Inside the $33m debut of an Aussie ‘star in the making’

Kingston upon Hull: On an afternoon that will live long in the memory of Hull City fans, new signing Lucas Herrington was one of the last to leave MKM Stadium.

The towering 18-year-old exited the ground as younger fans waited for his signature and a chance at a photo. He happily obliged.

He happily obliged to an interview with Nine too.

“It was unbelievable, such a great moment for the club and for me, such a dream come true,” he said outside the ground.

The photos kept coming before he drove away from MKM Stadium with his family and agent.

He spent the evening with that same group, the crew that’s helped him get to this massive stage.

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Herrington is a polished media performer, polite and as calm off the field as he looks on it.

He never looked flustered in his 30 minutes for Hull, and rarely did for the Socceroos on the biggest stage of the World Cup.

His agent, Buddy Farah, has been there for three and a half years as the Queenslander went from the Brisbane Roar to Colorado then the World Cup and now Hull City.

The transfer interest in the defender came far and wide during the World Cup. Barcelona and Liverpool were the clubs that grabbed the headlines, but the newly promoted Hull landed its man for a reported $33 million.

Farah told Nine the process has been “so easy” for Herrington.

“He’s just taken it in his grasp, and it hasn’t fazed him,” he said.

“I was having this conversation with his mum, I’ve been here for two weeks with him and she arrived yesterday and she said ‘how’s he feeling?’ But it’s just another day for him, he just gets on with the job, it’s amazing.

“He’s a star in the making, he really is.”

The Saturday afternoon fixture makes Herrington the third-youngest Aussie to have made their Premier League debut, falling just behind Harry Kewell and Aiden O’Neill.

Herrington’s next step will be settling in the Hull district having only arrived 10 days ago.

He’ll have a host of Australians around him, with many former NRL players living in surrounding areas and playing for Hull KR or Hull FC.

The rest of the growth will come on the pitch.

Heading to Hull on Saturday morning, the big watch was where Herrington would be named.

Ultimately, when the team dropped, there was a slight disappointment to see him on the bench.

But that disappointment evaporated when he came on in the 64th minute to replace goalscorer Nobel Mendy.

And with every duel won it became clear the teenager felt at home in the Premier League.

How he’ll break into the first team will be interesting.

Both goalscorers, Semi Ajayi and Nobel Mendy, play his position and will be hard to displace.

Herrington will have to become accustomed to the set-pieces of Hull too, which were used to ruthless effect.

However, with a Carabao Cup fixture against Stoke in three days, it might not be long until we see that star in the making run out as a starting defender on one of the biggest stages.

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