He returns to Brunton Park as a vastly-experienced 34-year-old – but Nicky Adams once fell foul of Chris Beech during his teenage days.

The Carlisle United head coach revealed he once banished an 18-year-old Adams from training for giving him “cheek”.

Recalling the moment ahead of Adams' return to Carlisle with Oldham tomorrow, Beech said: “Nicky was a third-year scholar at Bury at the time.

“He always had that lovely smile on his face, but in one of my first training sessions in my first full-time job, I sent him off the pitch and told him to go and run round the first-team pitch, for his cheek.

“I thought, ‘He’s got a chance to think about what he’s just done, and if he comes back round and ends up apologising I’ll allow him to continue to train'.

“He was disappointed he wasn’t training with the first team at 18, and he went mumbling off, wobbling that head of his.

“He’s gone round Bury’s first-team pitch, and the manager’s going, ‘What the bloody hell are you doing over here, Nicky?' He said, ‘Well, your new youth team manager’s sent me over here…’

“By the time he came back round he said, ‘I’m really sorry Chris, is it alright if I join back in?’ ‘Of course it is, Nicky…'”

Adams went on to star in Bury’s first team and embarked on an excellent career which brought Wales Under-21 recognition and club spells at Brentford, Rochdale, Crawley, Rotherham, Northampton and Carlisle, as well as two further stints at Gigg Lane.

The winger was with Carlisle from 2016-18 and starred in the 16/17 campaign, when United reached the League Two play-offs under Keith Curle.

He made 69 appearances for United, his second season curtailed by injury, before helping Bury to promotion and them being reunited with Curle at Northampton in 2019, also helping the Cobblers reach League One through last season’s play-offs.

He dropped back down to League Two with Oldham in January in order to be closer to his family, and Beech says the Latics captain has been a proven performer for many years.

“I know Nicky from a young boy, and his dad [Terry], a great bloke, has followed his career," Beech said.

“Nicky’s a really good player, has had a fantastic career and he’s looking to continue that.

“He stated publicly that he’s moved to Oldham to be nearer his family, but he did ever so well at Northampton.

“The type of lad Nicky is, I know he said he felt, with the rest of his team-mates, even though at the time with Carlisle they had massive finance to try and support promotion at that point with Keith, that he and his fellow teammates felt like they’d let the club and Keith down, and he was so pleased for Keith getting promoted at Northampton.

“I also remember seeing that Sky Sports interview he did and he was also digging his chairman out asking for a bit more cash. That’s Nicky Adams…”

Adams will skipper Harry Kewell’s side 17th-placed side tomorrow against the Cumbrians.

Oldham have a useful away record, having won six and drawn four of their 14 games on the road.

Inconsistency has prevented them from climbing the League Two table, Oldham losing at home to Barrow on Tuesday, while their two previous meetings with Carlisle at Boundary Park this season brought a 3-0 Carabao Cup win and a 1-1 league draw.

“They’ve scored four goals against us in two games, so they’ve got definite attributes to do very well,” Beech said.

“The equalising goal in the league [from Zak Dearnley] was some finish. They have four or five players who can score goals like that.

“They can be quite quiet and can end up scoring spectacular goals, or they can be right at it and playing quite freely with no pressure in terms of how they’re playing.

“They are unpredictable. I think it's because of that they’re very dangerous because they can play with no fear and they can play freely.

“Harry will want his team to be more consistent, but so does every manager. They've got a lot of very good technical players, they can drop the shoulder to score great goals and we’re well aware of that.

“We’re definitely preparing to play a team that has some real good individual attributes.”

Midweek results in League Two caught the eye in a number of places, with struggling Southend’s 3-1 win at Forest Green demonstrating the unpredictability of the fourth tier.

There remains inconsistency across the division but Beech does not believe Carlisle have shown that trait themselves performance-wise, in the context of their challenges this campaign.

“If there’s one thing I believe to ourselves, I don’t think we’ve shown much inconsistency,” he said.

“We were slow-starting, then got going, you’re hit by what we were hit by [a long enforced lay-off], then we’re in this position to be playing again.

“We’re getting back to consistent behaviours and if we repeat what we had and did do on Tuesday regularly, we’ll be the better side on points and that’s what I’m looking forward to.”