Blog: Ace

Gazza's decline - is he the only one?

Paul Gascoigne's well publicised mental decline throws up the issue of what happens to sports personalities when they retire. Because he is not the only one to hit the skids after the spotlight has turned away.
Bijorn Borg - who retired at the premature age of 25 after winning 4 consecutive Wimbledon titles then went on a rampage of wasted business ventures and sex scandals. Gerd Muller - the prolific German centre forward was found destitute on a park bench. The alcohol had got him. The Yorkshire and England wicket -keeper - David Bairstow took his own life becuase he so missed the club structure. George Best was also a lost soul trying to find the answers in a bottle.

For us amateurs as well - we find it tough. Speaking personally I wander down to my football club where I played for 30 years more or less. No one takes a blind bit of notice of a middle aged man wandering along the touch line harking back to the time when I could rise like a salmon at the far post. I probably played for all ten teams growing up and then growing old in football terms. From the First team to the Vets. But that was then and this is very much the Now generation. Maybe it always has been.

Its not necessarily the football I miss - because I know I can't do it anymore or play at a standard that is acceptable - what I miss is the craic. The banter. The daft chats in the dressing room. The travelling as a team to away games. The laughs. The drinks. The Friendship. The stories. We were one big family.

And I suppose the same applies to the more famous of these sporting stars except worse. Sport for the Gazza's and the Bijorn, the Best's of this world was all they had really - there were the fans, the media the spotlight, the money, the club, the training and their mates and when that's taken away - there's nothing left.

I remember reading an article about the ex Nottingham Forest and England midfield player Neil Webb becoming a postman and explaining that why shouldn't he. Is was the outdoor life and he could keep reasonably fit. Incidentally I read too that Kevin Hector from Derby, David Harvey from Leeds and Peter Bonetti all joined Webby in this noble trade.

Premiership footballers now are made for life and won't have to worry a jot financially.

But Gazza's experience maybe a lesson to these Prima donnas who think the spotlight will always be there. It won't.

by Ace on 06:59 on 23rd February 2008