Josef Bursik idolised Jack Butland growing up in Stoke City's youth academy - and now the Hibernian goalkeeper can't wait to lock horns with the Rangers star in Scottish football.
Bursik, who has arrived at Easter Road on a season-long loan from Club Brugge, spent six years at Stoke before securing a switch to Belgium in January 2023.
That move didn't quite go to plan though as the former England Under-21s internationalist was demoted down to the reserve side after failing to make a breakthrough.
18 months later he's been handed an opportunity by Hibs and is ready to grasp it. Especially since Butland had been so complimentary about the Scottish Premiership when they'd exchanged contact prior to his latest transfer.
"Going to Stoke, my idol at the time was Jack Butland," the 24-year-old shot-stopper revealed.
"In the space of a few weeks I was then training with him every day. That was crazy and I learned so much from him.
"I dropped him a message before I came here. We're always in brief contact. He was down my way when he was at Crystal Palace, that's my local team.
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"I spoke to him and he sang a lot of praise about the league. He had a great season last season which saw him getting shouts of being in and around the England squad.
"Fair play to him. He's done really well and had a few tough years. I get along really well with him and learned a lot from him.
"It would be good to see him this season. It would be great to play against him."
Butland was named Rangers' Men's Player of the Year following a terrific first campaign at Ibrox.
The former Crystal Palace and Manchester United 'keeper went through tough periods of his own before looking revitalised as the Light Blues' No.1.
And that's why Bursik sees parallels to where he's currently at in his career.
"I'm buzzing for him," he added. "He went through a hard time, and that's where it's so important to keep playing games.
"You get that confidence back. I'm in a similar situation. The last year and a half I've been unfortunate with injuries and stuff; things haven't quite worked out.
"So now I'm in a similar place where I'm happy to come somewhere and feel good, confident and look forward to playing.
"Hopefully we can do some great things this season."
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At the time of signing, Hibernian claimed that Bursik rebuffed interest from "several clubs" to become the first signing of David Gray's managerial tenure.
Bursik explained: "I spoke to [sporting director] Malky [Mackay] quite a bit over the last few weeks and he really sold the club to me.
"We spoke about the size of the club, the big games that the club are involved in, and that we want to do better than we did last season; it’s something I wanted to be a part of."
