European Cup, Super Cup, Club World Cup, Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup.
Despite only seven starts in 2022-23, Klopp asked Liverpool to give him a new contract. When they refused he joined Brighton, where he still sets standards.
"Quite a lot of pros as they get older realise younger players are probably going to take their place and get a little bit narked about it," says Ward. "He recognises it's about the bigger picture and the team."
The minutes are more sporadic now – just 377 so far in this season's Premier League – but the influence is still strong.
After leaving Brighton for Chelsea in the summer, Joao Pedro spoke about it.
"I said to him: ‘I want to play for a big club’,” he revealed. “He made me promise I would never stop pushing my limits.”
“He’s an absolute model professional for any young player," says Harper.
Or as Ward puts it: "He's just a normal human being who has a lot of emotional intelligence, extremely empathetic, he’s got a great sense of humour and isn't that what we all want our sons to be?”