Gerrard: My Autobiography (7 page)

When I returned to Liverpool after those games, I sought out Steve Heighway. ‘I really enjoyed playing for those teams,’ I said with a smile. I soon got a promise of a Youth Trainee Scheme contract out of Liverpool! Towards the end of the U-16 season, all the schoolboys went one by one into this room at Melwood to learn whether a YTS place was on offer from Liverpool. I never went in. I already knew. I couldn’t click on to anyone that I had this deal with Steve, all in black and white. But it was there: £50 a week. Michael Owen had one off Steve as well.

Steve always looked after us, like getting us tickets for the Kop for me, Paul and our friends. He took me to Wembley three times to watch FA Cup finals and Coca-Cola Cup finals. We travelled south on the train, with Steve, Hughie, Dave and their wives looking after me like a son. We saw Liverpool’s 2–0 FA Cup defeat of Sunderland in 1992, and that brilliant Steve McManaman performance against Bolton Wanderers in the Coca-Cola Cup three years later. Michael was also in the party heading down to Wembley. Michael was Liverpool’s prized
junior, so I thought I must be the second best if I was also being taken down to Wembley.

Steve was always good to me. I will never forget receiving a phone call from him early one morning in May 1996. I was just about to head out of the door to catch the bus to Cardinal Heenan when the phone went. Steve came quickly to the point. ‘Steven, we’ve got the FA Youth Cup final against West Ham in two days’ time and we have one or two injuries, so we need you on stand-by. Be on your toes.’ I was buzzing, floating on a cloud all the way to Cardinal Heenan. Injuries and illnesses had plagued the youth team, but I never dreamed they might turn to me. I wasn’t required in the end – a real pity. Liverpool had some youth side, with David Thompson, Jamie Carragher and, of course, Owen, the real star of the show. They won the final against the likes of Rio Ferdinand and Frank Lampard comfortably. But I was grateful to Steve simply for considering me.

Steve even organized it so I did my work experience at Liverpool. I sat in the classroom at Cardinal Heenan, listening to all the boys talking of where they were going on work experience. Stacking shelves at Asda or Kwiksave was not for me. As the forms were going round, someone mentioned that a few Cardinal Heenan boys wangled work experience at Melwood in the past. That was me sorted. No chance was I going to a supermarket. Not with a chance of Melwood. Sharpish, I was into Steve Heighway’s office. ‘I will mop as many floors, clean as many boots as you want, so long as I can do my two weeks’ work experience at Melwood,’ I told him. Steve agreed, and set it up with Cardinal Heenan. Liverpool
obviously thought a lot of me. While the rest of my year worked with their dads, brick-laying, labouring or helping out in shops, I joined Liverpool’s first team for a fortnight. I could not believe my luck. Nor could my schoolmates. I was the envy of everyone at Cardinal Heenan.

Those boys who had done work experience at Melwood just trained with the ressies. When I reported for duty, I was informed I would be training with legends like John Barnes and Jan Molby. My idols! The pair of them, I swear, were so good. It was a privilege just to watch them at close quarters. Standing on the touchline at Melwood, my mouth open in amazement at their skills, seemed the closest I would get. Work experience involved washing floors, cleaning boots, pumping balls up, putting cones out, and collecting balls. But Roy Evans, the manager at the time, invited me to join in the five-a-sides. I was sixteen and passing a ball to John Barnes and Jan Molby! They kept passing to me, making me a better player. They made me look like Diego Maradona.

Those two weeks deepened my passion for football and my desire to make it as a pro with Liverpool. I never changed with the first team those two weeks. I was put in with the young pros like Jamie Carragher, Jamie Cassidy, David Thompson and Gareth Roberts. Their banter was just pure quality. So funny. So wicked. God, I was jealous of them. Carra and the rest were in at Melwood every day, having the time of their lives, and I was heading back to a boring classroom after a fortnight. I was spewing. It was not for long. I had that promise of a YTS. That last term, I did most of my homework and had a go in my exams,
but I wasn’t really focused. I knew two months down the line was Liverpool.

On my last day at Cardinan Heenan, I faced a two-hour RE exam. I sat in the exam hall thinking hard over one important question: exactly how I would burn my uniform. The clock showed barely an hour before I sprinted out the room. I have never run so quick to a bus-stop. I wanted to get back to Ironside, get into my normal clothes, ditch my uniform, have six weeks off and then start football full-time.

‘How did your exams go?’ Mum asked.

‘Yeah, fine,’ I replied, knowing I had done shite. I handed her my uniform. ‘Just pop that in the bin, please, Mum.’

A new uniform awaited me: Liverpool FC.

AND SO BEGAN
the best days of my life, my two years as a Liverpool apprentice, a time of banter and dreams, dressing-room fights and glorious wind-ups. Laughter all the way. As I swapped the dour school uniform of Cardinal Heenan for the bright red strip of Liverpool Football Club, my character changed as well. Gone was the shyness that accompanied me through school. At Cardinal Heenan, I always avoided getting into trouble. I hated bollockings, being sent out of classrooms, or being ordered home to face Dad. I loathed the thought of getting a telling-off or a little belt. So I behaved at school. A mischievous streak emerged the moment I set foot in Melwood as an apprentice.

At Cardinal Heenan, I never had many mates. Liverpool was different. Everyone was a friend. We all shared this unbelievable passion for football. My partners in crime were known as Boggo, Greggo, Wrighty, Bavo and Cass. John Boggan was a year below me with his own firm, but he soon became a close ally in the wind-up
business. Boggo, a real funny character, could talk for England; he’s now training with Accrington Stanley after losing a couple of stone. Neil Gregson was another real character, and like Stephen Wright and Matty Cass, he was always up for some banter. Ian Dunbavin, a Knowsley lad, was also in the group; Bavo now keeps goal for Accrington Stanley and to this day is a really good friend of mine. And of course there was Michael Owen, the Boy Wonder who mucked in brilliantly with us mortals. None of us could believe our luck. After the drudgery of school we were actually getting paid to live the dream of becoming footballers. It wasn’t riches. As an apprentice, I got only £50 a week; Mum was paid £160 a month to feed me. Compared to what I make now it was peanuts, but I felt on top of the world every day. The sun seemed to shine just on us Liverpool apprentices.

Because the new Academy at Kirkby was not ready until my second year on the YTS, we spent the first twelve months at Melwood, seeing all the stars. We heard the banter bubbling around the first-team dressing-room at Melwood, so we copied them. So this was the way to become a Liverpool professional: work hard, train hard, laugh hard. Jesus, did we muck about. Liverpool’s staff slaughtered me for all kinds of minor offences, but it was completely different from being coated by the teacher or Dad. I made amends in the next training session.

Pure madness reigned in the apprentices’ dressing-room. As soon as I came through the door, I started wars simply by flicking the lights off. That would be the signal for all the lads – Greggo, me, Bavo, Wrighty, Cass, Michael and everyone – to batter each other with towels
in the dark. That room staged many an ambush. Liverpool had this caretaker called Don; he was in his late forties but the fittest man ever. Don was in the gym all the time, pumping iron. Arm-wrestling was his forte. He would charge into the dressing-room and challenge the bravest apprentice to wrestle him. Elbow on the physio’s table, right hand gripping Don’s, try to muscle him over. I never could. Don was so strong. He could fight us all. Sometimes when Don entered the room, the lads gave each other the nod. Bang, lights off. ‘Let’s get him!’ We’d thrash Don with towels or throw boots at him. One day, Greggo hit Don in the head with a pair of Reebok studs. ‘LIGHTS!’ Don screamed. Nervously, I turned them back on. Jesus, Don was a mess. This huge lump rose above his eye. Don was raging. ‘I’m going to kill you!’ he shouted. He was old enough to be our granddad, and there he was, roaming angrily around Melwood with a black eye and steam coming out of his ears. ‘What have we done now?’ I said to the lads as Don charged out the room. ‘He’s off to get Roy Evans.’ Fortunately, Don didn’t go to the manager. After getting his eye sorted by the doc, Don was ready to sort us out. He rushed back into the dressing-room like a maniac. ‘He’s going to blame me,’ I whispered to Wrighty. I was not in Don’s good books at the time. ‘He’s going to kill me with his bare hands. If he gets into me, Wrighty, you had best help me.’ Luckily, Don just wanted to rant and rave. The storm passed.

Along with torturing innocent caretakers, us YTS boys had another favourite dressing-room game. Again, the lights went off. This time the maulings were verbal not physical: Chinese Whispers. We’d sit around in a gang, the
lights extinguished, and the whispers began. I might quietly tell my neighbour, ‘Greggo’s got some shocking gear on.’ Caning people was the aim of the game, and I was a master. Whispers went round the room, everyone trying to remember all the abuse. The last man switched the lights back on and recited every whisper. ‘Tell Stevie to sort his trainers out. Tell Greggo he dresses like a tramp.’ I loved Chinese Whispers. It was a brilliant chance to slaughter someone without them knowing.

No-one was safe. Even tough guys like me were targeted. Whenever I came in with a new pair of trainers on, the other apprentices plotted their demise. The moment I headed off to the showers, the lads would cut right through the laces or tie them in unbelievable knots. One time, it took me an hour to get my trainers back to normal. Frequently, I pulled a sock on and my foot went straight through the end, which my team-mates had kindly cut off. I sat there in the dressing-room, with my toes sticking out the sock, as all the boys fell about laughing. They were so bloody sneaky. I never knew they had planned any skit against me until it was too late.

Revenge was had, though, big-time. I was one of the ring-leaders, inflicting loads of grief on others. Sometimes it stepped over the line. Fights broke out in training through bad tackles, pushes and snarls. The changing-room was no different. If someone couldn’t take the banter or a prank, arguments would erupt. Rucks were part of my daily life. If I ruined someone’s trainers and they weren’t happy, I reacted. Pushing and shouting broke out. ‘Can’t you fucking well take a joke?’ I’d scream at Greggo or Wrighty as they stood there, steaming, holding
a pair of wrecked trainers. Emotions ran high at times. Training was so exhausting, I would be knackered, short-tempered, my head gone. A confrontational streak occasionally seized me in the dressing-room, but I never, ever got nasty violent.

Any small room packed with competitive teenage lads will spill over. Sometimes, even the kickabouts in the changing-room got heated. We’d put one footy sock into another, twist it and push it through to make a solid ball, which we’d ping around. Michael and I always played it, belting this sock from one end to the other. Two-a-side matches were always going on, with benches for goals. Michael had the ball once, and gave me the nod that he was going to blast it at someone. His target was Roy Naylor. Michael jumped up, smacked this sock-ball across the room and sat down quickly. For once, Michael missed. Instead of Roy, Michael hit one of the goalies, Adriano Rigoglioso, on the back of the head, almost decapitating him. Michael carried on tying his trainers. Adriano turned around, his face like thunder. Matty Cass started laughing so Adriano went for him. Full-on fight. Blood everywhere. Michael sat there, shitting himself, thinking, ‘I’ve caused murder!’ As soon as we could, Michael and I scarpered. ‘You are going to have to own up,’ I told Michael when we reached somewhere safe and quiet. ‘Adriano will kill Cass.’ The next day, Michael admitted to Adriano that he was the guilty man and it was all forgotten about.

Loyalty was an unbreakable code in Liverpool’s YTS dressing-room. Whatever happened, however ruined your trainers were, nobody complained to the staff. If there was a fight, it would be split up. ‘Shake hands,’ came the order
from all the other boys. If two lads wrestled and one got cut, everyone else shouted, ‘So what? Get on with it.’ Adriano was never going to tell on Michael. Everyone respected a team-mate clearly heading for greatness. When Michael first came in, after Lilleshall, people looked up to him because he was so good as a footballer. Michael had his own sponsorship, and soon his own car. All the other apprentices knew it was only a matter of time before he was off with the first team. Michael was a class apart, we all realized that, but he was never aloof. He was one of the lads. He could have said, ‘I’m Michael Owen, fuck all youse.’ But he never did. There were no airs and graces with Michael, none of this England schoolboy superstar crap. All the banter and wind-ups often had Michael bang in the middle of it. He was clever about it, though. Michael hated getting caught. He was just focused on reaching the top.

Greggo and Boggo were different. They were always being cheeky, and being moaned at by the staff. They were just thick, really! All Greggo and Boggo were interested in was getting in the betting shop after training, or playing on the fruit machines. I loved hanging out with Greggo and Boggo. We’d play snooker or go shopping. But when they went gambling, I kept my money in my pocket and just watched them. But I loved their company.

One day, the management announced that us YTS boys were moving to Liverpool University’s grounds, before we eventually settled at the new Academy at Kirkby. Liverpool’s staff almost had to drag us kicking and screaming from Melwood. We loved it there, but Liverpool decided it would be best if the YTS lads and
first-year pros were kept separate from the first team. Shit. I wanted to be at Melwood, showing what I could do in front of the Liverpool management. Melwood was the gateway to Anfield. Instead, we were packed off to some student pitches. I came back from the university on the first day and Dad immediately asked what the set-up was like there. ‘Shite,’ I replied. ‘The pitches and facilities are shite.’ It was only for six months, before Kirkby opened, but I felt like I had stepped on a snake after climbing so many ladders.