An extract from the secret footballer, is it any wonder there is a rift between the man on the street and top flight players when they behave like this.
Footballers are fantastic fodder for the papers. I haven't worked for a club that hasn't had a player caught out by his girlfriend or wife. But there are plenty of footballers' partners who turn a blind eye to indiscretions because they know that the life they enjoy would disappear if they walked out. I know wives who have walked in on their other half when he's in full swing, gone shopping, come home and had his dinner on the table as if nothing had happened. They simply cannot do without a designer wardrobe, two weeks in Dubai and half of Tiffany's every Christmas and birthday, and so look the other way. This amicable agreement becomes a problem only when the media get hold of it. Even then, the general rule is that things are brushed under the carpet as quickly as possible. The exception is when a wife no longer needs the player.
The real question is: what's in it for the player? After all, the risk and reward are completely out of sync. A married player has so much to lose for the sake of five minutes of lust. But it's more than that. There is the bravado. I can sit down with a stunning woman and she'll hang on my every word; I can make the worst jokes and she'll laugh like I'm a standup; I can buy her bottles of champagne and she'll be impressed. In short, a player can have his ego stroked relentlessly, sleep with a beautiful woman at the end of it and, nine times out of 10, he'll get away with it. If, indeed, his wife or girlfriend even cares. Many players have childhood sweethearts who they end up marrying, and many of them will have kids at a young age. When a player begins to earn the big bucks, that's when the temptations really start: and they coincide with the arrival of the Louis Vuitton handbags and the first-class flights to Barbados.
A friend who used to play football with me years ago and has since retired told me a great story from when he was in Dubai at the
One & Only resort. He and his wife had checked in at the same time as another player, who is now an England international, and his wife. You all know him, though his wife is probably more famous than him in certain circles. My friend, who, it has to be said, is a handsome bastard, was sunning himself at one end of the swimming pool and he noticed the wife of the other player slip into the water at the far end. After he had caught her eye a couple of times she made a beeline for him. When she was close enough, she wrapped her legs around him. All the while, her husband was asleep on a sun lounger under a shady tree. My friend even brought out his mobile phone to show me a few of the picture messages she'd sent him after their return. Anyone who had taken a picture of the action in the pool would have made a fortune, and made four lives unbearable for a time.
But no footballer who preaches ethics where the media is concerned would be foolish enough to completely regret the influence they have in this country. After all, Sky TV has pumped billions of pounds into football, which in turn has filtered down into our pockets.
The money players earn makes anything a possibility. Over the past few years, Las Vegas has overtaken Marbella as the number one destination for footballers looking to let their hair down. Out there, even our worst behaviour looks sedate. A few seasons ago, I made the pilgrimage with a group of regular revellers and was blown away by the debauchery. By the end of the week, eight players had new tattoos and one player took a local girl back to England and married her in a shotgun wedding.
Halfway through the trip, one of the players said that
Lindsay Lohan had invited us to her house in Los Angeles – something that didn't appeal to me. That turned out to be a great decision because on their arrival they quickly realised that she was under house arrest. As one of the lads later told me, "We drove five hours to watch a fucking movie."
I've been to just about every club and trendy bar worth going to, and I've seen every kind of show. But I've never seen a place quite like
TAO in Las Vegas. We took a table that had a $5,000 minimum spend. In Vegas, you absolutely must have a "sorter" – a type of concierge who knows everyone in town, will get you the best seats for shows, clubs, restaurants and pool parties, have helicopters and limos on tap and access to all the women a man could ever need. As we took our seats, "Jess" introduced us to the owners and explained who we were. Five minutes later a parade of drop-dead gorgeous women walked in a line past our table. Each time we saw one we liked we had to tell Jess, who'd seat them at the table.
It was hugely embarrassing for me, but the girls make thousands of dollars a night and I'm not here to judge. Behind us was another table that included some proper stars, among them a Barcelona player. We had a couple more spaces to fill; when a woman who was a complete knockout walked past the table, everyone stood up in unison and yelled, "That one!"
She had not gone unnoticed by the table behind and, when Jess reappeared, we realised we were not quite as important as we thought we were. Jess told us: "The table behind have asked me to tell you that whatever you offer for this girl, they will double it." One of our party, mortally offended at losing the girl to the table behind us, challenged them to a "champagne war". The idea is to send over a bottle of champagne; the other table is then meant to reciprocate, and on it goes until the bill gets too big for one side to pay. If a table keeps playing but cannot afford to pay, they are forced into the ultimate loss of face – they are marched out of the club by security to heckles and wolf whistles.
The final bill? Just short of $130,000, excluding tip, which as Jess explained on the way back to the hotel was nowhere near the record but still a great effort. Those situations can be awkward. I had made it clear that I did not want to participate, but I was only kidding myself. How could I possibly sit at the table and buy my own drinks? That's why I didn't put up any resistance as I checked out and paid my final bill of $14,000, which included some ridiculous overpriced room service and a helicopter trip to the Grand Canyon.
