Inside the 10-mile Stockport triangle which forged England's three musketeers as Cole Palmer, Phil Foden and Kobbie Mainoo prepare to shine in Euro 2024 final

A couple of days before meeting Prince William at St George’s Park and flying off to a tournament he could scarcely have believed his involvement in just a year ago, Cole Palmer made a stop at home.

The Black Boy Pub in Wythenshawe, the district of Manchester from where he hails. Bunting outside, a bouncy castle ready for inflation. This place will be rammed on Sunday, a clamour for the garden furniture under a smart wooden cover housing two screens.

They will come from the residential flats over the road, the semi-detached houses built in the 1960s. The sense of community in these areas remains as strong as ever and it is where Palmer — down in the bright lights with Chelsea now — still views as home, where he is most comfortable. 

It’s a safe haven for him to just be, sat listening to the hubbub with a soft drink. That, for somebody who doesn’t enjoy attention or speak unless spoken to, is a valuable commodity.

‘After the England friendlies, he came back to watch the local pub team,’ Palmer’s first coach at NJ Wythenshawe Graeme Fowler says. ‘His dad Jermaine played for them. He comes back and watches all the time.

‘There was a presentation night. He didn’t give out the awards, just came to show his face. Everyone knows him so nobody bothers him. The kids come up asking for pictures and autographs and he does all that. He knows what a role model he is. But then he can just sit there and relax. He’s not got everyone all over him. It’s a big family.’

The pub was where Palmer took his Treble medals last year after a historic season at Manchester City. It stands proud at the heart of the estate and a five-minute drive from Hollyhedge Park towards leafy Gatley. Hollyhedge is a great expanse where Jermaine spent hours working on his son’s control, a reason Palmer’s boots always seem to be caked in glue.

From there, Mail Sport goes on a short trip, because there are two other England stars not far from here. Six miles southeast of the Black Boy is the indoor Box Football, formerly Shots. 

Kobbie Mainoo’s arena, where he had his peers begging him to perform what became trademark overhead kicks. Eight minutes north is Mainoo’s school, Cheadle Catholic Infants. Three miles north again is Gatley Primary School, where Palmer attended.

Then go east: Phil Foden country. Four miles on is Bridge Hall Primary and three miles north into the Heatons, just over the Stockport Pyramid, is Reddish Vulcans, Foden’s first club.

It barely takes any time to whizz around this area, throwing a blanket over three points of interest in English football. Mainoo and Foden are pure Stockport. Palmer is Manchester, but his early schooling in Gatley — and moving to Cheadle — means that Stockport can lay claim to him as well. And they have, council leader Mark Hunter this week congratulating the trio.

‘The disadvantaged areas had always gone untouched,’ Fowler says. ‘Now everywhere is getting looked at because of the amount of scouts. They are kids who have to fight for everything. 

'They have to work hard, that’s engrained in them. That’s why they are the ones who make it: you can have all the talent in the world but if you don’t work hard enough you don’t get anywhere.’

Reddish Vulcans had a ‘bus stop of scouts’ waiting at the end of Foden’s matches, according to his first coach and City recruitment co-ordinator Joe Makin, who once described Foden as ‘coming from heaven’. ‘The dad asking who he was looked at me open-mouthed,’ says Makin. ‘This is my 30th year at Vulcans and nobody has given that immediate sense of, “this could be a special occasion”.

‘We had three — Phil, Diego Latte and Mace Goodridge — who went to City at Under 9. So we put a piece on the website. All I put about Phil was, “Foden, Phil Foden: remember the name — a left foot to die for.” He was smaller than the other boys, definitely quieter. He didn’t have a lot to say for himself — still doesn’t really!’

There is a story that entwines Foden and Mainoo, even though Foden is five years older. The scene is Shots. Foden’s younger brother is training there and the City academy graduate, then around 15, turns up with him. 

‘Phil came a few times,’ Mainoo’s coach Paul Newton says. A coach at City as well as running Shots, Newton knocked balls about with Foden while the younger groups trained on the other pitch.

‘Honestly, mind-blowing,’ he says. ‘Phenomenal talent. We had those five-a-side nets that were slightly taller, Phil would be shooting from the halfway line and pinging it in the top corner again and again. What the hell?’

Mainoo, a centre forward back then, won Shots two North West Champs of Champs tournaments set up by Makin. ‘One year he won it at his own age and then a year up as well,’ Newton says. ‘All the Manchester United scouts were coming up to me asking, “who’s that lad playing for you?” I thought they were joking. He’d already signed for them!

‘He’d walk in and the lads would say, “oh Kobbie’s here, Kobbie’s here”. Kobbie would throw the ball up, do an overhead kick and land on his feet. From the age of seven. All the other kids, as soon as he arrived, would be asking him to do that. He’s like an acrobat.’

Mainoo’s father Felix is never far from his side. The pair are like a double act according to Newton and there is a paternal element to the rise of all three players.

A short walk from Foden’s old house on Grenville Street in Edgeley is Alexandra Park. There is a lake where, towards the end of each day, local fishers sit and wait patiently. 

It’s thought that is where Foden fell in love with the pastime, going with Phil Snr. ‘It’s still a strong hobby,’ Makin says. ‘They have a spot in Stoke where they go night fishing. They’re very similar, I can imagine them sitting there with hardly a word crossed.’

Newton’s son, Sam, was in United’s academy with Mainoo and caught lifts with Felix to the Cliff. ‘Sam would tell me how they used to chat about how every session had gone, positive and negatives and how to move forward,’ says Newton. ‘That’s unusual for a lad and dad because you can sometimes have conflict. They had intellectual conversations from very early on. Felix was a massive mentor to Kobbie.’

Newton marvels at how Mainoo — ‘calm , laidback yet fiercely competitive’ — has made each jump in class without fuss. It has felt seamless, in contradiction to Palmer’s journey, with City cashing in last summer for £42.5million.

‘There were setbacks in the academy,’ Fowler says. ‘He was called too small. There was a point when he had a wake-up call. He was getting a bit left behind and I remember his dad speaking to him. He went, “I’m gonna go for it proper” and he was in the gym, starting weight training and getting himself fit. The next minute, things start happening.

‘You know those tournaments you have in the summer? They’re all-day things so you’ll have kids having burgers and chips, ice creams. Cole never had any of it. All he had was a packed lunch his dad made up. Rather than chocolate, it was fruit. Water. That was from the age of seven. He always wanted to be that player.

‘You know what kids are like, they all want big burgers. But he knew if he was going to play football he wanted to put something different in his body. He’s always looked after himself. That’s part of the reason he’s got to where he is and you haven’t seen the best of him. There’s more to come.’

Stockport expects now and they may have three on the pitch on Sunday in Berlin. ‘Welcome to Stockport, twinned with Beziers and Heilbronn; home to three Euros winners’ has something of a ring to it.