The ball was sent positively down the Bournemouth right, into the speedy stride of David Brooks. The winger got to it first but, in a flash, found that he had lost it.

This was because his young opponent had matched him for pace, put his body between man and ball, muscled Brooks aside and, in one smooth sequence, alleviated the situation for Everton.

“Well done, son,” whispered Jamie Carragher in commentary.

That was one of the last things Jarrad Branthwaite did last season. What might await him in this new one?

Further opportunities under Carlo Ancelotti? Another climb in profile and praise? The scrutiny, perhaps, of England’s age-group scouts?

The imagination can easily run riot at the possibilities, given how the boy from Wigton went from League Two substitute to top-flight starter in 2019/20.

All of it is out there for Branthwaite. So, too, may be a period when he is held back from the stage. In such circumstances there may be disappointment but also the need for everyone to remind themselves that he is, after all, only 18.

Football, when you think of such stories, often feels as though it is advancing at lightning speed, and there are times it might appear the same way with Dean Henderson, who starts the new campaign closer than ever to Manchester United’s first team.

It has been a more gradual climb for Henderson, through a sequence of loan moves, but at 23 the man from Whitehaven stands on the brink of something truly significant.

It is at this point, with this basic information, that those of us watching from this proud old county should really pause and marvel.

An lad from Wigton already playing at centre-half for an established, historic Premier League club. A boy from Whitehaven trying to land the premier goalkeeping spot at one of the biggest in the world.

These are, then, high and stunning times for Cumbrian football. Henderson and Branthwaite are trend-setters for our area in the advanced global game.

So let us applaud them on their way. And let every other aspiring player here watch them, follow them, be stimulated by them.

They are the leaders of a new Cumbrian wave; a little further behind them are teenagers like James Trafford of Manchester City and Joe White of Newcastle United. If you listen to people who know both of those boys, good careers ought to lay ahead for them too.

Cumbria has supplied its individuals of high talent over the years but not too often in a cluster. The Brunton Babes of the 1990s was probably the last time it happened en masse: Jansen, Delap, Murray and the rest who broke out of a newly-confident Carlisle United with the idea that all things were in reach.

Particular stories can be found in different eras, in such as Jackie Sewell, Peter Thompson, Kevin Beattie (and his Ipswich colleagues Geddis, Turner and McCall), Paul Simpson, Steve Harkness, Grant Holt, Scott Carson and Glenn Murray.

Beattie, arguably the most talented, was 18 years and eight months old when he made his top-flight debut. Branthwaite, when he first represented Everton’s first team, was 18 years and two weeks.

Others have played at the elite level younger, like the Liverpool great Thompson (17) and the dynamic Simpson (16). Not too many, though, can compare, and let us not forget how much more separated the game’s levels are these days, and how immensely difficult it must be to adapt from fourth-tier scrambles to a Premier League defence in the space of a few months.

When watching Branthwaite on a screen, though, you are struck both by his composure and the extent to which he appears to enjoy this rare chance. He smiles a lot. He jokes and chats with more experienced Premier League performers. If football is a game of the mind as much as the body then he seems to be of the right elements.

As, in different respects, does Henderson. You will travel a long way before finding a young footballer with a more confident mentality and there are many stories out there which sum up his iron self-belief.

One arose from Grimsby’s victory over Carlisle at Brunton Park in 2017. Henderson had just completed his third Football League appearance yet when shaking hands with his opposite number, Mark Gillespie, it was not just a case of the usual post-match pleasantries.

Grimsby’s on-loan No1 was also bold enough to point out that his more senior opponent might have done better with the second goal he conceded.

Brass neck? Maybe. Ultra assured? For sure. When Henderson, today, talks about his faith that he will be Manchester United’s top dog, do not imagine such words are for show.

They are said with sincerity. Again – we should admire the simple reality here; that it is a boy from west Cumbria, not an expensive recruit from any other point on the planet, who is threatening to unseat David De Gea for the right to protect the Stretford End, to follow the golden line of Gregg, Stepney, Schmeichel and Van Der Sar.

Henderson had no particular childhood advantages other than a positive upbringing, dedicated coaching - and talent, and commitment, by the shedload.

What finer message could there be for any boy or girl in a Cumbrian club’s ranks? There can be no excuse for thinking our area is any kind of backwater, a place only of limitations, when it has produced young men of Henderson and Branthwaite’s superb calibre.

They are Cumbrian football 2.0, and may have many bright and invigorating years ahead. So should anyone looking to the pair for the perfect inspiration.