Читать книгу Goals to Gold - Lee Sandford - Страница 22

It wasn’t altogether a bad time. I had plenty of successes to take my mind off the England youth squad disappointment. It was the season that PFC got into the First Division (what is now called the Premier League), and I had recently been named as the FA’s Young Player of the Month, a very prestigious award for a young player. In my second season at PFC my wages had gone up to £35 a week. I thought I was rich, but I had no idea what was on the cards for me.

Most apprentices saw out their two years before signing professional forms, but before my two years were up, when I was only 17, I was offered a professional contract at £250 a week. In today’s terms that sounds like nothing, but imagine a pay rise of over seven times your current weekly salary! The money still meant nothing to me, I was just happy to be playing football every day, but I was able to start buying real, grown-up assets like stereos and cars... and eventually my first property.

My first game as a professional was at Millwall, ironically the closest league club to Elephant and Castle. I was on the bench initially, but soon after the start of the game Kenny Swain got injured and I went on. In those days there were high mesh fences all around the pitch because football hooliganism was a big problem. I was terrified as I ran out on to the pitch because I could see the Millwall fans pushing up against the fence.

They were like snarling tigers, eager to get out of their cage and tear apart their prey. I was still a victim of the 1980s and with my long, bleached-blonde Nik Kershaw hairstyle, I was a prime target for the Millwall fans. They started chanting and shouting abuse at me, spitting and calling me a “fucking Portsmouth poofter.” I desperately wanted to turn around and tell them that I was born up the road, that I was a local lad, just like them, but I knew it wouldn’t have made a difference. More importantly, I had to concentrate on my first professional game.

In the end, we beat the home team 4-0. It was such an impressive victory that some of the Millwall fans actually clapped us off the pitch. Even so, there were some very angry fans lining the street on the way back to the coach and I remember being quite scared, imagining they were going to drag me off and beat me to a pulp. Luckily Noel Blake pulled me out of harm’s way. At 6’2”, and with shoulders almost as wide, he was a force to be reckoned with and the angry fans backed off. Noel and I became great mates after that; it was the beginning of a lifelong friendship.

Alan Ball continued to be my mentor and my greatest inspiration as I rose through the ranks. He would give the most incredible pre-match motivational speeches. He could actually make you cry. I remember choking back tears several times at the end of some of his pep talks. He made you feel like the only thing that existed was the game you were about to play. To this day, I think he is the best motivator I have ever met. Of course, his influence didn’t end on the pitch. His “live hard, play hard” attitude encouraged us to enjoy ourselves to excess after the game. All the drinking and partying was fine as long as we’d worked hard out on the pitch.

Alan had a reputation for gathering up mavericks that other clubs had grown exasperated with and getting them focused. Perhaps it was because he allowed us to get away with so much partying off the pitch that we worked so hard in training and during the matches. We were known as “the gremlins” because we were never out of trouble, whether it was on the pitch or in the pub. After hours, it was a constant flow of booze and girls. There was a fantastic team spirit and I never questioned it for a moment. You couldn’t, you were part of a team; the peer pressure was huge.