Former Arsenal man Daniel Oyegoke plans to help Hearts 'beat up' Spurs as he 'never liked them'

One of Tynecastle’s newest recruits is out to put the cat among the pigeons on Wednesday

Perhaps it’s a trait he learned whilst playing in Arsenal’s youth academy, or simply a personal view towards the London club’s biggest rivals. Whatever the reason, Hearts’ new defender Daniel Oyegoke won’t be holding back when Spurs visit Gorgie for Wednesday night’s pre-season friendly.

Oyegoke learned the important of the North London derby as a teenager and those emotions are still ingrained within him. He recalled his Arsenal days with a grin as he talked of youth derbies against Spurs and why he simply didn’t like Tottenham teams.

“I faced them quite a few times. We used to beat them up! It was always a good fixture for us,” smiled Oyegoke. “They tried to tell us the importance of the derby when you are young. I’ve never really liked Spurs, so hopefully we can try to beat them up again!

“I wouldn’t say I was an Arsenal fan. I wasn’t really a fan of any team, I just loved my football. Oliver Skipp is a good few years older than me but I caught him when I was playing for the 21s. Dane Scarlett, who is there at the minute, is a really good friend of mine. I’ve got quite a few friends there as I live near the area. They have a good team. So do we, though. It’s a game we’ll use to build our fitness and, yeah, hopefully beat them up.”

Oyegoke is still only 21 and arrived at Hearts from Brentford last month. He is expected to compete for the right-back position alongside another new arrival, the Costa Rican internationalist Gerald Taylor.

“I went to Arsenal from Barnet when I was about 14. It was good for me and my development as a footballer,” explained Oyegoke. “I joined as a striker or a winger, but quickly became a right-back or centre-half in my first year.

“That was the best thing for my development. As soon as I became a defender I started to get involved with England at youth levels and pick up a lot of experiences. I look at my time there very fondly. I made a lot of friendships and connections with people who helped me along the way. It was a good club for me.

“I joined at the end of the Wenger era and then it was Uni Emery. It went on to Mikel Arteta. Obviously I was quite young but I spoke a lot with Arteta. I was involved in pre-season games with them, training and stuff. I had quite a few sessions with him.

“He’s obviously a great coach and you can see the detail he likes to go in to, you can see it coming out now in the way Arsenal play. It was good to take what I could from him and hopefully bring it here.

“Football was always my sport. Obviously at school you play cricket, athletics, rugby and so on, but football was always my sport. I played lots of sports when I was younger, but that’s just what you do when you are young and have lots of energy. It was always football for me.”