Former Gunner Chris Willock has seen his recent strong form rewarded with the Championship Player of the Month award for November.

The Championship’s official Twitter account confirmed on Friday that former Arsenal academy winger Chris Willock (brother of Newcastle United’s Joe) has won their Player of the Month award for November.

It was undoubtedly an excellent month and a well-deserved award for Chris. He scored three goals and assisted one in his four Championship appearances, one goal contribution in each game as QPR won three and drew one.

For followers of the Arsenal academy, it was initially surprising to see Joe Willock breaking into the first team whilst Chris moved away to play for Benfica B.

Chris had been one of Arsenal’s top talents, whilst Joe was a bit of a late bloomer, and for a long time seemed a bit raw for Premier League football.

Chris played as a regular at every level from the u16s to the u20s for England, and it looked only a matter of time before he made the u21s and beyond.

Yet his move to Benfica stalled his progress. The winger never made the step up from Benfica B to the first-team, and his loan spells back to England with West Brom and Huddersfield were relatively uninspiring.

Eventually, Benfica decided to move on, selling Willock to Queens Park Rangers in 2020.

After a season of adaptation that was decent at best in 2020/21, Chris is finally finding his feet this campaign.

The 23-year-old has five goals and four assists this season, including those four goal contributions in November. He’s part of a QPR side driving up the table into the play-off places, with a realistic promotion charge on the cards.

Just as he did in youth football, Willock is excelling in creating chances and completing dribbles. He’s top-10 in the league for the latter.

It’s taken a while for Joe’s older brother to start looking like his Arsenal u23 self in senior football, but he’ll now be eyeing up a Premier League future in west London.