As a kid, I learn to take that self-belief into the boxing gym. If ever I get into the ring with a lad twice my size I never think, Look at the size of him! I’m going to get battered. Doing that means I’m beat in my head already. Instead, I go into every fight thinking, I’m going to win, even against the bigger lads. One pal at the gym is called John Donnelly1, he’s older and heavier than me, but every time we spar together, Uncle Richie tells me to take it easy on him. He’s frightened John can’t handle me.
The desire to win and the self-belief on the footy pitch is there from the start too, even when I play for De La Salle, my school team. If ever a player knocks me off the ball in a tackle I work on my strength training in the gym the following week. I promise myself that it won’t happen again. No-one’s going to beat me in a scrap for the ball.
If I look like losing my hunger, Dad pushes me a bit. When I play football on a Sunday afternoon, he always comes to watch. He encourages me to get stuck in. He gets more wound up than me sometimes. He tells me to work harder, to try more. I play one match and it’s freezing, my hands are burning and my feet are like blocks of ice. I run over to the touchline.
‘Here, Dad, I’m going to have to come off. It’s too cold. I can’t feel my feet.’
His face turns a funny colour and he looks like he’s going to blow up with anger.
‘What? You’re cold?’
He can’t believe it.
‘Get out there and run more. Get on with it.’
I leg it around a bit harder to warm myself up. I’m only nine but I know that if Dad’s advice is anything to go by, I’ll have to toughen up even more if I want to be a proper footballer.
*****
All my heroes are battlers.
On the telly, I love watching boxers, especially Mike Tyson because his speed and aggression makes him so exciting. He always goes for the KO. When I watch Everton with Dad, my favourite player is Duncan Ferguson because he’s a fighter like Iron Mike, hard as nails, and I love the way he never gives up, especially if things aren’t going his way. He always gets stuck in. He also scores cracking goals. I could watch him play all day.
I love Everton, I’m mad for them. I write to the club and ask to become the mascot for a game when I’m 10 years old. A few weeks later a letter comes through the door telling me I’ve been chosen and I’m dead chuffed because I’m going to be walking out with the team for the Merseyside derby at Anfield. I step onto the pitch with our skipper, Dave Watson, and Liverpool’s John Barnes and I can’t believe the noise of the crowd. Later I go into the penalty area to take shots at our keeper, Neville Southall. I’m only supposed to be passing the ball back to him gently, but I get bored and chip one over his head and into the back of the net. I can see that he’s not happy, so when he rolls the ball back to me, I chip him again.
I just want to score goals.
A couple of years later, I get to be a ball boy at Goodison Park. Neville’s in goal again and as I run to get a shot that has gone out of play he starts shouting at me. ‘Effin’ hurry up, ball boy!’ he yells. It scares the crap out of me. Afterwards, I go on about it for ages to my mates at school.
That afternoon at Anfield, Gary Speed scores for us, which I’m dead chuffed about because he’s one of my favourite players. I can see that he works hard and he’s a model pro. Someone tells me that he grew up as an Evertonian as well, so when my mum buys me a pet rabbit a little while later, I decide to name him ‘Speedo’. Two days afterwards, the real Speedo signs for Newcastle and I’m moody for days.
*****
The training and the toughening up pays off.
I get spotted by club scouts when I’m nine years old and join Everton, which is like a dream come true. Then I play in the older teams at the club rather than my own age group because I’m technically better and physically stronger than the lads in my year. It’s mad; I don’t let on to the kids my age when I go to footy practice because I never play with them, I don’t really know them. When I’m 14 years old, I work with the Everton Under-19s. Me, a kid, playing against (nearly) grown blokes and competing, scoring goals, winning tackles. It feels great.
It gets better. At 15, I play in the Everton reserves. At 16, I’m in the first team. I know I can play at this level because I’m grafting hard and a place in the side is my reward, just like Mum and Dad taught me. Some of the coaches wonder whether I’ve got enough strength to mix it with the pros, but I know I have bags of it because boxing with Uncle Richie has given me the muscle.
When we play Manchester United’s reserves at our place, one of our coaches gives us instructions to be strong with Gary Neville, one of the stars of their first team. Everyone hates Gary Nev outside of Old Trafford because he’s United through and through. He’s always giving it on the pitch.
Not long into the game we both go up for a header. I accidentally catch him with my elbow and when I turn round to see if it’s had any effect on him, he doesn’t even flinch. The next time we go for a ball, he gets me back, clattering into me really hard.
It’s just another lesson in playing the game.
*****
I don’t change for 10 years. I take that same Crocky spirit onto the pitch throughout my career. Rolling up my sleeves, gritting my teeth and getting on with things helps me to a lot of goals at Manchester United. Like when I’m playing against Arsenal in January 2010. We’re one-up through an own goal from their keeper, Manuel Almunia. Arsenal are one of our rivals for the Premier League and beating them will go some way to helping us win the title. I know that if we score again we’ll probably take the game. Luckily, I manage to get us a second goal in the 37th minute, a strike that comes from not giving up.
I’m back defending, doing the dirty work, getting stuck in deep in the United half, which some strikers won’t do. I win the ball on the edge of our penalty area, lay it off to Nani and leg it, checking the position of the Arsenal defence as I push on towards them. I can see their full-back, Gael Clichy, on one side of me, but I’m focused on Nani. He’s bombing down the wing and I know a pass is coming my way if I can bust a gut to get into the right spot. He plays the ball into my path, I check my stride and thump a shot past Almunia first time which puts the result beyond Arsenal.
Three points in the bag.
When fans talk about the players with a desire to win games, they always mention the tacklers, the ball-winning midfielders, but desire to me is something different. It’s my goal against Arsenal; it’s sprinting for several seconds (again and again) to get onto a pass that might not come. Desire is playing out wide and making runs into the box and then tracking back to defend. Desire is risking injury to score. Desire is about trying your heart out and never giving up.
When the player stats came out for the Arsenal game – which they do for the Premier League every week – United’s fitness coach, Tony Strudwick, comes into the dressing room at training with all the facts and figures. He reads out the speed of my run during the build up to our second goal. Apparently, I covered 60 metres in a ridiculous time.
‘If you’d carried on running for another 40 metres at that pace, you’d have done the 100 metres in 9.4 seconds,’ he says, looking at the flipchart with a smile on his face.
Everyone starts cracking up. That stat makes me quicker than Usain Bolt.
*****
Sometimes I go too far. The same blanked-out feeling that happens whenever I score takes over when the red mist comes down.
During an away game against Fulham in March 2009, nothing seems to go right for United and I lose it, big time. We’ve been beaten by Liverpool the week before and The Manager wants us to bounce back at Craven Cottage. Instead, we go a goal down after a penalty is given against Scholesy, who gets sent off for deliberately handling the ball in our box. I come on during the second half