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A WORKAHOLIC BESET BY A SENSE OF NEVER BEING QUITE GOOD ENOUGH

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Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona were the greatest team many have ever seen, but Guillem Balagué reveals in his new book the former Barca coach is a workaholic beset by a sense of never being quite good enough.

By CHRISTOPHER DAVIES

THE SPECULATION will intensify as the season progresses, there will be exclusives about his next destination with “sources” confirming it will be Chelsea, Manchester City, Inter Milan or whoever, but right now even Pep Guardiola does not know where he will be working next season.

The man who coached the Barcelona team that most (outside of Madrid) rate as the best they have ever seen will end his self-enforced sabbatical next summer and return to football. Guardiola will not be tempted by the highest bidder because, as Guillem Balagué explains in a superbly researched and highly readable biography Pep Guardiola – Another Way Of Winning, the Catalan will choose a club that seduces him with football rather than finance.

“Pep only moved once in his career for money, when he went to Qatar,” Balagué told footballwriters.co.uk. A 33-year-old Guardiola joined Al-Ahli on a two-year contract worth US$4 million, but as Balagué explains in his book: “After playing 18 games and spending most of his time lounging by the pool in his complex…he went for a trial at Manchester City, spending 10 days under Stuart Pearce’s eye in 2005. Eventually Pep turned down a six-month contract in Manchester, wanting a longer deal that the City manager was not prepared to offer…and joined Mexican side Dorados de Sinaloa.”

Balagué, a lifelong Espanyol fan and a familiar figure in English football because of his regular appearances on Sky Sports’ coverage of Spanish football, admires Guardiola, a complex character who invested so much into his first experience as a manager he needed pills to help him sleep.

In the biography, Balagué outlines Guardiola’s self-imposed work-load: “Despite having 24 assistants he worked longer hours than most of them. His players will tell you he is a coach whose care for the smallest detail improves them, who can see and communicate the secrets of the game. They see a complex man with so much on his mind, always mulling things over, excessively so sometimes. Players say they are sure he would like to spend more time with his wife and kids but he can’t, because he dedicates the vast majority of his time to winning games. He lives for that, but sometimes even they wonder: does he overdo it?

“He would go for walks with his partner and their children to help him find some sort of emotion balance.

“‘A manager’s work is never done,’ Pep was often heard saying. One morning, the enthusiastic Pep seen the previous day had made way for a silent Pep whose words said one thing but his sunken eyes another. ‘What’s wrong?’ one of his colleagues asked him. ‘Yesterday I should have gone to see my daughter in a ballet and I couldn’t go.’ ‘Why not?’ his friend asked, surprised. ‘Because I was watching videos of our opponents.’”

So would being a slave to the cause, which contributed to him taking a year off, not remain with Guardiola when he returns? Balagué said: “Many people in this day and age overwork, we do too much. It can reach a point where you stop loving what you are doing and he lost that.

“When you are the sort of person who has to give absolutely everything, you take that with you everywhere. You go to the next club and you still have to do 120 per cent. Pep will not just want to keep learning about the game, he will want to know about the club’s history and the culture of the place where he lives. So he will immerse himself again with work, trying to gather information because that’s how he does it. The hope for him and his family is that he can balance it more so he can last a little longer.”

Balagué writes in the book: “Pep sets impossibly high standards and is beset by a sense of never quite being good enough. Guardiola might look strong and capable of carrying a club and nation on his shoulders but he is very sensitive about the reaction of the team and about disappointing the fans by not meeting their expectations. Or his own.”

He said: “At his next club he cannot fail. To him he would be failing himself, failing a nation, failing the club, failing his family…so he’d have to work even more to achieve this.”

Having reached footballing utopia at the Nou Camp, there will inevitably be the belief that the Guardiola magic can be transferred elsewhere and he can create Barca II. “It is impossible,” said Balagué. “I’m not sure how he will approach this or what message he will give the people at his new club. He will produce good football and he believes in a way of playing football. He will take that with him, he will maximise what he has at his disposal, he will improve the players, look at every detail to beat the other team…that kind of thing.”

In 2008 Guardiola took over a successful team put together by Frank Rijkaard, albeit one with signs of ill-discipline which was soon sorted, starting with the departure of Ronaldinho. Balagué said: “He took some significant decisions which not everyone was in favour of but as a manager from the first minute Guardiola did the right things, then as a coach he took the team to a completely new level. He combined the lessons he had learned from everyone…from Johan Cruyff, from his close friend Juanma Lillo who was his coach in Mexico, from people in Italy [where he played for Roma and Brescia] and applied all this to his own football philosophies.

“I have never seen a better team than the one Guardiola produced. He took a side that was maybe 7/10 to the limit at a time when everyone knows everything about each other, about the players, the tactics and still took them above everybody else in the world.”

His four years as coach saw Guardiola win 14 major honours. At Barcelona, the motto is “more than a club” and Guardiola, a key member of Cruyff’s Dream Team of the Nineties, is a symbol not just of Barca, but Catalonia. Balagué understands Guardiola’s decision to leave a team with players such as Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta and Xavi (you could name the entire squad) but “I don’t completely agree with it.”

In the book Balagué writes: “By the end of his tenure he was no longer the youthful, eager, enthusiastic manager Sir Alex Ferguson met that night in Rome [in 2009]. On the day he announced he was leaving his boyhood club you could see the toll it had taken, it was discernible in his eyes and in his receding hairline, now flecked with grey.

“When he took the job he was a youthful looking 37-year-old. Eager, ambitions, enthusiastic. Now look at him four years later, he doesn’t look 41, does he? To be a coach at Barcelona requires a lot of energy and after four years, now that he no longer enjoyed the European nights, now that Real Madrid had made La Liga an exhausting challenge on and off the field, Guardiola felt it was time to depart from the all-consuming entity he had served – with a break of only six years – since he was 13. And when he returns – because he will return – isn’t it best to do so having left on a high?”

Balague said: “I remember something Luis Aragonés said to me. He is one of the wise men and said: ‘I don’t believe Pep when he says he is tired.’

“I don’t believe it entirely, either. When Pep was a player at Barcelona he left the club too late. Cruyff always told him he, himself, should have left two years earlier. Guardiola always had the idea, from minute one, that he wasn’t going to last long. So I think there’s a bit of a strategy behind all this. It was a combination of many things, including the fact there were a lot of very hard decisions that had to be taken. He built this team from love as well as from tactics and everything else. Try telling your kids ‘sorry I don’t want you any more’ or ‘you’re not playing in the team.’ That demanded an emotional investment he was not prepared to do.”

Balagué is adamant the world’s most sought after out-of-work manager will not return to work until next summer. His advisors are constantly in touch with Europe’s leading clubs and Balagué said: “The only thing they are trying to convince him of at the moment is to say ‘yes’ to a club and start working in the shadows.

“Everyone likes money, but Guardiola will be saying ‘show me this club can be taken to the top, show me it can be done in the way that I like.’ There is no point in him going to a club that prefers to play long balls or does not have a squad that is ready to keep the ball.”

The smart money would be on Guardiola’s next stop being England, Germany or Italy. In the book, Sir Alex Ferguson writes in the foreword: “I missed out on signing Pep Guardiola as a player back at the time that his future no longer lay at Barcelona. Maybe the timing I chose was wrong. It would have been interesting: he was the kind of player that Paul Scholes developed into. Sometimes you look back at a really top player and you say to yourself: ‘I wonder what it would have been like if he’d come to United?’ That was the case with Pep Guardiola.”

The longest-serving manager in British football makes no secret of his admiration for man who ticks just about every box needed for his successor.

Ferguson wrote: “One thing I have noticed about Guardiola – crucial to his immense success as a manager – is that he has been very humble. He has never tried to gloat, he has been very respectful and that is very important. As a coach he is very disciplined in terms of how his team plays, whether they win or lose he is always the unpretentious individual. And to be honest, I think it is good to have someone like that in this profession.”

Would Guardiola’s pending availability persuade Ferguson to step down? “I am pretty sure Ferguson and the club have discussed the possibility of that,” said Balagué. “It doesn’t mean it will happen because we all know Sir Alex wants to be there for at least another year or two. He lost the opportunity of getting Guardiola as a player, but would he retire to bring him in to take over? No.

“Pep has not told anyone he wants to go to this club or that club in England. From what I know of him, at 10 in the morning he’ll have made a decision, at 11 he’ll think ‘well, actually…’ and at one he’ll be thinking about another club. By the evening he’ll have ruled them all out. It will take him months to decide to take his family to another country and for him to join another club.

“I think it’s clear Chelsea are doing all they can to convince him, they have probably been the most consistent ones.”

Wherever Guardiola’s next port of call may be, Balagué is sure he will one day return to Barcelona.

“He’s going back, no doubt about it.” As coach? “We’ll see. It’s the kind of thing he has not decided, but I am 100 per cent sure he will go back at some point.”

How Barcelona developed under Guardiola.

The team that Rijkaard left in 2008 was: Valdes – Zambrotta, Milito, Puyol, Abidal – Yaya Toure – Xavi, Iniesta – Messi, Eto’o, Henry.

The starting XI for the 2009 Champions League final against Manchester United was: Valdes – Puyol, Toure, Pique, Sylvinho – Busquets – Iniesta, Xavi – Messi, Eto’o, Henry.

By 2010 it was: Valdes – Alves, Pique, Puyol, Abidal – Busquets – Xavi, Iniesta – Messi, Ibrahimovic, Pedro.

In 2011: Valdes – Alves, Pique, Mascherano, Abidal – Busquets – Iniesta, Xavi – Pedro, Messi, Villa.

Guardiola’s last season: Valdes – Alves, Pique, Mascherano, Puyol – Busquets – Xavi, Fabregas – Alexis, Messi, Iniesta.

*Pep Guardiola – Another Way of Winning: The Biography by Guillem Balagué (Orion £20).

 

WHEN THIERRY BECAME HENRY

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PHILIPPE AUCLAIR thinks Thierry Henry has a right to be considered France’s greatest footballer but in a ‘love letter’ he explains the character of the player changed…

By CHRISTOPHER DAVIES

IT IS sad that a player who gave Arsenal, English and French football such joy, so many moments of incredible skill, scoring breathtaking goals after a 60-yard lung-bursting run should be remembered as much for a handball (pedants will argue two handballs) as the pleasure he served up.

Thierry Henry remains the only three-time winner of the Footballer of the Year award, a distinction likely to remain for a long time unless double-winner Cristiano Ronaldo returns to the Barclays Premier League or Lionel Messi fancies giving up el clasico for Chelsea v Arsenal or the Manchester derby.

The Hand Of Gaul is a tattoo for life and what Henry did in the 103rd minute of the 2010 World Cup play-off second leg between France and the Republic of Ireland on November 18, 2009 was as surprising as it was unacceptable. It was so out of character – a word Philippe Auclair uses frequently when talking about Henry in a fascinating, absorbing biography Lonely At The Top.

Auclair, France Football’s London-based correspondent for over a decade, believes Henry has a right to be considered an even greater player than Zinedine Zidane whose glorious career ended ignominiously and violently in the 2006 World Cup final. Admiring Henry is one thing; liking him is another. And the more Auclair spoke to people about Henry for the book the more uncomfortable he became about France’s finest.

“You have to make the distinction between the person and the persona,” said Auclair. “I do not know the person well enough to have the right to place any judgment on him. It’s a very important distinction. But I am like many people in France in that I am ambivalent towards Henry, which is why the book proved quite difficult to write. I would come across people who were telling me things about Thierry that I didn’t particularly want to hear and was reminded of the very strong feelings some have about him, not all positive.”

In his book Cantona: The Rebel Who Would Be King, it was clear that Auclair, perhaps reluctantly, was won over by the player Manchester United supporters still call King Eric.

Auclair said: “There were many flaws in Cantona, we know what they are, but there is a certain generosity of spirit in him and a sparkling wit that, for me, was impossible to resist. The more I worked on the Cantona book the more I became drawn to the character, but the more I worked on the book about Thierry the more difficult it became to retain the very warm feeling I had towards him when I began writing it, but which I thankfully recaptured after his return to Arsenal and that beautiful night at the Emirates, when he scored against Leeds. It was something I found hard to deal with at times, however.

“I tried not to pass judgment which is up to the reader, especially whether I’ve been fair or not. I have tried to be fair with Thierry as I tried to be fair with Cantona.

“But my admiration for the Thierry the player is absolute and I do not think he is revered or admired as much as he should be. The handball in Paris tarnished his image and the strength of reaction to that incident was because such a so-called crime against football was so out of character. “

Auclair writes in the book: “When the British papers tried to find ‘previous’ in Thierry’s career, and tried they did, they failed to do so. Henry’s increasingly aloof demeanour may have grated with some, indeed with many, but he had never been labelled a ‘cheat’ before. He didn’t dive or wave imaginary yellow cards when he had been fouled, and heaven knows he was fouled more than most, when defenders could get to him, that is.”

The stage, with a place at the 2010 World Cup finals up for grabs, inevitably exaggerated the consequences of the handball, but Auclair said: “The image of Thierry sitting on the grass with Richard Dunne after the game as the celebrations went on really hurt a great number of people. I’ve tried [in the book] to express the disarray in French football after that.”

Another paradox of Henry was the lack of emotion he often showed after scoring the sort of stunning goal that lit up English football. “I wouldn’t say he was incapable of enjoying the moment,” said Auclair. “It’s more that he used to transport himself out of the game while being in it. He’s a reserved sort of guy, his own harshest critic, with incredible powers of self-analysis on the field, not someone who jumps up and down. He finds it hard to express this side of himself, he seems to be on his guard permanently, always thinking ahead.”

Auclair has closely followed Henry’s career from his early days at Monaco, where Arsene Wenger was his coach, to his glory days at Arsenal.

In the book he writes: “It was hard to reconcile the sweet, generous Thierry who had stood talking to us at Highbury, barely protected from the rain by an umbrella-wielding press officer, with the increasingly aloof Henry I had to deal with on a weekly basis later in his career.”

Auclair said: “His status changed. Thierry became Henry. He was very aware of his status which saw the progress from ambition to its realisation. For that you need to be focused to such an extent that I think you can lose touch…lose contact with your environment in such a way that you will appear distant, haughty not scornful though not very far from it.”

While it is common for players and managers to claim they never read the papers – yet they always seem aware of criticism, if not praise – Henry not only made a point of seeing what had been written about him, but contacting any journalist whose comments he felt unfair.

In the book, Auclair writes: “Oliver Holt of the Daily Mirror has told how – on the eve of the 2006 Champions League final – Thierry spent 20 minutes chastising him for having mistaken the council estate he grew up in with another in a preview piece. An amateur psyschologist would perhaps explain this hypersensitivity as a direct consequence of the willingness of his father to simultaneously praise (in public) and chastise (mostly in private) his son for his performances, which ultimately he found unbearable. What is certain is that at the heart of this superb player lay a feeling of insecurity that he often found impossible to disguise and which he tried to assuage by trying to exercise an ever-growing measure of control over what he said and what was said about him.”

Auclair said: “He set himself extraordinarily high targets. If you look in terms of the honours he won and how he won them, he’s achieved almost as much as anyone in modern football yet somehow still does not belong to that extra special group of players who dominate an era.I feel this is an injustice, which I hoped to set right.

“If you asked me which was the greater player, Henry or Zidane…in terms of achievements in his career I’d be tempted to say Thierry, even though Zidane scored two goals in a World Cup final and the winning goal in a Champions League final. In this respect I’d place Thierry on a par with Zidane, perhaps even above him, despite the fact that Zidane, in absolute terms, thinking of his vision and technique, was superior to him – and to everybody else, for that matter.

“But going back to the persona of Thierry, everybody who had to work with him noticed the changes between the player between 1999 and 2004 to the player of his last few years at Arsenal and then Barcelona. He became more and more remote. Maybe that’s the consequence of fame or success. Most people who experience such an ascent within their profession, whatever it may be, have to build mechanisms of self-preservation. Thierry had to, in order to survive, from the very beginning. It only got tougher. This is a guy who has been driven to become a great footballer almost since he was born and has been under tremendous pressure.”

The distance clubs place between players and the press these days makes it increasingly difficult to build up a close relationship with the people those who cover football write about. In the book Auclair is dismissive of those writers “willing to concur with Henry being able, with some luck and provided they wrote for a publication that carried enough clout, to join the inner circle.”

He writes: “Each paper has at least a couple of these privileged reporters on its staff; some of them are groomed from a very young age, sent out to follow youth teams in the hope they’ll sympathise with players whom it’ll be indispensible to develop a close working relationship with later in their careers. The first time I engaged in small talk with one of them I felt like a concert-goer who had crossed the path of a record company executive wearing an invisible ‘access all areas’ badge around his neck.

“Likewise, some of those who, much to their chagrin and despite their best efforts, were not asked to sit at the master’s table or who were told to leave it, contributed much to darken the player’s reputation out of sheer spite and resentment, with scant regard for their target’s outstanding achievements.”

Auclair, who makes no secret that his favourite French player and the one he considers the most charming is Robert Pires, said: “Thierry didn’t exploit that as many other players have, but if that was unusual, it wasn’t to have a select group of journalists who he used as PRs, so to speak. When you surround yourself with people who will not criticise you it is not the best recipe for having as open a view of the world as possible.”

When Henry reads Auclair’s book what does the author believe the subject will think about his efforts?

“There are elements in it that might not please him, reminders of difficult moments in his career, not just the Ireland episode but his early days when things almost went pear-shaped at Monaco. He made some mistakes which he paid for. But I hope he will feel that this book is also, in the end, a love letter to a magnificent player, whose greatness is not always recognised as it should”.

THIERRY HENRY Lonely At The Top: A Biography by Philippe Auclair (Macmillan, £17.99) is out on November 8.

 

FWA Q&A: BOB CASS

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The Mail on Sunday’s BOB CASS on missing bums at Darlington…oh dear Cantona… and an Eye-talian lady thinking he was Charles Bronson

Have you ever worked in a profession other than football?
Apart from two years serving Queen and country doing National Service in the Royal Army Service Corps, where incidentally I played in the same football team as Ron Yeats, Chris Crowe and Alec Young (the Golden Vision) – No.

Most memorable match?
Easy – the 1973 FA Cup final – Sunderland 1 Leeds United 0.

The one moment in football you would put on a DVD?
Jimmy Montgomery’s double save in the above match. The greatest in the history of football.

Best stadium?
The now lately lamented stadium that used to house my team, Darlington, where 90 per cent of the 25,000 seats never had a bum on them during a football match.

Worst?
The same because incurring the debt that it cost finished the club as a Football League outfit.

Your personal new-tech disaster?
Apart from the usual, accidentally obliterating copy right on edition time on several occasions, I fear that is still to come.

Biggest mistake?
Telling the sports editor there was no truth in the speculation that Eric Cantona was about to quit football.

Have you ever been mistaken for anybody else?
When I sported a droopy moustache, a beautiful Italian lady told me I looked like Charles Bronson. Turned out she had cataracts!

Most media friendly manager?
Kevin Keegan – he talked in headlines.

Best ever player?
Toss-up between George Best and Lionel Messi.

Best ever teams?
Club – Real Madrid 7 Eintracht Frankfurt 3, European Cup final 1960; international – Ferenc Puskas’s Hungary side which beat England 6-3 at Wembley in 1953. Two great matches that stick out in my memory after watching both on film.

Best pre-match grub?
Competition is fierce: Manchester City’s ham might just edge it.

Best meal had on your travels?
The Kobe beef in Kobe during the 2002 World Cup…mouth-watering memories.

Worst?
Lyon has a reputation for being the gastronomic capital of France. I must have picked its worst restaurant.

Best hotel stayed in?
Upgraded to a suite in the Imperial Hotel, Tokyo – fabulous.

Worst?
Hotel Ukraine in Kiev. It really was the pits.

Favourite football writer?
There are many good and few poor ones. Henry Winter is always good value.

Favourite radio/TV commentator?
Age has yet to catch up with Motty and neither has the competition.

If you could introduce one change to improve PR between football clubs and football writers, what would it be?
It’s getting better, but there are still too many incompetent media officers. They don’t know enough about what newspapers are all about and accordingly can be very negative. And no problems – Wi-Fi should be essential at every Premier League club.

One sporting event outside football you would love to experience?
Been lucky enough to cover all the top golf tournaments and been racing at all the top meetings. But my ambition is to go to the Melbourne Cup.

Last book read?
Just finished `Nobody Ever Says Thank You’ – Jonathan Wilson’s biography of Brian Clough. Superbly researched but he never got near the fella.

Favourite current TV programme?
The Newsroom, first series has just finished; can’t wait for the second.

Your most prized football memorabilia
Billy Hughes’ number seven shirt from the 1973 FA Cup final.

Advice to anyone coming into the football media world?
Don’t forget to subscribe to Twitter – it means you don’t have to make the kind of contacts that thankfully I did. The game has changed.

(The Football Writers’ Association have led the drive for efficient Wi-Fi at all Premier League clubs and most have this facility).

Giving Alan Ball a piggy-back after the 1966 World Cup win…drinks with Ronnie Biggs…and praying for the phone to ring

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As Fleet Street legend STEVE CURRY celebrates his 70th birthday he looks back on a successful and eventful career.

By CHRISTOPHER DAVIES

IT WAS Cassius Clay who was the springboard for Steve Curry’s career as a football writer.

And when a young, innocent lad from Lancashire came to London his life literally went to pot.

Curry forged a reputation as one of Fleet Street’s leading football news reporters, working hard and playing hard in an era when journalists were able to eat, drink and be merry with managers and players. And Ronnie Biggs.

These days, much of his time is spent helping his wife Carol at Morts wine bar/restaurant in Walton-on-Thames. “She does all the cooking,” said Curry who is a meeter and greeter to customers at the former Ruby’s.

A far cry from his first job on the weekly Blackburn Times where he began covering weddings, council meetings and law courts, reporting on Rovers at the weekend. He then moved to the Preston-based evening newspaper Lancashire Evening Post before being transferred to their offices in London in 1964 when he joined the Football Writers’ Association, making him one of the longest-serving members.

“Though basically a sub, I was allowed to write a Saturday column,” said Curry. “I did a piece on Cassius Clay, as he was still called then, which caught the eye of the editor. This earned me my transfer to London which was when I started to specialise in sport, principally football.”

Curry moved into a flat in Fawley Road, Hampstead with five girls who worked for United Newspapers. Upstairs were some guys who played in a jazz band and Curry said: “I was pretty naive and when I walked into the flat I sniffed the air and thought how peculiar it smelt. I asked one of the girls what it was and it turned out the entire block was smoking pot. Needless to say I didn’t get involved in that.”

In 1966, Curry covered England’s World Cup final win over West Germany which remains the highlight of his career. Clive Toye had left the Daily Express which created a vacancy for a football writer and with Toye’s recommendation, Curry got the nod ahead of Peter Corrigan who went on to serve the Observer so well.

A Fleet Street rookie, Curry was initially helped by the Daily Express football correspondent Desmond Hackett, who wore a trademark brown bowler in press boxes, and Geoffrey Green of The Times. “They were the doyens of the football writing circuit and were fantastic to me. They also taught me how to drink…”

At the Daily Express, Curry and the late Joe Melling were an outstanding news team, regularly leading the way with transfers and managerial appointments. “Joe was a great scuffler and had really good contacts in the game which rightly won him awards.”

After 30 years with the Daily Express “almost to the day” Curry left for the Sunday Telegraph where, in the mid to late Nineties, the sports desk enjoyed a golden era under sports editor Colin Gibson, now head of media and communications for the International Cricket Council.

The paper had a series of exclusives in 1998 including the breakaway European League and the demolition of the Wembley twin towers.

“We cleaned up the awards,” said Curry. “I was named sports news reporter of the year, Colin was sports journalist of the year, golf writer Derek Lawrenson won the sports correspondent of the year…it was almost a clean sweep.

“I’d say Colin and David Emery, my sports editor at the Daily Express, have been the two biggest influences in my career. Both were former writers, which is a help when you become sports editor and why I think Matt Lawton will do a good job in his new role on the Daily Mail sports desk.”

A 10-month spell at the Sunday Times was followed by a move to the Daily Mail which he left in 2006. Curry still does “bits and pieces for the Daily Mail” and the occasional newspaper review for Sky but most of all he is thankful he was able to experience reporting during the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties when football writers and players mixed freely, an impossible dream for the current generation.

He said: “Access was so much easier. We used to stroll into training grounds, stand on the touchline, shout at the players and have fun. It was all one happy family. Now, of course, you almost have to make an appointment to visit a training ground. They’re like Fort Knox.

“With England, we’d watch the training at the Bank of England sports ground at Roehampton, wait in a lounge in armchairs, Alf would come in booted and suited with his suitcase and the eight or 10 reporters present would chat to him. No cameras…it was far more relaxed than it is now.

“We made friends with footballers. After England won the World Cup I remember giving Alan Ball a piggy-back round the reception of the Royal Garden hotel in Kensington late in the night.”

Forty six years later the only contact football writers have with England players is in the mixed zone after internationals.

Curry continued: “My contacts book was full of home numbers – there were no mobiles then.”

No mobiles and no lap-tops which made filing reports far more challenging from the present era of pressing “send” and within seconds a story is with the sports desk. “In those days you had to have a phone installed in a press box. Not just that, you couldn’t ring out, you had to wait for the office to ring you. We’d sit there with our copy ready waiting and praying it would ring.

“There were occasions when only one paper could get a line out and after the reporter had put his report over to the copy taker, his switchboard would somehow transfer to another paper.”

The job has moved on in many ways and the current generation of football writers operate under far more pressure than those of yesteryear where working conditions were more free and easy.

Curry said: “I remember being in the Bernabeu in 1965 when Sir Alf Ramsey first played without wingers against Spain. It was a bitterly cold night and a chap was a walking round with some fiery liquid. By the time the match finished Geoffrey Green must have drunk almost a gallon of this stuff and was a little the worse for wear. Yet as always the next morning his report read like prose.”

England’s visit to South America in 1984, when John Barnes scored his supergoal against Brazil in the Maracana, was a particularly memorable trip for Curry. He said: “Jeff Powell of the Daily Mail and I went to a beef restaurant in Rio he knew and inside were Bob Driscoll [Daily Star] and Alex Montgomery [Sun] talking to this English chap about life in Brazil.

“They had no idea who he was, but I recognised him. It was Ronnie Biggs who was delighted to chat to us while we bought him drinks.”

The flight back from South America was delayed and Team Curry found themselves in a hotel in Montevideo where the foursome decided to try the Uruguayan Bloody Mary. They were soon joined by other football writers who also found the cocktail the perfect companion for killing time.

“After a while the waiter, dressed in a dicky bow, said as he put down the final round of drinks ‘Congratulations, you have now drunk 100 Bloody Mary’s.”

A bar tab, Curry maintains with a hint of pride, he has never given to anyone at Mort’s.

NORTHERN MANAGERS AWARDED

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The 30th Northern Managers Award Dinner took place at the Radisson Blu Edwardian Hotel in Manchester last night.

There were plenty of managers and coaches in attendance along with press and media from up and down the country to celebrate the award winners.

Nine awards were given out on the night and the managers who received the accolades are listed below.

Roberto Mancini was the last manager to be honoured on the night and it will please Manchester City fans that he is determined to win the award next year too, which will only happen if City win the league again of course.

It was somewhat appropriate that the event took place in Manchester after last season’s thrilling finale to the Barclays Premier League and chairman of the FWA Steve Bates took great pleasure in welcoming the managers to the evening.

“It’s often said that players take the glory while managers get the grief so we are delighted tonight to honour our award winners for their success last season,” said Bates.

Comedian Vince Miller was the Master of Ceremonies and was pleased to introduce special guest Graham Poll, who addressed the audience of whom many will have once used to write about his performance on a Saturday afternoon.

The nine award winning managers are as follows:

1 ROBERTO MANCINI (Manchester City) Barclays PL Champions.

2 KENNY DALGLISH (Liverpool) Carling League Cup Winners.

3 DAVE JONES (Sheffield Wednesday) npower Lge 1 runners-up.

4 SIMON GRAYSON (Huddersfield Town) npower Lge 1 p/off winners.

5 STEVE DAVIS (Crewe Alexandra) npower Lge 2 p/off winners.

6 JOHN SHERIDAN (Chesterfield) Johnstones Paint Trophy winners.

SPECIAL AWARDS:

7 GARY MILLS (York City) FA Carlsberg Trophy winners and Blue Square Bet Premier play-off winners.

8 MICKY MELLON (Fleetwood Town) Blue Square Conference champions).

9 BILLY IRWIN (Dunston UTS) FA Carlsberg Vase winners.

FWA Q&A: RORY SMITH

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RORY SMITH of The Times on being mistaken for a drugs trafficker in Chile…why Ian Herbert grew a beard in 17 minutes…and Joycey’s two-foot long loaf

Have you ever worked in a profession other than journalism?
Regulars at several pubs in west Yorkshire will bear witness to the fact that I’m a better barman than a journalist. I was a Christmas card salesman for a while, too – in an office, not door-to-door, like some sort of festive tinker – but the best job I ever had was with a landscape gardener. My boss was a raging alcoholic. We’d do a bit of weeding and go for a fry-up, then he’d be off into the night. Or afternoon. Or the morning.

Most memorable match?
A toss-up between the 4-4 between Liverpool and Arsenal in 2009 – the one where Andrei Arshavin used up his lifetime’s supply of talent to hand Manchester United the title – and Tottenham beating Reading 6-4 in (I think) 2007 [it was 2007 but only just, Dec 29 – Ed]. Chelsea against Barcelona in the Champions League semi at the Nou Camp would be up there, too. That was just a ridiculous game of football.

The one moment in football you would put on a DVD?
Of the ones that aren’t already on DVDs, Benitez’s press conference after Liverpool beat United 4-1 at Old Trafford was pretty special. Martin Blackburn walking down the steps of the Stadium of Light in Lisbon declaring that he “just wants to know everything about” Angel di Maria, like a love-sick teenager.

Best stadium?
The Stadium of Light. You’re right in the gods, so the view is brilliant, and any ground where they release a bird of prey before a match is alright by me. The Allianz Arena is superb, too. The atmosphere at the San Paolo in Naples is unique, but there is a chance you’ll be stabbed by ultras before you’re allowed to experience it.

…and the worst?
Layer Road in Colchester was horrible. That takes it from Turf Moor on a Wednesday night in January during an FA Cup third round replay. The wind, whipping off the Pennines, cuts to your bones, but the smell of 10,000 Lancastrians lighting up at one end of the Main Stand at half-time just saves it. Also, on a side note: the press box at White Hart Lane. Really? Is that really the best you can do?

Your personal new-tech disaster?
I’m not sure it was my fault, to be honest, but the wifi at the Artemio Franchi in Florence is abysmal. We were there for the beginning of the end of Benitez’s Liverpool, and there was some intricate financial story breaking at the same time. None of us had any phone signal, any wifi, or any understanding of what a share issue was. That’s probably the single most stressful hour of my life, alleviated only by watching Ian Herbert’s face melt with the pain of it all. He used to look quite young, did Herbie. That night did for him. He grew a beard in 17 minutes.

Biggest mistake?
Many and various. Asking Steven Gerrard after the 2012 FA Cup final what the mood was like in the dressing room. Mistaking Cristian Rodriguez for Mariano Gonzalez – or vice versa, I’m still not sure – after boasting that I could get us a Porto line in an Old Trafford mixed zone was pretty embarrassing. My favourite is suggesting, in the spirit of Garth Crooks, that Jonny Evans’s form was so good that it was a mystery why Fabio Capello wasn’t picking him for England. Mark Ogden still asks me when I think he’ll get the call up.

Have you ever been mistaken for anyone else?
I was once mistaken for a drug trafficker by a border guard in Chile. That may not be what you meant.

Most media friendly manager?
I’m contractually bound to say Rafa Benitez, but very few would agree with me. Roberto Martinez is brilliant to talk to, and David Moyes if the mood takes him. The most interesting – this sounds deliberately offbeat – was Ralf Rangnick, who used to be at Hoffenheim and Schalke. Perfect English – obviously – and really engaging on stuff like training methods and his playing philosophy.

Best ever player?
Messi, Maradona or Pele, depending on what floats your boat, I suppose. That’s quite boring, isn’t it? The ones that I loved watching when I was younger were Juan Roman Riquelme and Rui Costa. That laconic style, the effortless grace, the impression that they’ll stroll to the side of the pitch and have a smoke in a few minutes. That’s what football’s all about. I also spent much of my teens nursing an unhealthy obsession with Patrik Berger.

Best ever teams (club and international)?
I suspect I’ll tell my grandkids that I saw this Spain and this Barcelona play. The best teams are the ones that change the game, that leave the sport different. Both of those teams fall into that category, with Holland in the 70s, Brazil from 1958 to 1970, and Sacchi’s Milan.

Best pre-match grub?
Manchester City. The pick and mix puts them ahead of Arsenal’s ice cream. I have fond memories of the buffet at Watford when Boothroyd was there. It was like going to a children’s party (as in, that’s how I remember children’s parties being, not that I go to a lot of children’s parties now). Nothing’s a patch on when QPR had their catering done by Marco Pierre White, though. That was incredible.

Best meal had on your travels?
Henry Winter and Matt Lawton insisted on trying one of the little home-kitchen things in Lyon when Liverpool played there, and the food was magnificent. More magnificent was the fact that the usually reserved Paul Joyce managed to put away an entire loaf of bread during the course of the evening. Not like a Warburton’s Toastie loaf, either: a big, two foot long ciabatta. He loves bread, Joycey.

…and the worst?
Czech garlic bread in Ostrava. Just a loaf – an actual loaf – with whole cloves of garlic stuck in it. It hadn’t even been cooked.

Best hotel stayed in?
The Westin Palace in Madrid is pretty good: we had to swap with the Liverpool players for some reason, so they stayed in a Novotel or whatever, and we got their rooms at the best hotel in the city. Payback, that’s what that is.

…and the worst?
Er, the Stadium Apartments in Donetsk. I say “er” because it’s not really a hotel. It was a one-bed flat in a proper old Stalinist block on the outskirts, in an estate filled with mangy dogs and endemic sorrow. There were no towels, no hot water, no pillows and no duvet, though the latter two weren’t really relevant because there was no bed. There was no wifi and no plug sockets. It cost, I think, £500 for two nights. Slap on the back for Commodore.

Favourite football writer?
There are far too many to mention. There are loads of journalists who you read and think either you wish you could write like that or you wish you could get stories like that. The two who maybe don’t get the credit they deserve are The Times’ George Caulkin and Dion Fanning, at the Irish Sunday Independent. Both are genuinely different, which is a rare skill.

Favourite radio/TV commentator?
Ian Dennis [senior football reporter for Radio 5 Live], because of his famous love of wine gums. He carries two “grab-bags” wherever he goes, dishing them out to strangers and friends alike. He has the “there’s a moose, loose, aboot this hoose” advertising campaign of the mid-90s as his ringtone on his Nokia 8210. He has a dog called Maynard: that’s how much he loves them. That’s a little-known fact, but it is very much a fact.

If you could introduce one change to improve PR between football clubs and football writers what would it be?
Something the FWA could help with, actually: I think we should get a compulsory mixed zone after Barclays Premier League games. Not a press officer going into the dressing room and asking “do you want to do the press?” in the same tone of voice as someone might ask if you want to attach electrodes to your genitals or lick a tramp, but a roped-off area where the players actually have to walk past the press, and decide if they want to talk to them or not. Make them front up, as they say in east London and films.

One sporting event outside football you would love to experience?
Live, no holds barred, man on man Kabbadi. I reckon a Super Bowl would be pretty good, and it has built-in breaks for snacks, too.

Last book read?
*Desperately tries to think of something pretentious* My girlfriend’s got me into William Boyd – he gives good story – and before that Inverting the Pyramid. On a point of principle, I don’t buy Jonathan Wilson’s books, because I don’t want to contribute to his debauched, Bacchanalian lifestyle. But I saw that one in a bargain bin in Books Etc, so figured he wouldn’t be able to buy too much speed with my money.

Favourite current TV programme?
I quite liked The Newsroom. Especially the bit where all these producers in America are sitting around watching stories develop and they say: “Does anyone have a contact in the Jordanian militia?” And then two put their hands up and say: “Oh, I was at college with the man who does the catering for Hezbollah. He’s staying at my house at the moment.” Oh, and the Bundesliga highlights on ITV4. I love the commentary. “That’s a second goal for Aaron Hunt – and don’t forget, his Mum’s an Englishman.”

Your most prized football memorabilia?
I don’t really have any, to be honest. My Dad was 70 this year and Coventry City very kindly provided pictures of the 1935 and 1936 teams of which my Grandad, noted left-back Bernard Smith, was a member. He cost £1,000, did Bernard, in 1932. He was described as “young” at the age of 28, and his half-time routine consisted of a coffee and a fag. Anyway, I thought it was a really thoughtful gift. He hasn’t put them up yet.

Advice to anyone coming into the football media world?
Bring fingerless gloves, and always go back for seconds.

FWA Q&A: ALAN SMITH

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Daily Telegraph columnist ALAN SMITH on the Crazy Gang…Sam Wallace pressing all the right buttons…and Leicester’s lovely pork pies.

Have you ever worked in a profession other than football?
Only for half a day. When I was 18 I got picked from a long queue outside British Leyland in Birmingham to clean the oil pits during the factory holidays. Good money too – £100 a week. But couldn’t stick it.

Most memorable match?
Has to be Anfield 89 when Arsenal had to beat Liverpool by two goals. We knew afterwards that nothing could ever beat that. What a night, what a journey home and what a weekend.

The one moment in football you would put on a DVD?
England winning the World Cup in Brazil.

Best stadium?
Loved Highbury. It could be a nightmare when you weren’t playing well – the fans were so close to the pitch you could hear all the stick – but what a historic place, from the huge dressing rooms with underfloor heating to the marble halls. No ground like it.

…and the worst?
Didn’t like Plough Lane too much. Not just because it was a bit of a dump with tiny dressing rooms and a dodgy pitch but because the old Crazy Gang at Wimbledon gave you a right going over if you didn’t go into the game with the right attitude.

Your personal new-tech disaster?
Like most journos, I’m sure, I have lost my entire piece from my laptop just as I was about to file once. Started panicking like a good ‘un. Luckily, Sam Wallace was on hand to tell me which buttons to press to retrieve it. Cheers Sam.

Biggest mistake?
Stretching for a ball at Millwall in January 1995. Tore my cartilage and never played again.

Have you ever been mistaken for anyone else?
Not really. But my Alvechurch team-mates called me Seb after Seb Coe.

Most media friendly manager?
Roy Hodgson was always helpful as a club manager and remains so with England (before he caught the tube anyway). Sam Allardyce too. Usually manage to have a good chat with Big Sam before his games. Not always about football either. For someone from Dudley he’s an interesting bloke.

Best ever player?
Thought I’d never see anyone better than Maradona but Lionel Messi tops him. Unbelievably consistent with a fantastic temperament. And never gets injured.

Best ever teams (club and international)?
I’ve got to say Barcelona who were probably at their best when they beat Manchester United in the 2011 Champions League final. Unstoppable, whatever you tried. On the international front, the present Spain team aren’t bad. But I did love Brazil in 1970.

Best pre-match grub?
At the home of football of course – the Emirates. What a spread. That said, Leicester did a lovely pork pie back in the 80’s.

Best meal had on your travels?
Arsenal stopped at the Palace of Versailles hotel before facing PSG one year. The creme brûlée was out of this world. And before we played at Torino, the lasagne was spectacular.

…and the worst?
The ones when we lost afterwards. If in doubt, blame the pre-match meal.

Best hotel stayed in?
Perhaps that one in Versailles. Properly elegant set in beautiful gardens
…and the worst? The one in Tirana when England played Albania in late 80’s. The bed sunk down in the middle and the water was brown.

Favourite football writer?
If I’m forced to stray off piste and nominate someone outside the Daily Telegraph, I’ve got to say Martin Samuel. But special mentions reserved for Henry Winter and Paul Hayward.

Favourite radio/TV commentator?
Love everyone at Sky Sports obviously. But I also like John Murray and Mike Ingham on 5 live.

If you could introduce one change to improve PR between football clubs and football writers what would it be?
Make sure the Wi Fi works.

One sporting event outside football you would love to experience?
The Masters. Always working when it’s on but one day I’ll get there.

Last book read?
Catching the Sun by Tony Parsons. A great holiday read. Miss that sunbed already.

Favourite current TV programme?
Boardwalk Empire.

Your most prized football memorabilia?
My memories really. Never been one for putting too much store in medals.

Advice to anyone coming into the football media world?
Never take this job for granted. It’s a fantastic way to earn a living.

IT TOOK ME FIVE MINUTES TO MAKE UP MY MIND

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After 20 years reporting the best games and the best teams, the Daily Mail’s chief football correspondent MATT LAWTON is ready for a new challenge as executive sports editor

By CHRISTOPHER DAVIES

IT HAD been an enjoyable summer for Matt Lawton, the Daily Mail’s chief football correspondent. Despite England doing what they usually do at major tournaments and losing on penalties in the quarter-finals, Euro 2012 was the best finals for many years, full of excellent football and outstanding individuals while Poland and Ukraine proved not to be the war zones predicted in some – well one – quarter.

Lawton then reported on the swimming at London 2012 which enabled him to tick off another ambition, covering an Olympic Games. The day after his Olympic stint had ended his phone rang. It was the office. Not about some pre-season features. How would he like to become executive sports editor?

“It came out of the blue,” said Lawton who has been on the road for almost 20 years working for the Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph and Daily Express. If being a football writer is a job coveted by many, then being a football correspondent, covering only the best games and best teams, is as good as it gets. Giving it up is not easy but it was an offer Lawton could not refuse. In fact, his mind was made up in five minutes.

“Yes, it was a big decision,” Lawton told footballwriters.co.uk. “To give up what many people think is the best job in the world is difficult, but after 11 years [as the Mail’s chief football correspondent] I thought it was the right time to try something different. It’s a chance to test myself again – not that the job doesn’t test you every day.

“When you are offered an opportunity like this it’s very difficult to turn down. Within about five minutes of being asked and once I’d got over the initial surprise, I was quickly getting into the idea.

“I’ll miss the banter of being on the circuit but there are a lot of guys I’m looking forward to spending more time working with in the office.”

These are exiting times for the Daily Mail with a significant expansion of the web site imminent. “It will be fascinating to be part of all this,” said Lawton who admitted his experience of working “inside” is almost zero.

He said: “The most production experience I’ve had was when I was on the Western Daily Press. We did everything. I wrote, I subbed and once a week I was stone sub.

“I’m not going to walk in on day one and draw a page. We have some very capable people to do that, though it is something I’ll have to learn so I can have more judgement about the pages.”

Lawton knows he has some of the industry’s finest sports writers to all upon, with Martin Samuel a multi award-winning columnist. In football and cricket, the sports that tend to generate the most back page leads, it is rare for the Daily Mail not to lead the way on the biggest stories and Lawton, a football correspondent who never lost his eye for an exclusive, will still be working with the reporters to bring stories to the pages.

He said: “I’ll be part of a team overseeing a very strong sports desk. We have brilliant writers and brilliant reporters.”

Lawton, who starts his new job next month, will still appear in the sports pages, but once every other month as opposed to virtually every day. He said: “There is a desire for me to do the occasional interview. I enjoy doing them and it would have been one side of the job I’d miss most of all. I like meeting new people…different sportsmen…and this is something the new job will allow me to do, maybe half a dozen a year.“

His experience on the road will help Lawton in his new position because the sharp end of a sports desk needs a combination of a top class production team plus those who have sampled life on the circuit.

He joins head of sport Lee Clayton and sports editor Les Snowdon as the major decision makers and said: “I think it can be of benefit to reporters to have somebody in a senior position on the desk who has been there, seen it and done it to work alongside the production guys.

“Lee is the perfect example of a former football writer who is a brilliant sports editor, the best I’ve ever had. With the different skills Lee and Les bring to running our department, I could not wish for two better teachers.”

And Lawton has been fortunate to work under “some terrific sports editors” during his career. He said: “Bill Beckett was my first at the Western Daily Press. At the Express I had David Emery, then at the Telegraph it was David Welch before Colin Gibson brought me to the Daily Mail.”

Tim Jotischky succeeded Gibson before Clayton and then Snowdon assumed control on the Daily Mail sports desk.

Lawton remains part of the most successful media organisation in what the former inhabitants still refer to as Fleet Street. At the 2012 Press Awards the Daily Mail won eight prizes, including Newspaper of the Year with Mail Online named best web site.

FWA Q&A: Barry Flatman

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BARRY FLATMAN, taking a trip along memory lane, on being called Colin…Chairman Ken going down…and a Big Apple hair-dryer from Fergie

Your first ever job in journalism?
Covering Hayes in the Isthmian League for the Middlesex Advertiser and Gazette. I started on the Monday and the following evening went to pre-season training. An extremely tall and muscular teenager in a woolly hat, who appeared to have been working on a building site all day, turned up to sign. His name was Cyrille Regis.

Have you ever worked in a profession other than journalism?
In between leaving school and going to college, I worked in a builders’ merchants. I realised it probably wasn’t my true vocation in life when somebody told me to go to stock-take the gravel.

Most memorable match?
It does rather date me, but the 1975 FA Cup Final. Being a Fulham man the memories are not particularly joyful and, unfairly I think now, a picture always forms in my mind of goalkeeper Peter Mellor almost waving the West Ham forwards through like a policeman directing traffic.

The one moment in football you would put on a DVD?
The night I was as Luton v Millwall [in 1985] when the rioting away fans ran onto the pitch and started hurling turf and anything else they could rip up at the press box where I and several other intrepid reporters were desperately trying to file copy down telephones. Perhaps it might have elicited a medal for bravery whilst under fire. Either that, or a moment in the Stamford Bridge foyer. Chelsea had just been relegated and their then chairman, Ken Bates, fancied purging a bit of malice on the gathered press corps. “Going back to your council houses then?,” asked Chairman Ken as he got into the lift. “Going down, Ken?” replied Joe Lovejoy, then of the Mail on Sunday just before the lift doors closed.

Best stadium?
Having primarily covered tennis for the last couple of decades, I have never experienced the luxury of the Emirates or the Etihad. Thinking back to my football writing days, for atmosphere it was hard to beat a big European night at White Hart Lane, but for sheer magnitude the Nou Camp (or Camp Nou if you like) is some place.

…and the worst?
These days I figure well down the pecking order of the Sunday Times’ match-list when there is no tennis and I am sent to football. I always cringe when I’m told the destination is Crystal Palace. Has that press box been updated since the days of Big Mal? Birmingham City is also pretty awful and so is Portsmouth, but of course they are skint.

Your personal new-tech disaster?
It was back in the days of the Tandy and those two muffler connections we had to strap to a telephone receiver. In a fit of temper, when I could not get the things to work, I wound the elastic fastener so tight it snapped and was made to pay for a new pair by then Express sports editor Ken Lawrence.

Biggest mistake?
It happened just the other week during the US Open when Sir Alex Ferguson gate-crashed Andy Murray’s press conference with Sir Sean Connery. I could be wrong, but he appeared to have had a glass or two of red wine and was very convivial. So I chanced a joke to him that it was the longest he’d spent talking to the press in years. At first he laughed but five minutes later in the corridor outside growled: “I’ll remember you.”

Have you ever been mistaken for anyone else?
For a while Graham Taylor always used to call me Colin. “How are you Colin? Nice to see you Colin. No, you cannot talk to that player Colin.” When I later pointed out the error to him, thinking he was having a Trigger-like problem from Only Fools and Horses (Rodney always being called Dave) he admitted to mixing me up with Colin Gibson [ex-Daily Telegraph football correspondent].

Most media friendly manager?
Tough one this because two stand out. Back in the day, you just couldn’t beat Jim Smith. Always helpful, regularly comical and more often than not an invitation into his office afterwards for a glass of something. The late Ray Harford was also a top bloke; he didn’t suffer fools but was always totally honest which couldn’t be said for some of his contemporaries.

Best ever player?
As a kid I used to love watching Rodney Marsh play, George Best was somebody really special and nobody, but nobody had the class of Bobby Moore. In a working capacity, the most naturally talented player I have regularly written about would have to be Gazza.

Best ever teams (club and international)?
Barcelona of the current day, and Brazil of 1970.

Best pre-match grub?
I don’t know about pre-match but you couldn’t beat the scones with jam and occasionally cream they used to serve during half-time at Craven Cottage.

Best meal had on your travels?
In terms of magnificent setting then it’s Doyles On The Beach, across the harbour from Sydney. But for great food then I make it a tie between Santopadres in Rome and Smith and Wollensky in New York.

…and the worst?
Now I like Chinese food in Britain. But in the Press Restaurant in Shanghai a few years back they served up things I wouldn’t feed to the dog that always used to chase me on my paper round.

Best hotel stayed in?
The Park Hyatt in Dubai. I walked into the suite I had been given and felt a compunction to ring reception to ask if there had been some kind of mistake…but I managed to fight off the urge.

…and the worst?
The Shinjuku Washington Hotel in Tokyo. Some might call the ability to touch all four walls whilst laying in bed – homely but I drew the line at pillows that seemed to be filled with pebbles.

Favourite football writer?
In terms of dedication to duty and being well informed then I don’t think you can beat Henry Winter of the Daily Telegraph. Of the younger breed I go for Tim Rich of The Guardian or Sam Wallace on The Independent.

Favourite radio/TV commentator?
Mike Ingham (radio) and Martin Tyler (TV). Both consummate professionals and very nice blokes in the bargain.

If you could introduce one change to improve PR between football clubs and football writers what would it be?
In tennis the press are still regarded as part of the sport rather than aliens. We are allowed to mix with the players and are therefore on first name terms with megastars like Nadal, Federer and Murray. I appreciate it is asking the impossible in today’s football but it would be a reversion to the way things were back in my days of football scuffling. I don’t expect perpetually open doors to the press at training grounds or players’ lounges but football writers should be not be regarded as a huge threat.

One sporting event outside football you would love to experience?
Being at the Ryder Cup when Europe made that astonishing comeback or watching Usain Bolt win gold.

Last book read?
Reelin’ In The Years by Mark Radcliffe…a thoroughly entertaining read for somebody of my advanced age who has always liked music but admits to being completely non-plussed when somebody called Example entered the Fulham press room.

Favourite current TV programme?
Much to my family’s dismay, whenever at home I tend to get engrossed with Sunday Supplement. Then I get annoyed at Sky Sports for not having a tennis chat programme so I could pick up the same fees.

Your most prized football memorabilia?
The match programme from Aston Villa beating Bayern Munich in the 1982 European Cup final signed by all the players. They were the good old days when the press were allowed to go out and celebrate with those who did it on the pitch.

Advice to anyone coming into the football media world?
Honestly, I would struggle to advise any youngster wanting to come into the football media world on the ground floor when I see so many hugely talented and experienced writers being thrown out of the top storey because newspapers are trying to save money and see such professionals as dispensable.

Barry Flatman is the Sunday Times’ Tennis Correspondent and has been on the tennis tour for 20 years. Before that he was a football scuffler for the Daily Express. He decided to give up front-line football reporting because “I got pissed off with George Graham being so unhelpful and the likes of Eric Hall and Jerome Anderson telling me I couldn’t speak to their players because the Sun paid them more money.”

CONFESSIONS OF THE FOOTBALL WRITERS

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www.footballwriters.co.uk is one year old next week. We take a look back at some of the revelations in the popular Q&A section.

By CHRISTOPHER DAVIES

THE IDEA was to learn more about the football writers who spend their lives searching for stories that players, clubs and administrators would rather not be made public.

We have tried to lift the veil a little on those whose duty it is, lap-top and wi-fi permitting, to give readers their daily fix of news, match reports and columns.

Her Majesty’s working press, as we are called (by ourselves) are, of course, strictly neutral when it comes to reporting. To the extent many members of the Football Writers’ Association use their journalistic skills to disguise which team they support. John Cross of the Daily Mirror was giving nothing away, as four answers from his Q&A confirm:

Most media friendly manager?
Arsene Wenger. Never dodges a question, has always been respectful. A special mention for Sammy Lee and the late, great George Armstrong. Two gems. George Armstrong would give me a lift home after Arsenal reserve games!

Best ever player?
Thierry Henry gets my vote as player seen/covered live. We also forget how good Cesc Fabregas is.

Best ever teams (club and international)?
Arsenal – Invincibles; Spain – glorious to watch

Best pre-match grub?
Arsenal – fantastic food!

Laura Williamson of the Daily Mail gave us a clue about her allegiance with the one moment she would put on a DVD. She said: “Kevin Donovan’s goal for Grimsby Town against Northampton Town at Wembley in 1998, which took the Mariners back up to the old Division One. I had a dismal haircut and my face painted in black and white stripes, but they were certainly good times.”

They would be even better, Laura, if you were to send me a photo of your dodgy barnet and stripey face, which I promise would not be put on the site – you know you can trust me.

Laura’s Daily Mail colleague, football news correspondent Neil Ashton, gave footballwriters.co.uk an exclusive about his finest playing achievement. Ashton revealed: “It was when Steve Coppell turned to me and said: ‘You’re on’ in Geoff Thomas’s benefit game at the Colosseum between Crystal Palace and Manchester United in 2006.

“To play in the same team as my boyhood heroes – Geoff, Mark Bright, Ian Wright and Andy Gray and to play centre-half against Mark Hughes – was something I didn’t imagine could ever happen.

“Shaun Custis from the Sun was on the phone the next day and he said: ‘Right, you’ve got two minutes to tell me everything and then I never want to hear another word about it again.’

“Somehow I forgot to tell him I had clapped the Palace supporters in the Holmesdale Road when I walked off the pitch – unfortunately for me it has now become part of Matt Lawton’s entertaining dinner party stories.”

OK Matt, table for eight next Sunday evening? The after-dinner speaker taken care of.

Like Ashton, there is every reason to suspect The Guardian’s Dominic Fifield is also a Crystal Palace supporter. In Fifield’s view “Zinedine Zidane just edges out Vince Hilaire” as the best player he’s ever seen. Who’s third, Dom? Gerry Queen or Lionel Messi?

Football writers appear regularly on television these days and have become mini (in some cases mega or micro) celebrities. Yet as freelance Sam Pilger, who wrote the book Manchester United’s Best XI revealed, we can still be mistaken for someone else. In Pilger’s case it was Ryan Giggs and he got his retaliation in first when he told us: “As ridiculous as it sounds, I took part in a penalty shootout challenge against Peter Shilton on Hackney Marshes several years ago. I overheard someone say: ‘Is that Ryan Giggs?’

“As I said, ridiculous. More realistically, someone once asked if I was the former Leicester and Spurs American goalkeeper Kasey Keller.”

Daniel Taylor, The Guardian’s football correspondent, went one better and inadvertently mistook himself for a Manchester City goalscorer.

Taylor confessed: “I’d like to think the copytakers were to blame but, freelancing in pre-Guardian days, my match report of a Manchester City game for The Sun began with the words ‘Daniel Taylor scored a last-minute winner . . .’

“Clearly, it should have been Gareth Taylor. Though I’d argue that we had a similar first touch.”

You may struggle to find a seconder for that, Danny.

The Sun’s Neil Custis has built up a reputation as one of the best news reporters in Manchester and rarely gets a story wrong. But in the FWA confessional box, Custis came clean about the mother of all mistaken identities.

He said: “I thought I was talking to Kevin Francis from the Daily Star on the phone when in fact it was Kevin Francis, a man mountain of a striker for Stockport County. It is fair to say their builds and lifestyle are contrasting (No problem with a seconder there, Neil – Ed) so when Kevin told me the delay of two months in ringing me back was because he had been teaching kids football in the Caribbean, you can imagine my response.

“It was: ‘F*** off, you’re having a laugh, aren’t you? How the hell can you teach kids football?’

“This continued for some time before the penny finally dropped on my side. I don’t think we ever spoke again.”

Rob Shepherd rarely does things by halves so it was no surprise that he said he has been a serial victim of mistaken identities. Shepherd said he has “frequently” been mistaken for other people. Are you sitting comfortably?

Start copy: “Morrisey, Quentin Tarantino (at a poolside bar in Antigua….and I strung the guy along for an hour), James May (once), Jeremy Clarkson (often), Bert Millichip (by a limo driver in Las Vegas), Eric Joyce MP (the other day) and Desperate Dan (even by my two sons).”

Shep may not shave with a blow-torch, but the hair dryer treatment was given to Shaun Custis, now The Sun’s chief football writer, when he “excitedly” told Sir Alex Ferguson that “I was a new football reporter on The People and looked forward to working with him.”

The feeling did not appear to be mutual. Custis, whose excitement soon turned to trepidation, said: “He replied that he hated the paper and everybody on it and that he would get me a job in Glasgow where his mate was the sports editor. He said if I didn’t take the job he would have nothing more to do with me and he’s pretty much stuck to his word.”

FWA members have been fortunate enough to dine in some of the world’s finest restaurants and Oliver Kay, The Times’ football correspondent, added a rare moment of romance to the site when he said: “The best meal on a work trip was probably at the River Café in Brooklyn. Fantastic food, but probably above all because I’d flown my wife out to join me in New York at the end of a pre-season trip. If I’d gone there with a group of journalists, we would only have ended up talking shop.”

Eat your heart out George Clooney.

But it is not all caviar and champagne, especially in parts of Eastern Europe. David Lacey, the former football correspondent of The Guardian, remembers a meal in Albania “where the steak came last in the 3.30 at Tirana.”

Ian Ridley, author and chairman of high-riding St Albans City (fifth in the Evo-Stik League Southern), said his worst ever meal was: “Probably in Poland. Glenn Hoddle said he had picked a team there because it was ‘horses for courses.’ David Lacey pointed out that in Poland, it was horses for main courses.”

Philippe Auclair, France Football’s correspondent in England, claimed the belief that you can never have a bad meal in his homeland is wide of the mark. “Try Auxerre’s sandwiches,” he said, making it sound more like a challenge than a recommendation. “They might change your views on French cuisine.”

FWA life member James Mossop probably wins the prize for the most unusual meal which surprisingly was also the best meal he’s had on his travels. He said: “The late Bobby Keetch once ordered peacock’s tongues for me in Paris. At least, he said that’s what they were.”
Auxerre’s dodgy sarnies suddenly appear more attractive.

Of course, it is not just the food that makes for a memorable meal – the company and table chat are as important. Cathal Dervan, sports editor of the Irish Sun, will never forget an evening in Holland with two English colleagues not known for holding back with their views.

Dervan said: “My most memorable meal is a visit to an Argentinean steak-house in Amsterdam before an England game against Holland when Rob Shepherd and Joe Lovejoy discussed the Falklands War at length. I was waiting for the chef to carve them up any minute.”

While football writers are paid to do what other people pay to do, most started with more humble jobs. Dave Kidd, The People’s chief sports writer, began his working career by “stacking shelves in Superdrug as a student.”

But Kidd was too good to be left on the shelves. He said he “rose through the ranks to be in charge of loo roll, nappies and sanitary products…power probably went to my head.”

The Sunday Mirror’s Matt Law was involved in newspapers from a young age. “I was a paperboy,” he said and with an eye for easy money “also once volunteered to clean the school for extra cash, but I was sacked for mopping the ceiling.”

James Ducker, the northern football correspondent of The Times, is unlikely to give up his day job. And if he does Robbie Williams has little to worry about. Recounting his most embarrassing moment, Ducker said: “I was working at the MEN [Manchester Evening News] when the news editor suggested I should ‘audition’ for Pop Stars, one of the predecessors to X-Factor, and write a story on it for the next day’s paper.

“I’ve the worst voice imaginable, so I was torn between trying to sing a notoriously tough ballad while giving the impression that I thought I was really good like a lot of lunatics on those shows do, or just doing something silly. In the end I did a chicken dance while singing Jingle Bells in front of Pete Waterman and Geri Halliwell. She didn’t even laugh. She just looked at me with complete contempt.”

Taxi for Ducker…

He added: “They later rang me up to request permission to use the ‘footage’ on the highlights package but, regrettably or thankfully, I’m not sure which, my one shot at stardom never aired.”

James, the vote was a unanimous “thankfully.”

Daily Mirror columnist Steve Anglesey also had a brush with the music world which ensured he was destined never to become Gordon Ramsay II. Anglesey said: “I worked as a chef in Manchester’s (in)famous Hacienda nightclub in the mid-1980s.

“I walked out one megabusy Saturday night when, after the manageress had left me alone for two hours so she could go dancing with her mates, she returned to tell me that Spear Of Destiny had complained their chips weren’t brown enough.”

The passion Lee Clayton, the Daily Mail’s head of sport, has for his job and profession came over in his Q&A when he remembered how he learned from one of the industry’s doyens during his early days. Talking about his favourite football writer, Clayton said: “Alex Montgomery was my chief football writer on The Sun and he wrote match reports that were about the football.

“It was a pleasure to sit next to him in press boxes and listen to him dictating live reports to copytakers with his soft Scottish voice. He taught a young and very raw junior a lot on those nights. He also had a dignity and a presence that all football correspondents should have (and many do).

“I do think there are some brilliant writers around now. And they all work for the Daily Mail. Well, most of them do. I’m very lucky to have an amazing team who can write with intelligence, insight and authority. There is an art to good match reporting on tight deadlines.”

Exciting as the job is, it is not without its dangers. We all have tales of lap-tops malfunctioning (and why is it ALWAYS on deadline?) but the Daily Telegraph’s Mark Ogden had a more sinister problem.

The one moment in football Oggie would like to have on a DVD would have been at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. He explained: “The guy who nicked my lap-top bag – lap-top still in it – outside a bar in Cape Town during the World Cup. Strictly speaking, not football, but he left me without a lap-top for the World Cup quarter-final between Germany and Argentina, so thanks for that.”

Guillem Balague, who does such a fine job on Sky Sports’ coverage of Spanish football, was the intended victim of two lap-top thieves in the middle of a radio broadcast, but forever the professional he stayed calm and carried on talking.

Balague said: “I was in Soho doing a live interview for Spanish radio, a show called El Larguero which has 1.3 million listeners. I was chatting to the presenter and the chairman of Real Madrid. I was on the phone referring to notes that were in my computer when two guys tried to snatch my lap-top. I ran away from them and was almost out of breath, still on air. I didn’t want to explain what was going on…”

And finally, Nigel Clarke of the Daily Express, a football writer who has multi-tasked by covering tennis, told of his biggest mistake. And in all honesty, they don’t really come much bigger.

The man known as Fonz tried to convince us that he did not have a happy day when he “walked into the ladies locker room at Wimbledon.”

Clarke’s intentions were entirely honourable and professional, of course. He said: “I was assisting an injured player who had turned her ankle, only to be confronted with about 10 naked tennis players, who stood their ground. Averted eyes and exited left very quickly.”

Hands up all who believe he (a) averted his eyes and (b) exited left very quickly.

I see no hands…