Читать книгу Totally Frank: The Autobiography of Frank Lampard - Frank Lampard - Страница 8

MOVING out of Mum and Dad’s house was like being given the keys to a new world. I decided that I should be more independent. I could afford to buy a flat and when I found the right place I took the plunge. It was more a case of doing what I thought I should than what I really wanted. I was very comfortable at home. I enjoyed having my family around. Some of my mates were in their own place though and it seemed like the right thing to do. It was. Well, I thought it was. I quickly found that instead of gaining freedom I had a lot more time on my hands. I could do whatever I wanted. I just wasn’t sure what that was.

At first, I did what I knew best and went back to Mum and Dad’s house. Ate there and hung out with my sisters. After a few weeks I actually moved back there for a few days because I was so lonely. Mum didn’t say anything. She knew what was going on and that I needed to get it out of my system. I drove back to the flat in Woodford Green and decided to get my mates round. I was bored. I didn’t really know why. Suddenly *** the restrictions which had governed my whole life didn’t exist. No more ‘Where ‘you going and what ‘you doing?’ I was a bit lost without Dad’s third degree every time I opened the door to go out.

A lot of my mates lived close by: Sam – who we call Tel – Billy Jenkins, Alan (Alex), Finny, Banger (Mike), and HK (Sam). Good lads. Most of them went to a rival school but we had got together when we were about 15 and bonded. I phoned them and would get them round to watch the football on a Sunday. It was the natural thing to do. There was no one else there, I wanted company, and the lads were up for watching the game. It didn’t seem so bad then. We would have a laugh and muck around and for the first time in my life I was doing the things that most people my age were doing. I was having a life. A life outside of my job. Outside of football.

In the evening we would pop down the pub and have a couple of drinks. The place was heaving with people squeezing the last out of their weekend. If there was no midweek game I would be off on Monday. Now and again I would feel like my weekend was still in full flow. So we would go to a club and have a few more beers, talk to some girls and stay out late.

I never did it directly before a game. I was up for it but I wasn’t stupid. It was always Saturday after a game, or Sunday, or maybe early in the week. I think most young players go through it. I wouldn’t say it’s good for you but it’s necessary. It’s not until you realize you’re not training as well as you should be that the effect kicks in. You just can’t train to the same level if your body is tired and still trying to get rid of the booze from the night before. I don’t mind admitting it, I realize that it wasn’t the best idea for my career but for me it was something I had never had experience of. My childhood and youth were not the same as most people’s.

Some go out with their mates when they are 15. They hang around a shopping centre or the local park and get a can of beer from somewhere and experiment with drinking. There were a couple of occasions when I did that towards the end of my schooldays but they were very rare. Mum and Dad were strict. They always wanted to know where I was going and why, and point out that I had training. I didn’t need the constant reminder. Some of my mates were going down the route of taking their social life seriously but I was already on the road to becoming a footballer and there was nothing I wanted more than that. That’s partly why it was such a liberating feeling to get my own place. No one to stop me going out or having my mates around me whenever I wanted.

The lads could do whatever they pleased. As a footballer I couldn’t. But there were times when I would drink on a Sunday to blank out what had happened at the game the day before. It was a release for me, especially at times when I was taking so much stick and would be very down about West Ham. When the lads came round and had a drink I would be at ease again. We’d talk about everything and anything other than the game and I relaxed, de-stressed. I had to go through it and realize for myself that there are right times to do it and times that you don’t. I want to go out and I still do now. The difference is recognizing the right time to do it. You have to know your body.

People remark that I’ve played 164 games consecutively and that I don’t rest for matches. How do I do it? I live well, I eat well, I rest well but I still like to go out for a few beers with the lads after a game or in a week when there’s no match. It’s about balance but sometimes to find the balance you have to overdo it and that’s what I did when I moved away from home.

I went through the same thing as most at that age though the experience was slightly different as a footballer. I would get recognized. When Rio and I went out it was unavoidable but it was nice. We earned good money and we got attention. We got into clubs easy and we could get our mates in as well. It was a good feeling. We had the money to do it. We could go out every night if we wanted. I had my freedom and I wanted to explore. It was a whole new experience for me, something that I had been aware of through my mates without ever feeling a part of it. Maybe I threw myself into it too much. For a while, I was at the centre of it and was happy to be there. I had to learn and that was the only way.

On occasion I would overdo it. Just like anyone else, a few too many could lead to embarrassing incidents. I had a particularly late Saturday night/Sunday morning after a game. We had won and I was up for enjoying myself. I slept it off for a few hours but was still feeling pretty rough and decided to call my agent, Steve Kutner, for something.

I had known Kutner since I was 18. Dad dealt with him when West Ham were trying to buy Steve Bould from Arsenal. Kutner had represented Bouldy who was interested in making the move to Upton Park. Though the transfer never materialized, something about the way Kutner had handled himself impressed Dad. I didn’t have an agent at the time and was looking to appoint one so Dad and I met Kutner at the Swallow Hotel near Chadwell Heath.

The three of us talked and I began to understand the importance of having a really good agent to look after you. Kutner made a lot of sense. He wasn’t pushy or flash. His company is very small and he specializes in dealing with his clients’ every need. I see young players now signing up to agencies which have 200 other guys on the books because they think that’s impressive. I have also seen players get terrible advice from their agents because the underlying motive was not to do what was best for the player’s career. With Kutner, I don’t just have the best agent in the business, I also have a very good and loyal friend. There is no conflict of interest either because we became mates after we had a business arrangement. Some players employ a friend as their agent, and this I think is asking for trouble. I would hate to feel I was getting bad advice from a mate, never mind a mate who also happened to be handling my business and career. I have disagreements with Kutner and he with me but I can be absolutely sure that the end result is what is best for me without either of us feeling compromised. I know where I stand with Kuts though and so does he – side by side. Some people find him a little odd when they first meet him. He is very individual, can dress embarrassingly, is quite eccentric, and is often disarmingly blunt. However, I felt that I could trust him and that was the most important thing for me.

At the time in question, he had a routine of playing tennis with George Graham every Sunday morning. George was manager of Spurs and at this particular time, I was playing well and Spurs were interested enough in me to have started talking to West Ham about a transfer fee. George had just upped his offer for me to over £5 million. I dialled Kutner’s mobile number and started to recount the events of the night before. I must have sounded a bit hazy. And loud. Normally, he would shout back at me, slag me off or whatever but on this occasion he was very quiet. After a couple of minutes I realized that he had cut me off. I wasn’t bothered. But I should have been.

Kutner called me back a few hours later.

‘You sobered up yet?’ he asked.

‘Yeah. Why?’

‘When you called me this morning George Graham was sitting in my car and you were on speakerphone. It didn’t make for good listening to a manager who has just bid over five million quid for you.’

‘Oh s***. Did he know it was me?’

‘Thankfully I realized it was you and cut you off. George was all right. He just said “Stevie. Who the hell was that?” but I told him it was one of my music industry mates who’d obviously been on the lash.’

I came off the phone feeling sick. And a bit stupid. It was one of those things but it wasn’t one of the things I wanted to be happening on a regular basis. To be a successful footballer means being in the right place at the right time. I hadn’t even arrived yet. Kutner didn’t give me a lecture. He didn’t have to. I knew from his tone of voice he wasn’t impressed. He still loves telling the story and I have even heard him tell it to George. Thankfully, George regrets not getting me for £5 million but the whole episode reminds me of the thin line between success and failure.

Sometimes you have to learn the hard way. Being a footballer means you have to live your life by a different rule book to most other people. There are things you can and can’t do because of the demands of the job and others which you need to be aware of because of the rules of celebrity.

I have always been very conscious about my health and fitness but when I went on my first lads’ holiday I was oblivious to the second. I went to Ayia Napa in Cyprus with Jamie when I was 17 and our group was pretty sensible – though I had to assure Mum that Stan Collymore wasn’t with us!

Back in 1996 Ayia Napa was the place to go if you were young and wanted a laugh. I wasn’t disappointed and went back five years on the trot. When I went with Jamie I was completely unknown. There was no pressure of people coming up and asking for autographs. I was just a kid and in complete awe of everything.

In the following years Tel, Billy and I went there together. Then it was just Rio and I, but we weren’t big-hitters at the time. I had played Under-21s and we had both made our West Ham debuts by then but we were still well below the radar in terms of being hassled. We certainly weren’t the target of any tabloids – just two young lads enjoying our holiday the same as anyone else.

Rio, Tel and Billy returned the year after and had a good week but I was shocked a few days after I got home when a girl I had met there sold a story to a newspaper. It was embarrassing. I was 19 and had gone on holiday and I had done what every lad my age was doing but it’s not the kind of thing you want your Mum and Dad to be reading over Sunday breakfast.

It jolted me but I was naive and Ayia Napa was the place to go and the place I knew best. I should have gone somewhere else because it had very much become the destination of choice for young footballers. I’m not sure if the Premier League had started running package tours but you saw so many faces on the beach and in the main square it certainly felt like it.

Inevitably, anywhere the cream of England’s young football talent go to let their hair down will also be infested by the dregs of the scandal sheets. Lads having a laugh, having a few beers in a venue where the girls are doing the same. In retrospect, it was the ultimate honey trap and therefore only a matter of time before there would be a sting.

For our next visit in 2000 I was on my toes a little and at the beginning of the week I was nervous when we were in bars and when people came up to our group because they recognized us. But of course I became more comfortable and more relaxed after a couple of drinks and joined in the holiday spirit. I was out one night with a couple of mates and another lad who was someone we had met as part of another group of friends.

We met some girls and worked our way from a bar to a club and then back to one of our hotel rooms. We were mucking around having a laugh getting carried away on the booze and the freedom of being on holiday. Clothes were discarded and we were fooling around. I didn’t think much of it and in that kind of situation I think most people just go with the flow.

Then I realized that the guy who we knew less well had produced a camcorder and was doing a running commentary of jokes. Well, it seemed funny at the time. Though we were all tired and hung over the next day, by the time we got out in the sun we were winding each other up about the night before. There was no fear of any consequences, no worries because we hadn’t done anything wrong.

We flew home a couple of days later having enjoyed ourselves and I went to the Punch and Judy pub in Covent Garden the following Saturday to meet with Tel and couple of the lads for some lunch. We had just finished eating when Dad called me. His voice seemed a bit panicked but I couldn’t make out what he was saying for the noise. I went outside and what he told me was the last thing I wanted to hear.

He explained that a newspaper had a copy of the video from the night in Ayia Napa and were running a story the following day. Dad was angry and disappointed.

‘How could you be so stupid?’ he said. How could I.

My knees had buckled and I felt sick. I was shocked and didn’t know what to make of the information. I called Kuts who explained that a video of the night we spent in Ayia Napa had been bought by the News of the World and that myself, Rio and Kieron Dyer – who had been filmed in different incidents – were the subject of a story due to break the next day.

I felt so stupid. And humiliated. I didn’t have to ask how bad it might look. I was there in the room and I knew. Now the whole country was about to find out as well. It was a nightmare. I tried to prepare myself for the shame of putting myself and my family in such an awful position.

When the paper dropped next morning it was actually worse than I had expected. Not only had they described everything in detail (with pictures as well) but they had also taken a moral stance claiming that we had been ‘disrespecting and degrading women’. That was absolute rubbish. No one had done anything they didn’t want to. I hadn’t done anything illegal. I was a single young lad who was the victim of someone else’s greed for money and the public’s appetite for salacious scandal.

It was all very predictable. Any story about footballers and their behaviour had to contain a negative and sinister slant. It was too much to expect even-handed treatment, though I found their tone a bit rich for a newspaper with their weekly content. Unfortunately, I was in no position to throw stones.

The rest of the press jumped on the bandwagon and for a week everyone had their say about me, about footballers, and about the disintegration of polite society. It all seemed wildly over the top to me but I had no voice to defend myself because I was there on tape and therefore open to accusation.

It was all very tacky and I have never felt so humiliated in all my life. I felt sick from the embarrassment, and experienced gut-wrenching, stomach-churning nausea for days. Dad was right. How could I have been so stupid? I didn’t want to be tagged as an irresponsible young reprobate. It wasn’t me. I wanted to be a decent person and for people to regard me as a young player with a good reputation and a bright future.

I wasn’t brought up to be the person who had been vilified in newsprint. I’d made an error of judgement in a situation where I should have been more aware of the possible consequences. I was disappointed with myself and have never felt so low.

Facing Mum was the worst. The whole thing was the most mortifying combination of events I think any son could present to his mother. She wasn’t angry, just very hurt.

‘You’ve let us down, Frank, but more than anything you’ve let yourself down,’ she said. ‘This isn’t you. It’s not the way you behave and it’s things like this that send the career of a young footballer into the gutter and down the drain.’

I was motionless. There were tears running down my face and even though there were a million things racing around my head I couldn’t bring myself to speak. I knew she was right. She felt the brunt of the shame. I’d let her down badly – her and my sisters, my nan and grandad.

I knew from football that some of the best lessons are those you glean from mistakes and now I had to do the same in my life. I should never have put myself in such a compromising situation and in retrospect I should never even have been in Ayia Napa. Needless to say I haven’t returned.

It was my first real taste of the damage the papers can do and how ruthless they can be. I’m pleased now that I can talk about it as being such a long time ago without the possibility of anything similar being thrown at me. My bad experience with the press didn’t end there, however. Worse, it raised its ugly head again around one of the most infamous days in modern history, 11 September 2001.

Reports of the terrorist atrocities that were taking place in New York began to filter through just as we were preparing to start training that morning. There was no way of realizing what was actually happening at that moment and when we returned to the dressing room afterwards there was a tension about what we might discover.

Some of the staff were very upset and when I found out the extent of what had happened I left Harlington immediately and spent the rest of the day in a horrified trance watching the news channels and trying to comprehend what was going on. I got a call from the club telling me that our UEFA Cup game which was scheduled for later in the week was likely to be called off but that I should report for training as usual.

The world was still in shock and the roads were noticeably quieter when I made my way towards the training ground which is adjacent to Heathrow Airport. The sombre atmosphere was made worse when Ranieri told me that my blood test had shown a low iron count and that I was being given the day off. I hate not training, especially when I really needed to focus on something else to take my mind off other things.

I got in the car, called my mate Billy and drove east around the M25 to his house. We went for a run for an hour and when we got back I had a message from Eidur to say that everyone had been given Thursday off and some of the boys were going out for lunch.

Billy and I met them in the pub down the road from the training ground but by the time we got there, JT, Jody, Eidur, and Frank Sinclair were already finishing up their food. We stayed and had a couple of drinks before moving off to another pub. You don’t have to travel far to find one around the village so we settled down at a table and ordered some beers.

There was nothing unusual about the place. There were some other people in there eating and having a drink and while the general atmosphere was still touched by tragedy, everything seemed normal enough. We were getting more in the mood and with each round I suppose the noise level was rising. I doubt very much that we were the only people in the country who were looking for an outlet that day even if we chose the wrong way.

The company got more boisterous and we were itching for a change of scene so we moved on. Perhaps we should have decided to call it a day – especially when one of the lads got a tip to say that we were being followed by someone from the press. Unfortunately, we had gone beyond the stage where good sense was the obvious choice.

We breezed through another bar before deciding to head for the Holiday Inn just off the M4 exit for Heathrow. It was just after 5 o’clock and we had been at it for a few hours. They had Sky News on in the corner and some people were sat around waiting for answers the same as the rest of the world. I don’t imagine our entrance was graceful but we found a table away from the main area where we could carry on with the banter without affecting anyone else. We ordered some food and drink and were in the mood to have a laugh.

It was the wrong decision, a stupid thing to do on the day after so many people had lost their lives in America. I look back now and I realize how naive it was to put ourselves in that situation. There is no excuse. As high-profile footballers it was a very bad idea to go out drinking at such a sensitive time.

However, I can honestly say that we did not at any point abuse any Americans who were in that bar. We didn’t shout at them or moon at them. The most we were guilty of was being loud and a bit rowdy but we kept ourselves to ourselves. Of course, that was not how it appeared in the press.

Two days later we were called to a meeting in the gym at the training ground by the managing director of the club, Colin Hutchinson. The News of the World had taken details of the story, including ‘witness’ statements about us, to the club. Colin was waiting for us with a reporter and photographer from the paper and told us that we were being fined two weeks’ wages for breaking club rules.

He also explained that the reporter was there to get our side of the story so that we would at least have the opportunity to defend ourselves in print. What a joke. We went through what happened in the knowledge that it didn’t look good but in the hope that at least some of it might be printed. Some of it was – anything which incriminated us and helped stand up their ‘version’ from their ‘eyewitnesses’.

The pictures were even better. Each of those published had us looking like convicted criminals – I had been whacked in the eye at training earlier in the week and the bruise had coloured just nicely to make me look particularly guilty. The story was followed up by the inevitable wave of condemnation about footballers and the shame and disgrace of it all.

I knew, because no one felt more shame than I did. To compound my misery I received a call from Sven-Goran Eriksson a few days later to tell me that I would not be considered for the upcoming England squad for the World Cup qualifying matches. He explained that the FA had instructed him that I was not to be picked but that he would speak to me again after all the furore had blown over.

I was angry and upset that I had allowed myself to get into the position where my reputation had been damaged and now my career was suffering as well. I was very down but made a promise to myself that I would come back better and stronger for the experience. The world had painted a very negative picture of me and I was determined to show what I was really like.

Kutner has always been around to remind me when I have needed reminding. When he tells me something it’s what he thinks – no bullshit, no flam. It’s for my benefit and the good of my career. Over the years I have learned to know what’s best for me whether it’s to do with football or life but I have been greatly helped by the people around me. When I go out now I know instinctively if it’s right. Part of the reason I play so many games is knowing when and how much to do it. Some players drink to excess and I have seen the results of that along my career. Others won’t touch a drop and not eat food they’re not supposed to. I eat well but I am not obsessive about food. I still eat what I want without being overly fussy.

Finding the balance is the crucial thing. That takes time and I was still learning where to draw the line back then. My football was not going as well as I would have liked. The 98/99 season was a good season, but not for scoring goals. Six was not a great return. The season before had gone well because I had established myself as a player. People always said the second would be harder – harder physically, mentally, harder just to get better.

It wasn’t as exciting as my first. The goals wouldn’t come and partly because of that I felt a bit deflated. There was a lot to be happy about around the club though. We had a very good team. Myself, Rio, John Hartson, Eyal Berkovic were all playing well. People still say to me that if West Ham had kept that team together then maybe the club would have won a trophy. Trevor Sinclair was doing well while Michael Carrick and Joe Cole were just coming through, but it was a strange campaign. We were middle to bottom of the table usually. Then that season we found ourselves climbing up and up. We drew confidence and we became something of a force to be reckoned with. Well, at home anyway.

There was a good blend in the team in that period and we had some good characters too. The older lads were still there – Lomy, John Moncur and the likes but Neil Ruddock came in as well and there was a strength about us which I hadn’t known before. There was also a creative heart.

I am not Berkovic’s biggest fan as a person but he was a good player and I enjoyed playing with him. You just had to give the ball to his feet and he would slip people in on goal. He was adept at it and he was in that sort of form that year. Paolo Di Canio had been shown the door at Sheffield Wednesday and when he turned it on we were exciting to watch. We ended up coming fifth and that was a huge achievement for West Ham. You only had to remember that it was as far back as 85/86 that the club had come third, long before any of us were on the scene. After that we were a bit of a yo-yo team: relegated, back up, relegated, back up.

Harry deserves credit. We were on the verge of another drop into the First Division but he had the vision to sign unusual players. Di Canio, Berkovic, Davor Suker. Not many people have the kind of eye for a player that Harry has. He’s still doing it. Maybe it was a loan signing of a player who was getting on and no one else wanted – players who may have looked unconventional to others; too young or just too much trouble. Harry, though, had a way of harnessing all kinds of talent.

He got it wrong on a few occasions. Dmitri Raducioiu, Ilie Dumitrescu and Paolo Futre come to mind but Harry was in a position where he was taking chances on people and the law of averages dictated that not every one would be brilliant. The problem with those particular guys was they had made their name in the game already and their hunger and desire was gone. When some of them rented apartments in Chelsea Harbour, when we trained about an hour and half’s drive in the opposite direction, you began to question exactly why they had come to play in London. I don’t think they knew what they were signing up to at West Ham. We were more about spirit than silky soccer and there were a few characters around who were strong and liked to assert themselves. It couldn’t have been comfortable to land at Chadwell Heath after a few years in the sunshine of Spain or Portugal.

To be fair to Harry, the chairman probably threw those guys in his face when he wanted to moan but the bottom line was that he got it right far more times than wrong. And, he didn’t pay a fortune for players either. Slaven Bilic and Igor Stimac gave us experience at the back as did Neil Ruddock.

Razor Ruddock was important as much for his character as his football. He was our social secretary and was brilliant at getting the right place for a game of golf, followed by lunch and then a night out. He was also a great laugh.

Razor could mix with anyone – whether it was the older lads, me and Rio or the foreign boys. He was hilarious even when he didn’t mean to be. At training we would do one-on-one and he would have Joe Cole running at him full pelt with the ball. He was slowing down so he would just back off. And off and off. Eventually, Joe was so close to goal that he would shoot from six yards and the rest of us were bent double laughing.

Ian Wright was another one. Wrighty had done his time, scored goals and broken the records when he arrived at West Ham. He didn’t have anything to prove and didn’t need to practise. He did anyway and I was glad of his professionalism. I would be heading out to hit a hundred balls and he would come with me and advise me on free-kicks and how to strike a ball best. He was 33 then and Roger Cross would clip balls in from wide areas for us to hit at goal. I have a lot of respect for Wrighty and I’m a lot sharper around the box partly thanks to his tips and watching his movement off the ball.

There were others whose careers had been thwarted by injury and Harry had faith in them. Trevor Sinclair was one. Everyone remembered Trevor as a brilliant winger with Queens Park Rangers who was unlucky enough to sustain serious injury. He came to us and got fit again but there was something about Harry which instilled confidence in Trevor and very quickly he became a major influence on the right wing and as second striker. I got on great with him. He was quite laid back and there were also no airs and graces about him. With some players I could detect a reluctance to get too close to me because of my Dad and Harry. Trevor never bothered with that. We would come in after training and he’d say ‘Tell your Dad he’s put on a s*** session there, Lamps!’

I loved it. It was very refreshing. He treated everyone with the same boisterous banter and didn’t care much how they reacted though I rarely found anyone who could resist his company. There was one year at the team Christmas party when we started off in a bar in Romford and were due to end the night in a club. On the way between the two Trevor decided we should stop off for a swift drink in another pub. I didn’t see why not – even though we were in fancy dress. I’m not sure what we looked like when we burst into this place but I’m sure I could feel the proverbial tumbleweed follow us through the door. Trevor didn’t give a monkey’s. He ordered some drinks and invited everyone in the bar to join us in a song.

After twenty minutes, the whole place was in great voice being led by West Ham’s right-winger who was decked from head to foot in ‘neon pick’ Seventies’ gear, the likes of which Huggy Bear from Starsky and Hutch would have been proud. We crashed out of there, pissing ourselves with laughter, but that was Trevor – infectious and fun to be with. We needed people like that at West Ham to galvanize the team spirit. Harry knew that and he delivered. He also brought stars. Paolo Di Canio was probably the biggest in terms of impact of all his West Ham signings and Upton Park was a place which any Premiership team would have worried about visiting that season.

The difference was we had never played without suffering before. We always seemed to be struggling with players some of whom may not have quite been up to standard. The quality was quite good enough and there were a lot of battlers in midfield – guys like Martin Allen and Paul Butler. Good players who were not always easy on the eye. Ian Bishop could get on the ball but the team were suffering and so did he. The fans were impatient and wanted a more direct style of play which Bish didn’t subscribe to.

Lomas came in, I did, Berkovic and Sinclair. Lomy would hold, I would get up and down while Berkovic would link it together. There was a confidence about the team and the pattern we established. We could play. We were actually quite upset that we didn’t do enough to qualify for UEFA Cup automatically and we went to the Intertoto instead.

I had proved a lot of people wrong in my first season and in the second season I put myself under a lot of pressure to do better. The team had improved but I found things quite difficult. It had been easy to see the difference the year before. I had looked and felt comfortable on the ball. Maybe it wasn’t as discernible. The leap was not as obvious and from the outside I wondered if it looked as bad as it felt. There had been a freedom about running forward the season before, which had seen me score goals. My legs were light and at times I just knew I was going to get on the end of something.