Gazza: My Story

by Paul Gascoigne

  I wasn’t drunk. Not at all. I might have had a couple of beers earlier that morning on the golf course, but I certainly wasn’t drunk. Perhaps a bit hung over from the night before, but that was all. I was just so annoyed and irritated. I barged into a room where Ray Clemence, Glenn Roeder and John Gorman, the England coaches, were sitting. I glared at all of them, daring them to tell me whether I was in, to give me some sort of clue. I could see in Glenn Roeder’s eyes what Hoddle had decided. There might even have been a tear there. It was clear to me that they all knew the score.

  I couldn’t control myself any longer. I burst straight into Hoddle’s room, where he was talking to Phil Neville, and I went ballistic.

  ‘What the fucking hell are you doing? You know what it means to me, you fucking bastard.’

  ‘Let me explain,’ Hoddle began.

  ‘I don’t want to hear any fucking explanations. I don’t care what your reasons are. You know what you’re doing to me? You are a fucking bastard …’

  I went over to his wardrobe and kicked in the door. Then I overturned his table, smashing a pottery vase and sending it crashing to the floor. In the process I managed to cut my leg, so now there was blood all over the place as well. I didn’t attempt to hit Hoddle, though I would have liked to. I suppose, deep down, I still respected him, as a player, if not as a manager. And perhaps I also had an inbuilt respect for the position of manager, if not for the man in it. I didn’t lay a finger on him, but I was in a complete fury. It wasn’t long before that he had led me to believe I would be in the final twenty-two, telling the world that we had not seen the best of Gazza yet.

  But now I didn’t want to hear any of his rubbish. I was hell-bent on trashing the whole room, and not listening to one word he was saying.

  ‘Gazza, just calm down and I’ll tell you why I’ve had to do it.’

  ‘Just fucking shut up, you bastard.’

  ‘The thing is, Gazza, your head isn’t right.’

  ‘I got you to France. I saved your skin, your fucking job, and now look what you’re fucking doing to me.’

  I was about to start smashing all his windows, when David Seaman and Paul Ince burst in and managed to restrain me. Then they called for the doctor, who gave me a valium tablet to quieten me down.

  I was taken to my room. All I wanted now was to leave La Manga at once and never see Hoddle again. Walter Smith’s words echoed in my mind. ‘Hoddle will want to make a name for himself …’

  I rang my dad and told him to cancel his French holiday. He wouldn’t be going there any longer. None of our family would be going, not now. Then I got the first plane out of Spain, along with Phil Neville, Ian Walker and Dion Dublin, who had been chucked out with me. Six of us in all had been given the boot. The other two were Nicky Butt and Andy Hinchcliffe. I found out later that most of the squad were surprised, and some were stunned, that I’d been excluded.

  From Luton Airport, I shared a car into London with Ian Walker. I rang Shel and asked if I could stay with her for a while. She was brilliant. The first thing she did when I arrived was to give me a big hug. I stayed with her for five days.

  I didn’t watch any of the 1998 World Cup, not even any of England’s games. I don’t like watching football at the best of times, as I’d always rather be playing. In these circumstances I really couldn’t face it. I was too sick and gutted.

  The press were stalking me, trying to catch me exploding, or doing something else daft. They doorstepped Shel’s house and hid in the garden. One bastard of a photographer managed to creep up on little Regan and the flash went off in his face. Poor little sod. It hurt his eyes. He was in tears with the shock and the pain. For several minutes he couldn’t see and we seriously wondered whether his eyesight might be affected.

  I rang the newspaper this photographer worked for, sounding all calm and reasonable, but I was seething. Why didn’t their photographer, the one who had just snatched a photo of Regan, come back and take a really nice photograph? I suggested. We would give him proper time so that he could do Regan justice.

  The prat fell for it. The moment he arrived in his car, I drove mine behind it so that he couldn’t get out again. Then I smashed his door handles. When he got out his camera, I smashed that as well. Some neighbours appeared, having heard me screaming that I was going to kill him. I let him go in the end without actually hitting him. Well, not very hard.

  I went inside and told Shel the police would be here soon. ‘I’ll probably get arrested for assault, but fuck it, I don’t care.’

  The police did come, and took a statement from me. I just told them the truth: what the photographer had done to my son. I fully expected to have to go to court, but nothing ever happened. I presume the newspaper decided to withdraw charges. No doubt they could see I had a case; that they had caused all the trouble by invading private property and hurting my son. They must have realised that if it went to court, it wouldn’t make them look very good.

  I went on holiday to Florida with Shel and the kids to try to get over it all. But I was in a terrible state for about a year after that, which probably explains a lot of the stupid things I did during that year.

  What really pissed me off was when, almost immediately after the tournament was over, Hoddle published his World Cup diary. In it, he described how I trashed his room. I might have spoken to the press about some of it at the time, but it is only now, at six years’ distance, when he is no longer England manager and it doesn’t matter any more, that I am giving my full story of what happened. I’m not denying what I did, but Hoddle should not have written about it while he was still the England manager. He was just cashing in on his position, making money out of my misery. I thought that was disgusting. I was not the only one who thought that, as he was widely criticised for producing that book.

  I can’t help wondering why Hoddle didn’t realise when he dropped me that I might cause a scene; that I wouldn’t be able to wait for his poxy appointment; that I would not be able to control myself and would go mad and cause trouble. After all, he could have dropped the six of us quietly in England, ringing us privately at home, and then announcing the final squad to the papers the next day. But instead he dramatically dropped the axe while we were away in La Manga, all warming up together for the World Cup, being with the lads. I don’t know what the reason for Hoddle’s decision was, but clearly his mind had been made up before I lost it in his room. Yes, as I’ve admitted, I had been drinking the night before, but, as I’ve also said, I wasn’t the only one. And it wasn’t the first time I’d had a drink while with the England squad and gone on to play a blinder.

  I still hate what Hoddle did to me, but I don’t bear personal grudges. Never have done. Not for ever, anyway.

  I met Hoddle by chance not long ago, in a hotel lift. I shook his hand and he said, how’s it going Gazza? and I said fine, and he smiled, and I smiled, and that was it. It’s all over now. But it will never be forgotten, at least not by me.

  I wondered, of course, whether this would be the end of my England career, which was what everybody was suggesting at the time. It was obvious that Hoddle would never pick me again, after what I did to his lousy bedroom. I just had to hope that Hoddle himself would not be in the job for too long.

  I was pleased when David Beckham wrote in his autobiography in 2003 that he felt Hoddle went about things the wrong way. England got through their first group, but were knocked out by Argentina in the quarter-finals, so they didn’t get as far as we did in 1990. David clearly thinks I might have helped. ‘I still wonder if that wasn’t what we were missing in France ’98,’ he wrote. ‘I think we’d have been better with Gazza there. Paul could bring something to the team nobody else could. He could change a game on his own. And I know we’d all have liked him to be around as part of the squad.’

  Thanks, David.

  “Gascoigne, at his best, remains the pivotal player for England’s World Cup chances in June.”

  Rob Hughes, The Times, 11 March 1998


  “He should have been the greatest player of his generation but wasn’t. Why? He simply lacked the dedication that distinguished the truly outstanding sportsmen. His attitude throughout his career has been ‘It’s my life and I’ll live it how I like.’”

  Michael Hart, Evening Standard, 20 May 1998

  “If Gazza had been given the right antidepressants or decent therapy I do not doubt that he would have been in the starting line-up against Tunisia on 15 June, playing to the full of his creative capacity.”

  Oliver James, Prospect, July 1998

  “After all I had seen of him physically and mentally, I knew deep down he had run out of time. At the airport, it kept coming to me that I couldn’t take Gazza to France.”

  Glenn Hoddle in his World Cup diary

  “Once you’ve played in the same side as Gazza, you fall in love with him because of the sort of person and player he is.”

  David Beckham, England colleague, 1998

  23

  A VISIT TO THE PRIORY

  One day after training at Boro, I noticed that the team coach was standing there empty, with the doors open and the key in the ignition. I thought, I’d like to drive that. I know, I’ll drive it into town, take some of the lads to the bookie’s so they can put a few bets on. I jumped in and started it up. It all seemed easy enough at first, till I came to this narrow gate on the perimeter of the training ground. I didn’t see the big breeze block. And it slipped my mind that I was driving a huge coach, not a car. As a result, I took the bloody thing with me. I heard this horrible scraping noise and realised I must have done a bit of damage. Then I reversed, which made things even worse.

  There was a security man on the gate, and I threw him the keys of the coach and said, ‘Quick, you take it.’ My team-mate Phil Stamp was driving up in his car and stopped, seeing what the coach had done, but not who had been driving it. I jumped into his car and said, ‘Hurry up, get the fuck out of here.’

  Bryan Robson rang me in town. ‘I know you are mad, but this is fucking too much.’ The team coach was so bashed up it couldn’t be used for the next away game and the club had to borrow another one. And I had to stump up £14,000 for the damage I’d caused.

  I thought Bryan Robson was an excellent manager. I had no problems with him, though he might have had a few problems with me. It was good having club football to look forward to again after the humiliation of La Manga, and great to be in the Premiership. During the close season, I had worked really hard on my fitness and agility, which is how I came to play the drums so well at David Seaman’s wedding in July 1998. And I tested my reflexes by setting fire to Jimmy’s nose. I then bet him £500 he couldn’t hold a red-hot lighter to his nose for more than three seconds. He did it twice, so I had to pay him £1,000. But it left him with a scorched conk for weeks, and he claims you can still see the burn marks.

  So I was, honestly, fit and slim by the beginning of the new season, and Bryan Robson was really pleased with me. But just before the first game, at the end of August, I had a lot on my mind. As well as the divorce from Shel, Glenn Hoddle’s book was being serialised in one newspaper and picked over by all the rest, so the press were after me all the time, on both topics. In the middle of all this came a sudden blow which knocked me for six.

  I was over in Gateshead, staying in a hotel with Jimmy and some friends, including David Cheek, who was Jimmy’s uncle. I’d known him for many years, and he was a good lad. I sometimes took him training with me. He always called me The Boss.

  We began the evening drinking cocktails, then went for an Italian meal, came back to the hotel, had some more drinks and crashed into bed. I woke at four in the morning and, as I usually do when I wake up early, wanted someone to play with. I rang Jimmy, who was of course still asleep, and he told me groggily to fuck off. I rang the others, but they all either hung up on me or didn’t answer.

  Not long afterwards, there was a call from Jimmy. I thought, good, he’s getting up now so we can go and do something, but all he said was, ‘Davey’s dead.’ He’d died in the night, just like that. I rushed out of my room and down the stairs to see his body being taken away in an ambulance.

  Davey was only thirty-eight and had four bairns. I was shattered. He had been a heavy drinker for many years, but I’d never expected this to happen. He went so suddenly. Once again, I felt it was my fault, for taking him out drinking. All I could do now was act as pall-bearer at his funeral. I wondered if the same thing would happen to me, whether I’d go out like that, out of the blue.

  After Davey died, I started having blackouts. I took tablets for depression and heaps of other pills, anything to numb my mind. Or I just got drunk.

  I didn’t feel much like playing after the funeral. Bryan Robson said I didn’t have to, but I wanted to turn out for Boro’s first game back in the Premiership. It was against Leeds at home. It ended in a goalless draw, but I lasted the full ninety minutes and most reports said I was Boro’s best player on the day. I managed to get the better of Lee Bowyer, who was snapping at my heels, and gave Paul Merson a forty-yard pass which he nearly converted, but he got bundled over.

  I was substituted in our next match, when we were beaten 3–1 by Villa, but I played the whole of the home game against Derby, which we drew 1–1. I was getting fitter with every match. We beat Leicester away, 1–0, our first win back in the Premiership, and I scored our goal. Paul Merson had left for Villa by then, complaining that there was a drinking culture at the club. I don’t know who he was referring to. Did he mean me?

  Actually, Merson was teetotal when I knew him at Boro, so we all tried to help. I remember him coming to my house once and hiding two bottles of wine in the kitchen so he couldn’t see them and wouldn’t be tempted. I deny that I was part of any drinking culture among the players at Boro. Since my Spurs days, and that was just odd nights out when I was young, I hardly ever went out drinking with team-mates. In fact, on the whole I’ve not socialised with other players after a game or after training. I’ve kept myself to myself. Having seen them all day in training, at work so to speak, I preferred to be with other people in the evening, such as Jimmy and my other old friends. That’s always been my style.

  In the middle of September, we were due to meet Spurs at White Hart Lane, so I was looking forward to that. It would be my first league game there since 1991. David Pleat was now caretaker manager at Tottenham, in the wake of the departure of Christian Gross. I was given a good ovation by the Spurs crowd. Glenn Hoddle was in the stands, still England manager, but I don’t think he’d come to see me. Probably he was checking out Sol Campbell, who didn’t have a very good game and didn’t look fit. We stuffed them 3–0. I was brought off four minutes before the end, as I was knackered, but I got probably the biggest cheer of the afternoon from the Tottenham supporters.

  In the next game, against Wycombe Wanderers in the Worthington Cup, Bryan made me captain as Andy Townsend, our normal skipper, was injured. We won that one 2–0. At that stage, we were sixth in the league.

  In October the Premiership clubs had a week off because of England’s vital Euro 2000 qualifier against Bulgaria. Needless to say, Hoddle had not picked me for that. So instead of a visit to Wembley, it was a four-day break in Dublin for me with Middlesbrough.

  I was sleeping very badly, far worse than normal, thinking about Davey and death and that his was my fault and that I would be next. I’d started taking sleeping pills at the end of my time at Rangers, in the hope that they would make me sleep and blank everything out. But all they did was make me feel really terrible when I woke up and go on feeling like shit all day. So I’d just dive into the booze to cheer myself up, stop myself thinking about death and dying.

  Those four days in Dublin turned into a four-day drinking session. Jimmy and my friend Hazy had come over to join us, as my guests in our hotel, with Bryan Robson’s permission.

  When the time came to catch the plane back to England, I got myself into a state about flying and started drinking before we even bo
arded. I knew I shouldn’t be doing it, because I was due to go direct from Newcastle Airport to Hertfordshire, ready to pick up my son Regan the next morning and spend a day with him as part of the access arrangements in the divorce agreement.

  To get myself fit to fly, I drank sixteen hot toddies. That’s about thirty-two whiskies (they were very strong hot toddies). I reeled off the plane at Newcastle and somehow got myself to the railway station and on to the train to Stevenage. I have no memory of getting off the plane or of catching the train. All I can remember is standing on the platform at Stevenage, crying my eyes out. I felt so miserable and depressed, and being drunk just magnified those feelings. I’d made such a mess of things, wrecking my marriage, ruining Shel’s life and the children’s. That row with Hoddle, then David Cheek dying. Everything seemed so bleak, and most of it was my own fault. It seemed to me that Shel and Regan would cope much better if I wasn’t around.

  So I decided, in this emotional state, to throw myself in front of the next train. I waited and waited, but no train came. A railwayman saw me staggering around and came over. I asked where the fuck the train was and he said there wasn’t another one. The last train had gone. That’s when I really started crying. Even when I was trying to kill myself I couldn’t get it right.

  I somehow managed to ring Shel, sobbing down the line, saying, ‘Please help. Please come and get me.’ She’d heard this sort of talk from me before, and she’d been taken in by it enough times already, she said. She refused to let me come and stay at her place, not in the state I was in. It would just upset the children. However, she agreed to come and pick me up from Stevenage Station and take me to Hanbury Manor. The hotel where we’d had our famous wedding.

  About one in the morning, the phone rang in my hotel room. It was Reception. They said a Mr Robson was there to see me. I said fuck off, and hung up. Then there was a knock on the door. I opened it, and there stood Bryan. He really was there.