Tales from the Secret Footballer

by Anon, Anon

  Rohypnol has a bad image: it is a very dangerous drug in the wrong hands. You may remember that not too long ago it was in the papers every week. A person who takes it will experience a sedative effect that brings on muscle relaxation and amnesia, even though they remain conscious and able to communicate. The drug is odourless, colourless and tasteless, which makes it ideal for spiking drinks. This combination of factors, plus a street price of around £1 a pill, has led to its use in countless cases of what has become known as “date rape”.

  I’m not sure if Rohypnol is addictive but I do know that the NHS doesn’t use it. As footballers we generally don’t have our injuries dealt with by the NHS, however. Our clubs have very cosy relationships with private health practices and insurance companies.

  So when I asked the doc if there was anything he could do so that I didn’t have to go through the pain all over again, he told me that he could book me in as a day patient to have the procedure under Rohypnol. He explained that it was essential to use a drug that wouldn’t knock the patient out entirely. When the sugar solution is injected it is important to flex the joint so that the ligament responds as it would under natural tension. In other words, if the patient were under full sedation, the ligament wouldn’t react in the proper way and the patient wouldn’t be able to tell the doctor if the ligament had stiffened as it was supposed to. As long as I was semi-conscious I’d be able to give valuable feedback.

  The first time I had this treatment I woke with the aid of another drug that was injected into an intravenous line inserted into my hand. I had a dry mouth and blurred vision and I asked the doc if everything had gone according to plan. “Yes,” came the reply. “No problems at all. I’ll see you next week.” But that wasn’t enough for me. “How does the joint feel?” I asked. “Strong?” That’s when the doc walked around the side of my bed, leaned down so his mouth was close to my ear and said, “Listen, we’ve just had this fucking conversation not five minutes ago and 10 minutes before that. I can’t have it again. Everything’s fine – see you next week.” It’s a powerful and scary drug, that Rohypnol.

  There was just one problem: the feeling as the anaesthetist pushed the drug into my drip and up my arm was incredibly seductive – so seductive, in fact, that I persuaded the club physio that the injury wasn’t fully healed and that another two rounds of treatment would probably do it. In the sterile room in which these procedures were carried out, there was a metal grate on the ceiling and as the drug was injected, the sharp edges of the grate became distressed and began to wobble. I liked to think of that steel grate as a gateway; I didn’t know where I was going but wherever it was it felt amazing. As I was drifting off during the last time I had this procedure, I looked at the anaesthetist and said, “I fucking love that feeling,” at which he bent down and whispered in my ear, “You’re not supposed to say that, you twat.”

  In the end I was busted by the fact that it had become impossible to get any more solution into the ligament. As a result I now have an abnormally sized ligament in one leg and no feeling around the joint. I can actually pull hairs out of my leg very slowly without feeling anything at all. Because of that, the third time I injured the same ligament the only way I could tell whether it was damaged was to kick a wall while the physio watched to see how far the leg was bending in the wrong direction. I’d tell you that the diagnosis of major ligament injuries has moved on these days, but it hasn’t. If it ain’t broke, don’t inject it.

  * * *

  I have written one column for the Guardian about drugs in football and I stand by the tone of it: namely, that there is not a huge drugs problem in our game. There are examples, of course, but it’s not as if we’re uncovering a drugs cheat every other week. But after the column went out I was contacted by an organisation representing cycling, which accused me of being blinkered and covering up my fellow professionals’ drug abuse. Quite why they felt they knew more than me I’m not sure, and it riled me hugely. I didn’t reply, but a year later, when Lance Armstrong was found to have cheated his way to seven Tour de France titles, I took enormous delight in sending an email back to my antagonists pointing out that people who throw stones in glass houses should be bloody careful that their own sport isn’t a complete and utter global embarrassment before they do so. Arseholes.

  But just as I was feeling smug, my wife asked me if I could remember a story from a club I used to play for. It had completely slipped my mind but as soon as she mentioned the player’s name the whole episode came flooding back.

  During one of my first seasons in the Premier League we signed a player for many millions of pounds. It was a strange signing for us: he didn’t seem to fit and he didn’t seem to bond. For some reason he made friends with the youth team players, even though he had been bought to play in the first team. He lasted no more than a year; I turned up to training one day to find that we’d somehow managed to sell him for a profit to a rival Premier League team. A few days later I received a strange phone call from our chief scout, asking me why I thought the club had sold him. “He didn’t fit in?” I suggested. “He seemed to make friends with the youth team and seemed a bit lonely?”

  “Yeah, that’s exactly it,” he replied. “Do the other lads think that too?”

  “I think so,” I said, “but nobody really cares, to be honest.”

  “OK,” he said. “I’ll speak to you later.” I now realise that he was fishing – but what for?

  A year later a couple of bizarre things happened within a few weeks of each other. First a journalist friend of mine rang to ask what I knew about the same player’s cocaine habit; he mentioned another player, too. I said I didn’t know anything about it at all – but now that he had told me about it, the call that I had received from the chief scout made sense. I told him what had happened in the past and he told me what had been happening recently. “He’s been a naughty boy at his new club. He and [the other player] have been caught in a drugs test with cocaine in their systems.”

  It made complete sense now that somebody had put all the pieces together in front of me. The reason these stories don’t come out is that these are young men who have made a mistake and the unofficial policy seems to be to clean them up rather than destroy their careers. It’s difficult to know where to stand on that one, but I suppose that if I had to stick a flag in the sand I would probably come down on the side of the player. He deserves to be punished, but that can be done by banning him from playing for a while and fining him. I don’t think there is a need to destroy his career by going public. Everybody makes mistakes, but I’ve always been grateful for a helping hand. The moment your father says, “I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed” – that’s all you need sometimes.

  However, the fun and games weren’t over because two weeks later we played against this player’s new team. Our former team-mate wasn’t playing, though, and I don’t think he was even in the squad. This was dressed up as a contractual agreement that stipulated that he couldn’t play against his former team. I, and all my old team-mates from that club with whom I still speak, now realise that this was complete bullshit. The game was extremely ill-tempered, as if the manager of the opposition had told his players to be overly aggressive. It’s inexplicable when you’re on the pitch – you know something has kicked it off but you can’t work out what. Sometimes it’s a personal spat between two players where one has slept with the other’s bit on the side, which then spreads throughout the team; or sometimes it’s bad blood between two managers that spills over on to the pitch as all the idiots who like to crawl up the arses of their bosses go around kicking people. We won the game thanks to a very contentious goal but the bad blood was everywhere. As we walked off the pitch there was a hold-up to walk into the tunnel; I was at the front of the players and barged past the police and stewards, only to be confronted by the two managers and about a dozen coaches, with a couple of cops trying to separate everyone. The opposition manager was livid and was shouting at our own manager, “You knew, didn
’t ya? You fucking knew and you didn’t say anything! You sold me a fucking cokehead!”

  The argument carried on and at one point spilled into the boot room, which had a maximum capacity of about six people. I knew exactly which player they were talking about, of course, and by the time they’d finished so did everybody else. There was no doubt that the manager of the other team had told his players to kick us to pieces because, as he saw it, he’d been stitched up by one of his peers – but if you don’t do your homework and you don’t even come in to the training ground until Fridays … well, that will happen, I’m afraid.

  So the rumours that we hear sometimes turn out to be true. It does happen. I didn’t want to believe it for a long time but I’m afraid that it’s a reality of the game. I’m half inclined to email that cycling group back and apologise – but no. I hate cycling.

  Top players who seem to be out of action for endless periods are major targets for the rumour-mongers. Their absence is usually blamed on a back injury – even the “experts” have no clue when it comes to back injuries – or a viral condition, because that could mean anything. The rumours work along the lines that the club has struck a deal with the governing bodies that the player will enter private rehab and serve a ban, so long as his name and offence is concealed. Why would the FA do that? Because the players are in the national team. They’re great rumours, and I wish I had evidence for more of them, but if you pick any top player who has been out for a long time with an injury that isn’t particularly clear, just ask yourself what’s going on.

  MESSING ABOUT

  While we’re on the subject of footballers behaving badly, I must pass on what has become known as the Boat Story. (We made that title up all by ourselves, by the way.)

  I first met the player at the centre of it in the Premier League; he breezed into training on his first day and never looked back. His performances were fantastic and he quickly had both the fans and the players on his side. On that first day, he arrived in a beautiful purple leather jacket; it sounds awful, I know, but he wore it so well and the fact that it matched his sports car only added to his lively character. I liked him the moment he extended his hand to me and said, “Pleased to meet you, pal. Where are we going tonight?”

  Since that day, we have been great friends. I’d do anything for him and I think that works the other way, too. He is one of the most charismatic, energetic and, above all, talented footballers I have ever played with or against. He doesn’t know this, but his signing was exactly what I needed at the time. It isn’t an exaggeration to say that the moment he walked through the door everybody at the club, staff and players alike, became re-energised about the task ahead. I love this guy and I am a better player and person for having met him when I did.

  Below is a story he told me a few years ago; it remains, to this day, one of my favourite-ever anecdotes. As with all tales like this, it is tinged with a sense of what might have been: it could so easily have ended in tragedy. I have a perspective on stories like this. These situations always seem to end well when certain people are involved – that is to say, these sorts of things are pretty much par for the course for them. They never think that the worst will happen to them and because of that it never does. If it had been me at the centre of this story, I’m sure there would have been a very different outcome.

  The season had just finished and my friend hadn’t put a foot wrong. The fans loved him and he was the focal point of all the good things that the team was doing. He had even been called up to play for England – a reward for his league form and the culmination of his efforts to date. It was a tremendous honour and he loved being part of that England set-up; more importantly, he felt at home there. He was fit and strong and had earned the opportunity. His manager was pleased for him, too: he had believed in him from day one and had built a very good team around him.

  But he needed the break: all footballers do. No matter how well you’re playing, you need the summer to let your body recover. You don’t realise how much effort goes into matches while you’re mid-season: only when you stop and catch your breath do you realise that you are functioning on autopilot. It’s good to stop, look back and see where you can improve, and it’s tough to do that when the games are coming at you from all directions. But as much as my friend was looking forward to a rest, he was also looking forward to the next season. That’s the sort of player he is. I think that’s why some of our team-mates said he had ADHD.

  He’d made a lot of friends at the club; the players were a great bunch to be around and as they’d just come off the back of a successful season they were still enjoying one another’s company. They went out together to the local restaurants, played golf together and went to one another’s houses for dinner.

  While everybody at the club got on well, my friend had a couple of mates that he was perhaps a little closer to than the rest. At the start of that summer, probably around early May, when the season was drawing to a close, the three of them had bought a yacht, as you do. This 30ft Sunseeker was sleek and menacing, a real work of art; it had two bedrooms, a galley, and enough room at the front for two or three people to sunbathe comfortably. It was a beautiful thing, and they were looking forward to sailing it up and down the coast all summer long. I’ll let my friend tell you what happened thereafter – it’s only fair.

  “For the first week or so we were anything but model sailors. But we really got into it: it wasn’t all parties and drag races. I enjoyed looking after it and loved the whole culture of boat ownership. It was a great way to meet people, too. The owners of many of the other boats in the marina were fairly wealthy and whenever you bumped into them you invariably talked to them about their boats, their families and what they did for a living. Because of that I made a lot of friends who have helped me over the years in business as well as football.

  “Lots of those people, and indeed some of the players from my team, lived in the apartments that overlooked the marina. It was a tight-knit community and a bit like Neighbourhood Watch in a way. I’d get phone calls to say that kids were hovering around the boat at night; mostly they wanted their picture taken and I’d have to go down there, sign a few autographs and talk to them about football. It was a good thing, because once I did that they began to hang out at the marina and watch over the boats. It was great security.

  “We kept the keys with the harbourmaster and if anyone wanted to take the boat out he’d let the others know in case they wanted to come along. One day I got a call from one of the other players who owned the boat with me. He lived by the marina and had a pair of binoculars that he used to watch everything that went on there. It seemed the boat was just a little too far away to determine who had taken it out.

  “‘Oh, it’s not you who’s taken the boat out, then,’ he said as I answered the phone. ‘It must be Jonesy.’

  “I thought for minute. It was only 11am but although I hadn’t fully come around I was with it enough to reply. ‘Why didn’t he tell us he was taking the boat out? It’s beautiful outside; I’d probably have gone with him.’

  “I could hear him fidgeting around with the binoculars, struggling for a better view of the boat. ‘Well, I’m not entirely sure,’ said my friend, ‘but it could be because he’s getting his end away with some blonde bird on the deck at the moment. Isn’t his missus a brunette?’

  “‘That must be it,’ I said. ‘I’m going back to bed. Let me know when he’s back.’

  “Later that afternoon my friend phoned again: ‘Jonesy’s back. Fancy taking the boat out?’ I did. It was a glorious day: the sun was beating down and although I couldn’t see the sea from where I lived, I could just imagine it sparkling under a clear sky. I packed some towels, sunglasses, shorts and sun cream; I also put a change of clothes in as we’d decided to sail up the coast later that evening for a bite to eat in a restaurant that I’d booked.

  “The three of us met down on the marina a little after 1pm. It was such a beautiful day that we decided to have lunch in one of the
many restaurants that were dotted around. I remember that there was a great buzz in the air: it was the first really hot summer’s day and people had naturally migrated down to the coast. We ordered our food and a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. I’m a big Sauvignon Blanc fan, especially when the weather’s good.

  “The restaurant was busy and so was the area around it. We had perfect people-watching seats and as we started on our lunch I could feel the warmth of the wine wash over me. With it came the confidence to talk to the four women who had taken the table next to us.

  “‘Oh, you live there, do you?’

  “‘What do you do?’

  “‘What’s your name?’

  “‘What do I do?’

  “‘It’s that boat over there.’

  “‘Of course you can come.’

  “That’s how easy it is when you have a boat and the sun is shining, and before anybody could think of a reason not to, the four women had joined me, Jonesy and Tel on the boat and we were sailing out into the Channel.

  “As soon as we were out the way of prying eyes, we turned the engine off and turned the music up. The coastguard had told us off before for loud music, but they weren’t going to bother us out here. We weren’t tempted to go for a dip. The sea was mucky and frothing inexplicably, and despite the heat of the sun the water was freezing. In any case, jumping into the sea from the side of a boat sounds like a fun thing to do but seems to yield very little pleasure when you actually do it. The ladies certainly seemed to share this opinion and remained dedicated to their day’s work of sunbathing.

  “As the afternoon wore on and the heat made way for the cooler air, we all made our way below deck to open the champagne that we’d brought with us. Some people say that four into three doesn’t go, but I can tell you that, depending on what floats your boat, it does. The three of us headed off in different directions with a girl or two and a bottle of whatever was lying around. Somebody turned the music up in what seemed to me to be an attempt to drown out his own performance.