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Karl Robinson and Ronald Koeman exist on different levels of football’s food chain.

“I’ve had a few hidings off his teams before,” Robinson says with a laugh.

But the managers experienced a similar sense of realisation when they first got the chance to work with the same player on the training ground.

Robinson had admired Ademola Lookman from afar before inheriting him as the star player in a Charlton Athletic side in need of his acute understanding of League One and skills as one of the country’s brightest young managers.

Koeman signed off on the teenager’s transfer earlier this month but it was others at Everton who had brought him to the Dutchman’s attention.

Yet he really started to take notice when putting him through his paces at Finch Farm - at Charlton’s Sparrows Lane, Robinson was the same.

“When I walked in the building on my first day we did an 11 v 11, or a 9 v 9, game followed by some tactical stuff the following day, “Robinson told the ECHO.

“Instantly I knew how much better he was than I had thought.

“I phoned everyone I knew about him.”

Koeman, was the same, last week telling the press he’d been so impressed by the 19-year-old that he would have no fear starting him in a league game.

Not one for hyperbole, the Everton manager declared: “He can be a really top player.”

Robinson raves about Lookman, describing him as a “maverick” and “exciting” but talks just as passionately about the forward’s personality.

“I saw him this week, Everton’s players had a few days off,” he said.

“He came to the training ground but, typical of the boy he is, he asked me if it would be Okay for him to come down and say hello to everyone.

“That is the type of person he is. He is a real, real top, top kid and he went with our blessings and well wishes.

“He is working for one of the best managers in the Premier League - I know, I’ve taken a few hidings off his teams before!

“He is a real pleasure to work with and is a credit to himself and his family.

“He’s a real diamond, shy and introverted but put him on the pitch and he comes alive.”

But Robinson’s first job as Charlton boss was to unburden Lookman.

“Before I went in, I’d watched an awful lot of matches and I could see the pressure he was under,” he explained.

“He was the player that everybody was looking at to do something special.

“I remember looking through his celebrations of recent goals with him and he was no longer celebrating like he did when he was younger.

“I told him I wanted him to get back to celebrating like he did when he was a kid.

“He needs that freedom, players like him are entertainers.

“When he scored on his debut for Everton I was really pleased to see him celebrate the way he did.”

Robinson, who had asked about taking Tom Davies on loan to MK Dons in the summer after facing the Blues in pre-season, has promised there is much more to come.

Lookman’s cameo at Crystal Palace last weekend was compelling. But only a glimpse of what promises to be an electric future at Goodison.

“He’s a maverick, he does stuff you don’t expect, his movement patterns are different and he is an exciting, young English kid,” Robinson said.

“He gets on the ball and you think: ‘Something is going to happen here’.

(Image: 2017 Getty Images)

“He is going to be that type of player who is going to give the ball away, and a lot of managers would find that frustrating, and so to be that player he has to have the right mentality to go and get the ball back.”

Everton paid an initial £7.5m up front but the deal to bring Lookman to the club this month is worth in excess of £10m.

Robinson said that the teenager, spotted playing amateur football as a 16-year-old in South London, had his heart set on the Blues.

“A number of clubs came in late for him but I can honestly tell Everton fans that as soon as he heard that Everton were interested he didn’t want to go anywhere else,” he said.