James Wilson: The Schoolboy Striker Making Waves

Not many 18-year-olds are asked for selfies by younger, star-struck fellow pupils in their school corridors. But James Wilson is not your average teenager. The unassuming Balerno High student is not short of stories to share from his weekend when walking to class with his pals on a Monday morning. For the past 12 months they have centred around leading the line for Heart of Midlothian. In the past few days, attention has been spiked by a first Scotland call-up.

He made his Hearts debut little over a year ago - coming off the bench in the Scottish Cup against The Spartans - but his recent run spearheading the Gorgie side's attack from the start has shot him into Steve Clarke's squad.

You would not know it, though. The fresh-faced academy product, who is too young to remember Hearts' last Scottish Cup success in 2012, is refreshingly grounded and mature beyond his years. He said his "head was spinning" after discovering the Scotland head coach included him in the squad to take on Greece in the Nations League play-offs later this week. The discovery came just five days after his 18th birthday. As weeks go...

In truth, it is just another mad few days during Wilson's meteoric 12 months.

But despite scoring to rescue a draw in the Edinburgh derby, becoming the youngest scorer in the Conference League, and now having the opportunity to become Scotland's youngest men's international, the forward insists he has not changed and has simply adjusted to a "different" lifestyle.

Meteoric rise of schoolboy striker Wilson

Just shy of 14 months ago, Wilson was "excited" to be named on the bench as Hearts made the short jaunt up the road to Ainslie Park, in the hope there was "a chance" of coming on for a senior debut against League Two side The Spartans.

Fast forward to today and not only is there an expectation that he will start for Hearts each week, but also a hope he could play for Scotland.

His rise has been rapid, or as he told BBC Scotland in January, "quick, crazy and mad". Wilson was squashed in a dinky dugout in Pilton last year, hoping head coach Steven Naismith would call on him if the Scottish Premiership side were in command of their fourth-round tie against The Spartans.

He received the nod, but with the game poised at 1-0. Soon after his introduction, Dougie Samuel's fourth-tier side had equalised. Wilson thought, "oh wow, this is different".

It was a wake-up call to the nature of the big-boy game for the bright-eyed kid, who has spent eight years at the club. But he has been alert since.

And he had to be when ball broke to him in the box at Easter Road, with his side trailing city rivals Hibernian with fewer than five minutes left last October.

While it was not his finest, the teenager described that equaliser as "one of the best moments in my career," and credited new boss Neil Critchley for allowing him to strut his stuff.

"He's given me the freedom to play and the opportunity to show what I can do," Wilson added.

"I have a role where I can simplify what I need to do - be in the box, try and score goals and just be on the end of things."

'The wee ones ask for pictures, it's quite cool'

Although Wilson already seems to have a knack for it, scoring goals does not come without a decent slice of pressure.

However Critchley has assured him there is no spotlight on him from the dugout.

"There is no pressure from us, he's just got to go out and play his game," the former Blackpool boss said. "He's been fantastic in the last few weeks."

He's a willing learner with a thirst for information and he wants to improve. We can help him with that, while James has just got to be himself."

Something which is easier said than done sometimes, but Wilson has a wise head on young shoulders, and Clarke has echoed Critchley's plaudits.

He previously spoke of his enjoyment at going away with the youth national teams to play with his pals. Fellow Hearts academy product Adam Forrester is with Scotland Under-21s this week. Wilson has just bypassed that age group altogether.

Unsurprisingly, he watches fellow striker Lawrence Shankland like a hawk in training, "trying to feed off him". The captain will not be with him this week after failing to make Clarke's cut, but there will be a familiar face in his "mentor" Craig Gordon, who made his international debut nearly three years before Wilson was born.

"He's obviously got invaluable experience," he said of the 42-year-old goalkeeper. "He asks me questions, I ask him questions. We're just feeding information off each other; he's really important to me."

Wilson's interactions at the other end of the age scale are more visual than audible.

"In school, the little young ones come up asking for pictures which is quite cool, and a bit weird," he added, "It's just different now, I guess."

It is already different and if the pace of his progress continues, people asking for selfies is only going to become a more regular occurrence for the boy who could be tasked with solving Scotland's striker problem.