by Lee Howey
The reason for my omission from the Norway tour was that I had been on honeymoon in Kenya, during which I had gained eight or nine pounds in weight, which is quite a lot for a professional footballer. My flight back was delayed and I landed at Newcastle at 10 p.m. The next morning I reported for the start of pre-season training at 9 o’clock in something less than peak condition. I was plainly knackered, but hadn’t expected to be lapped during the gentle jog we began with. The manager was furious and told me that I would not be going on the trip. This meant that, for now at least, I wasn’t in the first team squad and I was most annoyed. Until I heard reports from Norway. It was the best ‘punishment’ I ever had.
• • •
There was more turbulence with my dear brother.
My wife and I decided to move to a bigger and better home. Nookside had been perfectly agreeable, but hardly big enough for an emerging superstar like myself, and we were looking for something a little more spacious. By happenstance, Steven wanted to move out of his home in Sunderland.
He lived in a new house in Silksworth and was keen to vacate it. This was not a reflection on the house or the area; it was more to do with him being a Newcastle United player living on Wearside. Most people he encountered were apparently pleased to see a local lad doing well, even if it was for an unloved rival club, but it was too much for a few to bear and he had to endure some unpleasant silliness, such as having his lawn painted red and white. It was hardly life-threatening stuff, but it wasn’t nice and it was enough to drive him out to County Durham after about eighteen months in Silksworth.
I liked that house and was interested in buying it, but was put off when Steven told me that it was worth £122,000. This was expensive for the time in the North East. It was roomy, had four bedrooms, front and back gardens and a large garage. It was a ‘well-appointed’ dwelling and something similar could lighten you of a couple of million in other parts of the country in 2018. Regretfully, I began to look elsewhere.
But not for long. A week or two later I was peering into the window of a Halifax Estate Agents selling for Persimmons Homes when I saw the same property on offer – for £99,000. He had sold it to them as one of those ‘we will buy your home to help you buy another Persimmons property’ deals. So we bought it after all, just not from Steven.
This led to an interesting telephone conversation between siblings. I was still on a basic salary of £500 a week while he must have been on about twenty times that. I didn’t think it unreasonable to ask him why he had attempted to wring another £23,000 that he didn’t even need from his own brother. Despite having no acceptable defence for what he had done, he stuck to his unloaded guns.
‘Well, that’s what I thought it was worth.’
‘Why was it on sale to everyone else for £99,000 then?’
The argument went nowhere. When someone knows they are in the wrong but won’t admit it, further discussion becomes pointless. Yet we still remained friends even after this. Sort of. There are people in this world who just have to be accepted as they are.
Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Lee Howey….
• • •
I was more than ready for the 1994–95 season. A pity then that I was barely used in the first team. In spite of this, I was being worn to a frazzle and it was obvious why.
I mentioned earlier that Mick was old-school. He gave no credence to trendy modern concepts, such as a thing that sports scientists refer to as ‘rest’.
I was a fringe player and therefore in both the first and reserve team squads. I had no problem with this in itself, but on an average week I would train on a Monday then do a tough double session on Tuesday with the first team. The first team would have Wednesday off, but I would be playing on the evening for the reserves. The reserves were off on Thursdays, but I would be training with the first team, running in the morning followed by pattern of play. I also trained on Fridays when I would be told whether or not I was required on the Saturday. I would have Sundays off, unless we had a game. On top of all this there was the travel to consider; I was sometimes not arriving home until two in the morning from a Wednesday reserve game, to be back for first team training seven hours later, which was at its most arduous on Thursdays and involved much running.
This exhaustion was a price I was prepared to pay, but it was horrible. The weariness this caused was adding to the old anxieties too. Had my grievance been made public, I would have doubtless been dismissed as a ‘whinging footballer’, followed by ‘You don’t hear (insert noble profession) complaining about their fifty-hour shifts’. The notion of a professional footballer being exhausted can, for some reason, be difficult for certain people to grasp.
Certain people included our manager. Mick was aware that I was doing much more training than anyone else at the club. Although as usual I did as I was told, I did challenge him on the matter one day because it was doing me, and by extension the team, no favours whatsoever. I had a feeling I would be wasting my time, but had a go anyway. I don’t know why I bothered. He could not for the life of him see why anyone my age, twenty-five, would possibly require something as namby-pamby as a rest. Using his non-existent expertise on exercise and rest patterns, and with the air of someone who actually knew what he was talking about, he shared with me his ‘theory’ on fatigue. Excuse the spelling as it may well be wrong.
He said: ‘Ptcha! There’s no such thing. Tiredness is all in your head.’ Oh Lord.
I thanked him for dispensing this utter codswallop and went about my business; my business being even more training. He actually spoke at greater length on the subject, but that is all I remember of his rambling. As ever, his unswerving devotion to tedium ensured that I only heard a small percentage of what he said. He then meandered away round the fields in his flat cap again, looking as usual like a man in search of a lost pigeon.
• • •
I was an unused substitute for the opening game of 1994–95, which was a goalless draw at Bristol City. For Sunderland and for me personally, this was almost a microcosm of how the season would develop. We would finish it with eighteen draws, the most in English football. Six of them were goalless. I wouldn’t step on the pitch until 15 October, as a late substitute against Burnley; again a 0–0 and another thriller.
This blizzard of non-events may be inducing you to nod off now, so I shall tell you about a rare good day that I had in 1994–95. It came at home to Bristol City (who would be relegated) a week before Christmas. It was my first start of the season. Don Goodman had left for Wolves and Phil Gray was injured. Luckily Mick remembered that I was still there.
It had been a turgid encounter with the score at its customary 0–0. The early stages of the second period were no more swashbuckling, despite the usual spellbinding half-time team-talk from Mick. The fans were discussing their favourite novels and how it was quite mild for the time of year, when we attacked the goal at the Fulwell End in the fifty-fourth minute. It may have been the first attack by either side. There was a scramble in City’s six-yard box, which culminated in a six-inch pile-driver off my studs. The crowd had no chance of knowing for sure who had scored, as if they cared, but the PA announcer bellowed out my name, much to the chagrin of Craig Russell, who thought the goal was his. Well, it wasn’t. The record shows that I scored it and always will, so he can bugger off; and it was his own fault anyway for having shorter legs than me.
Twenty minutes later, the day improved further. Gordon Armstrong had a long-range effort and it was dreadful. Left to make its own way in life, that shot would have gone for a throw-in. It was wildly inaccurate but had the virtue of being firmly struck. The ball hurtled towards me on the edge of the penalty area. I put my shin to it and then watched it ping past the keeper, Keith Welch. Quality goals my arse. As long as they go in. That said, it wasn’t a complete fluke; I wasn’t trying to miss.
The final score was 2–0. As we had won only one of our previous eight matches and were sliding down the league, the three points were more than useful.
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br /> It was a good victory and wonderful for me personally to score twice. But it was a terrible game. Perhaps more significant than the result was that it was Gary Owers’ 330th and final game for Sunderland.
The team was shuffled around; Dariusz Kubicki was moved from right-back to left-back, with Gary moving to right-back and Derek Ferguson replacing Gary in midfield, while a disgruntled Richard Ord was dropped from left-back and from the team altogether to make way for Dariusz. Have you got all that?
The idea was to prove to Joe Jordan, Bristol City’s manager, that Gary could play at right-back, as indeed he could (they already knew about him as a midfielder). Money changed hands and within a week Gary had signed for City with Martin Scott moving in the other direction. I was sad to see Gary leave, but this, along with moving Kevin Ball into midfield, was one of Mick Buxton’s shrewder moves. Martin was the ‘genuine article’ as a left-back and would be at Sunderland until he was forced out of the game by injury in 1999.
• • •
Gary’s departure left a void that needed to be filled: urgently. He had been organising the Christmas party.
Yuletide socialising for the pros and youth players over eighteen tended to be a combination of industrial quantities of drink, a similarly large amount of food and some strippers. Obviously, it wasn’t as sophisticated as that every year, but we always tried.
The custom was that we would have the next day off, but Mick Buxton guillotined that idea, as it might have enabled fun. We usually went somewhere in Sunderland city centre, but for the Wednesday before Christmas of 1994, Mr Owers, in conjunction with a Geordie called Derek, had arranged for a meal and entertainment downstairs in a Chinatown restaurant in Newcastle. Derek was someone with contacts throughout the area who could provide pretty much anything: seats at the opera, crockery, three-piece suits, turquoise paint, kryptonite – you name it. For the entertainment we were desperately keen to have plate spinners or a harmonica player; perhaps even someone who could produce budgerigars from his sleeves. In the end we had to settle for more strippers, although the disappointment in the room was barely noticeable.
That morning I took a phone call at home from Gary Owers. He had just signed for Bristol City and wouldn’t be attending the festivities. But he still didn’t want to let the lads down and so entrusted me to take over the necessary arrangements with Derek. My wife was listening to my half of the conversation and heard the word ‘strippers’ at least four times. I toyed briefly with the idea of pretending I had been discussing plans to redecorate the dining room, but thought better of it, what with her not being an idiot. She rolled her eyes with menacing disapproval, before stomping off to do anything other than give me a goodbye kiss.
The plan, if it could be called that, was to have the meal and a couple of drinks before the ladies we had hired demonstrated their art. The younger members of our party were made to go on stage and ‘assist’, which they did with an aplomb best left undescribed on the printed page. This was early in the evening before a couple of minibuses arrived to take us back to Sunderland. Alec Chamberlain and Derek Ferguson went to St James’ Park to watch Newcastle lose to Manchester City in the League Cup. It was far from sold out, so Derek procured the tickets quite easily. Kevin Ball, Phil Gray and Andy Melville among others stayed to have a few jars in Newcastle. The rest of us returned to Sunderland.
Not long after they had entered this particular bar, one of Tyneside’s less evolved bouncers recognised an opportunity to make a name for himself as something other than a cretin. His ambition would go unrealised. This oaf locked the door and proceeded to provoke Phil for not even the slightest reason. Phil was never one to back down and the argument became more heated. The bouncer was left flummoxed by Phil’s superior vocabulary, especially the longer and more complex enunciations such as ‘fuck off’. Kevin’s efforts at peaceful mediation were rewarded with a punch in the face from this near-human and a small scuffle ensued.
Actually, a large scuffle ensued. The police arrived and several arrests were made, including those of Kevin and Phil. Word got back to us through our swanky new mobile phones (they had been around for a couple of years and by then were down to the size of prize cucumbers). We found out later that much of this bouncer’s time was taken up with telling apocryphal tales of how many Sunderland players he had filled in during the course of that evening and throughout his career as a whole. Someone from Wearside later went to discuss the matter with the gentleman and my understanding is that it went considerably beyond a ticking off. I am pleased for my own sake to have no more details on the matter.
In the meantime we all had to report for training the next morning. Most of us were hungover. Bally arrived late, having been released from custody, and his left eye looked like a rotten plum. Mick Buxton had not expected us to spend our Christmas night out brass rubbing in Durham Cathedral, but this was a bit much and he was justifiably annoyed. He attempted a severe verbal dressing down which failed in its desired effect because his bollockings were like his team-talks: no one listened. Regardless of this, arguments and recriminations commenced among ourselves.
‘It was your fault.’
‘Don’t blame me.’
‘It was your idea to go to Newcastle.’
‘But it was your idea to go in that pub.’
‘I said there would be trouble.’
This went on for some time until we decided where culpability for the whole contretemps did truly lie: it was all the fault of Gary Owers.
In time-honoured workplace tradition, the blame was allocated to the one person who wasn’t there to defend himself. It served him right for allowing himself to be sold.
Oh, Gary. What were you thinking of? Bristol City should have fined you a week’s wages for that episode. Disgraceful.
• • •
We were due to play away to Swindon on 2 January. But the game, which never seemed likely to go ahead, was postponed at 9 a.m. due to snow. We had stayed the night in a Wiltshire hotel and were told that we could still have a training session after breakfast. The journey home was further delayed because the bus was knackered. It was eventually started, but with no electrics, so we couldn’t even listen to the radio. To combat the boredom, it was suggested that we should (surprise, surprise) have a few snifters while we travelled and make a little party of it; not a Roman orgy, just a little party. Our next game was days away, so what harm would it do?
But, never a man to be mistaken for a ray of sunshine, Mick Buxton turned down the suggestion like a bedspread. Perhaps the Christmas night out escapade still rankled. Or maybe he decided it was better to be disliked than simply disregarded. Whatever, he decreed that only soft drinks were to be imbibed which, in the absence of electricity, did not even include tea or coffee. Water only. We could also have a game of travel chess if we behaved ourselves, so long as it didn’t get too raucous. This bore all the hallmarks of a weak man trying to appear strong and it was not appreciated. We weren’t after a day of unfettered debauchery, merely some levity to make a wasted twelve-hour road trip more tolerable. But that was Mick. He didn’t understand and there was no joy in the man. Boozing was not all we were interested in, but he had needlessly made everyone as miserable as he was.
• • •
For the second successive year, we drew Carlisle United at home in the FA Cup third round. For the second successive year we drew 1–1 and for the second successive year we won the replay. The mathematical odds of this happening are precisely… best left to someone who can be bothered to work out that sort of thing. For the third successive year we drew Premier League opposition in the fourth round.
We would play Tottenham Hotspur at Roker Park on Sunday 29 January 1995. This was a big deal on Wearside. Despite the misgivings that fans of Sunderland AFC may have about the club today, they have become accustomed to celebrated opposition at the Stadium of Light. In 1994–95 only one of the previous ten seasons had been spent in the top flight; so the visit of Tottenham and their accom
panying Sheringham, Barmby, Popescu, Mabbutt and who-have-you was an occasion to be savoured. There would be the added novelty of live television too and this time it was national. Match of the Day would be broadcast from Roker on BBC1, with the suave Des Lynam, the coolly analytical Alan Hansen and the cheating Jimmy Hill.
Everyone at Sunderland, not least the fans, was greatly looking forward to the game because it was a welcome respite from yet another season of struggle. On the day of the Spurs game we were eighteenth in the league and our previous fixture had been a home defeat to Notts County, who were bottom of the table and would stay there.
To prepare us for the cup tie, the club flew us out to Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol, where in January they have even better weather than we do in the north-east of England. There was understandable muttering from some of the fans about this after the depressingly bad show against Notts County, but it was deemed to be the best preparation. I didn’t object. A golf day was arranged for our first full day there, with some training during the evening. The BBC’s Football Focus team, fronted by Eddie Butler who was really a rugby journalist, were to come out to do a feature on us while we belted golf balls round a picturesque, southern Spanish course; the sort of tough assignment with which the lads at the Beeb’s sports department like to challenge themselves. The feature would go out the day before the game, thereby giving an additional plug to Match of the Day.
We checked in at the hotel at around 7 p.m. and held a meeting an hour later. Mick and Trevor Hartley said we were allowed a few drinks, but imposed a midnight curfew. This was the sort of thing my mother used to do with equal effect – and Yvonne was far more frightening than Mick Buxton. We all readily agreed to the curfew, then strolled out into the warm, crepuscular Spanish air without the slightest intention of keeping our word.
We headed for Fuengirola’s main square. It was Tuesday, so the square was fairly quiet. At first. The local bars were most welcoming and it was one in the morning before anyone took the trouble to check the time. Not one person in our party had left that bar. Oh well; we were late now anyway so we thought we might as well continue, and moved to another pub. It seemed a good idea at the time, your honour.