“We would love to keep him here, but maybe we have done too good a job with him.”
Preston North End manager Paul Heckingbottom is talking to The Athletic four days before their FA Cup quarter-final against Aston Villa.
For both sides, the game represents a major window of opportunity, knowing victory would take them to a Wembley semi-final and closer to the shot at silverware.
If Preston win, that would give 22-year-old full-back, Kaine Kesler-Hayden, who is enjoying an exceptional loan at Preston from Villa, a chance to play at Wembley and perhaps reach that final. However, due to Football Association rules, he cannot feature on Sunday against his parent club in the quarter-final, so he will instead be in the stadium watching with family and friends.
“It will be strange for him,” Heckingbottom says. “It’s not Villa stopping him playing; they would be delighted if he could play in an FA Cup quarter-final, (as) it’s a great experience and they get to assess him first-hand against top players. Everyone’s disappointed he can’t play.”
Kesler-Hayden has accrued nearly 3,000 minutes in the Championship this season and started the last 31 league fixtures. There is a feeling that his time at Preston has hardened his mentality and brought a new level of performance, having adjusted to playing right and left wing-back.
“Whatever happens at the end of the season, we wish him well,” adds Heckingbottom. “But he knows he’s loved here and we’d love to keep working with him. But he may have got too many suitors now. We are in touch regularly with Villa. Tony Carss is their development manager and comes to our games a lot. He’s due another visit in a couple of weeks. They’re delighted with how he’s progressed.”
Such consistency is impressive in itself but perhaps made even more so considering how the campaign started for him and Preston.
Heckingbottom joined two games in and on the back of successive league defeats. Incredibly, he was Preston’s third manager of the season by mid-August, with Ryan Lowe departing by mutual consent after the opening weekend and then replacement Mike Marsh, who was placed in caretaker charge, stepping down a week later.
Preston were in a state of flux and far from what Kesler-Hayden — who had signed on a season-long loan two weeks earlier — had envisioned, especially after conversations with Lowe, who had mapped out longer-term plans before signing.
The full-back agreed a new three-year deal at Villa last summer under the provision he would head out for his fifth loan. The extension protected his market value but club staff insisted an improved salary was a reward for a beneficial six-month loan at Plymouth Argyle.
He returned to Villa in January 2024 and, despite receiving offers on deadline day from top-end League One sides, opted to stay until the end of the season and learn under Unai Emery. He then made his Premier League debut against Wolverhampton Wanderers in March.
Following a new contract, Championship sides began to register interest. Peter Risdale, Preston’s chairman-turned-director, made the biggest play and contacted Kesler-Hayden’s representatives and Villa’s loan manager, Adam Henshall.
As Kesler-Hayden spoke to Lowe on his way up to Lancashire to complete paperwork, another Championship club made a last-ditch attempt to sign him. By this stage, though, the player’s mind was made up.
Lowe left a week later, leaving Kesler-Hayden to question if he had made the right decision. Having joined a team marred in uncertainty, he then started just two of the first seven league fixtures.
“He was someone I knew about,” says Heckingbottom. “I had seen him in the odd game, but not followed closely. A couple of days later, we were playing Luton Town at home, and I needed a left wing-back because we had injuries and I knew he’d played there at Plymouth.
“I did a lot of ringing around about him — Stuart McCall, my assistant, watched his game against Leeds United when he played left wing-back against Dan James — and just learned about him. And you know what, he responded really well then.”
It was not until October that Kesler-Hayden fully established himself. A 3-0 victory against Watford set the run of consecutive starts and coincided with a five-game unbeaten run and three successive clean sheets. Kesler-Hayden was regularly switching flanks, operating as a wing-back in a back-five system and becoming increasingly robust.
“He is more natural on the right in some aspects, but then the left suits him when he comes inside on his right foot,” Heckingbottom explains.
Since the turn of the year, Kesler-Hayden has remained at right wing-back, his favoured role. Being stationed in a higher position lends itself to his strengths, using his burst of pace in one-on-one situations and being in better areas to deliver into the box. Over the past 12 months, Kesler-Hayden ranks in the top six per cent of full-backs for progressive carries and the top nine per cent for take-ons attempted.
“His athleticism stood out,” says Heckingbottom. “I saw how quick and direct he was with the ball, which was great, and then all the other areas people said he needed to work on, he’s shown he’s willing to work on it. His reactions away from the ball have improved to no end. His one-v-one defending has improved significantly, but he can get better.
“We’ve used some of his clips as really good examples. So when he’s playing wide and we lose the ball on the opposite side, he needs to get back in and recover. No one notices how he reacts, except me and the coaches if he’s costing us. But since then, when we’ve lost the ball on the opposite side, he has reacted as a defender should: getting back in and snuffing out a lot of danger.”
The purpose of moving to Preston was to accelerate development and grow his appeal for next summer, whether for Emery in the first team or, more likely, to potential suitors. Including 14th-placed Preston and others further up the EFL ladder, tentative interest from elsewhere has already been received.
It is hoped that Kesler-Hayden’s future will be clarified early in the summer window, allowing him to find a sense of permanency in his career. He bought a house in the Midlands last year and has been living in Salford while on loan.
“The amount of minutes he’s played has significantly jumped,” says Heckingbottom. “So with that, the challenge becomes about how you prepare for a game and how you recover. I’ve just spoken to him about that today. He was carrying a little hamstring injury, which we managed to get him over in the international break and as I said to him this morning, that’s a skill in itself.
“He’s got Premier League qualities. But now he’s shown he can do it on Saturday and Tuesday every week.”
Preston supporters have taken to Villa’s academy graduate. He has grown defensively reliable and, while registering three assists, admits himself there is a glaring area for improvement: he is yet to score a goal. His shooting, at times, has been wayward, contributing to Kesler-Hayden failing to match his expected goals (xG) rate of over two.
“For me, it’s just the productivity in the final third which he’ll be judged on now,” says Heckingbottom. “He’s capable enough to defend the box and win his one-on-one duels. So what he needs to add is using his athleticism and pace to help the team at the other end of the pitch.
“Crossing, goals and assists are all definite areas. But he’s got too much in his game to not improve on those things.”
Reaching the last eight of the FA Cup gives Preston, as the firm outsiders of the teams left, immediate underdog status. As for the task of Villa coming to visit, Heckingbottom is aware of the dangers posed and the complexities of planning for Emery’s side.
“In terms of set up and personnel, I’m not too sure because Unai’s got that many options at his disposal,” he says. “One of our problems is whichever players he picks totally changes the dynamic of how they attack.”
It will be a peculiar feeling for Kesler-Hayden to see his boyhood side against his current club and the one which could give him the chance to play in an FA Cup semi-final. Yet he will be safe in the knowledge that despite being forced to watch at the weekend, his career is doing anything but sitting still.
(Top photo: Kesler-Hayden playing for Preston in September 2024; by Alex Livesey via Getty Images)
