13
Idid some growing up in that first season at Newcastle, too, though. Sure, there were some things I did wrong and some things I wish I could take back. But even as our challenge for the title gathered strength, I assumed responsibilities I had not thought about shouldering before.
A couple of weeks before we went on the ill-fated trip to Marbella, one of the Newcastle press officers, Hazel Greener, asked me if I’d make a visit to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in
Newcastle. She told me about a young boy there who was sick with kidney disease and whose father had asked if there was any chance of their son meeting me. The boy’s name was Indie Singh. He was 14 years old.
It was only round the corner from where I lived. It was hardly even a diversion on my way home. It had been set up as a surprise for him so I went over there and met Indie and his dad, Bal. They were both avid Newcastle fans and Indie’s face lit up when I walked in. I played a bit of PlayStation on the computer with him for a while and asked him about his favourite players, and whether he was a fan of mine because of the silver boots I was wearing at that time.
I really enjoyed it. He and his dad had season tickets just above the dug-outs at St James’ Park so I told them that when we played Aston Villa the following Saturday, I would make sure to look up and give them a wave. Before the game, I thought I’d pop in and see him again. I gave him a Wales shirt and one of my Wales caps. I’d never given one of them away before because they’re for my kids but it felt like the right thing to do.
The game felt big to me. I thought it might be one of the last times he watched me play because it was obvious he wasn’t well at all. I wanted to try to make it memorable in some way. I got lucky. A few minutes before half-time, I hit a half-volley into the top corner and after I’d celebrated, I ran over and waved to Indie and his dad. I’ve still got the picture in my mind of him sitting there with his old man with a big smile plastered over his face.
We won the game 3-0 and I got the third that day, too, sliding it through Peter Schmeichel’s legs. Indie came down to the dressing room after the game and I gave him my shirt and had my picture taken with him. I felt so good. It was one of the best feelings I’d ever had after a game. Whether there is a God or not I will never know but if there is, I thank him for that.
I don’t know why it touched such a nerve with me. He was a lovely kid. That was part of the reason. He’d won some award for being a Child of Courage and had given the money he received straight to the hospital so they could buy presents for the other kids. But it was more than just that. I was a father, too, of course, and seeing what was happening was heartbreaking.
But I think it was a bit of an escape for me, too. It was getting increasingly hard for me to trust anybody and I could feel the spotlight increasing on me. When I went to spend time with Indie, I didn’t have to worry about any of that. I find dealing with children so much easier than interacting with adults. With adults, I am worried that there is always a question behind the question. With young kids, they are blunt and truthful. They ask questions about things I am interested in like who is my favourite team and player.
Sometimes, I am a child and sometimes my love for the game is like a child’s. I do have favourite players, I do remember things from a couple of weeks ago when a certain player did a trick or something. That’s what kids remember, too. That’s why I enjoy dealing with kids and that was part of the reason I loved being with Indie and his family. I could speak freely to him. Even with all the craziness surrounding me, it made me remember what was real.
Indie was sent home just before Christmas. His condition was deteriorating. He had a younger sister but he was his father’s only son. If it was my child and that had been happening to him…well, I couldn’t comprehend it. I spent quite a lot of time round at their house in Durham, just talking and playing on the PlayStation with Indie.
He was really ill this time. He began to lapse in and out of consciousness. I saw him as much as I could. One afternoon, I knocked on his door and his sister answered it. She didn’t know what to say. Eventually, she told me that Indie had died that morning. I went in for a couple of hours and spent a bit of time with his family. I felt it probably wasn’t my place to be there but they asked me to stay.
I am very fortunate to have met a boy like Indie but how many other boys are there in similar plights? That’s one of the main reasons why I have an academy for kids in Sierra Leone now. So I can try to help a bit more. After Indie died, I went back for more visits to the Royal Victoria Infirmary. I saw a lot of doctors and nurses who used to deal with kids like Indie all the time. What a job they do.
It felt like, in a very small way, I was doing something worthwhile, something good. It stirred a few memories in me, too. When I was a young child and my asthma flared, there were quite a few occasions when I’d have to go and spend a week at Heath Hospital in Cardiff to recover. I’d always want my dad to stay with me overnight but that wasn’t possible because I had brothers and they had to be looked after, too. I remembered how lonely those places can be for a child.
I’d like to say meeting Indie made me a little less self-absorbed but I’m not sure if that’s true. I’m an obsessive. I was totally wrapped up in my career and in Newcastle’s title challenge. We were still in the thick of the race at the end of February. When we beat Sunderland at the Stadium of Light on February 24, we moved to two points behind Manchester United with a game in hand.
Earlier in the month, I’d driven down to Cardiff with Gary Speed for a Wales game against Argentina. It was just after the Southampton game and the fracas with the Newcastle University student. Speedo had TalkSport on and there were a lot of phone calls about me coming in, about how well I had played after the week I’d just had.
Speedo turned the sound down and started talking. He talked about how different we were as characters in some ways but that he admired my attitude. He said I was one of the best players he had ever played with but he said it was time to cut the bullshit out. He knew I wasn’t a bad kid, he said, but I had to understand I was becoming a player now and I needed to start acting like a player. I had to realise I was marked, he said.
There was so much I wanted to take on board, so much I knew I needed to improve. But there was so much coming at me, too. Playing in Newcastle, in a team that was top of the table, had exposed me to a whole new level of celebrity and attention. It was turning my head, to be honest. I was scoring a lot of goals and getting a lot of praise. I began to think I was invincible.
The title seemed in reach. We had a decent run-in, too. Our last six games were against Fulham, Derby, Charlton, Blackburn, West Ham and Southampton. Everybody was saying we had a real shot at it. We were right in the mix. It was all going so well. And then, during that win at Sunderland, my luck suddenly turned for the worse.
The Sunderland defender, Jody Craddock, went to hit a ball down the line and I scampered across and blocked it. As I broke to try to chase it, I felt a little click in the patella tendon in my right knee. It wasn’t enough to make me come off but it got worse during the game and in the dressing room afterwards, it was really sore. I had a scan the next day and it showed I had a slight tear.
They said I would be out for four weeks. It was a hell of a blow. It was such a crucial stage in the season. We had 11 games left. We thought if we won eight of them, that would probably be enough for the title. We were so tantalisingly close. The first two games I missed were tough ones, too. Home to Arsenal and then away to Liverpool. We lost them both without scoring a goal.
When we drew at home to Ipswich in the next game, we knew the league had gone. Almost in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, we were eight points behind United. Liverpool and Arsenal had opened a bit of a gap on us as well. We were even starting to worry about whether we would qualify for the Champions League because Chelsea were chasing us for fourth place.
When we could only draw at home with Fulham on April 8, our lead over Chelsea was down to a single point with five games to play. I had already missed six games and I was desperate to come back. I was training but my knee still wasn’t right. It wasn’t healing. But we rallied after the Fulham game. We won at Derby and rolled Charlton over at St James’ Park. That meant that if we got a point or better against Blackburn at Ewood Park, fourth place would be safe.
I’d made the bench for the Charlton game and I came on against Blackburn. We came from behind twice as two goals from Shearer carried us to a 2-2 draw. It put us out of reach of Chelsea and it was my last involvement in the season. Sir Bobby left me out of the last two games. He knew that my knee wasn’t right. There was no point risking me now that there was nothing left to play for.
In the end, we finished 16 points adrift of the title winners Arsenal, who had beaten Liverpool into second place. Behind us, Leeds pipped Chelsea to fifth place but they were about to disappear into the chasm. Nobody had expected us to finish fourth but we had done it. I had won the PFA Young Player of the Year along the way, voted for by my peers, and now I’d be playing in the Champions League the following season. The dream I had been chasing was coming true. I was part of football’s elite.
I didn’t have much chance to celebrate what we had achieved. Before the season was even over, I was on a plane to Colorado to see the surgeon, Richard Steadman. So I celebrated with a knee operation. He said I’d be out for four months, which would get me back almost for the start of the 2002-03 season and the beginning of our Champions League campaign.
I did very little rehab during the summer. My knee was in a brace, I kept out of trouble and I assumed everything was going to be fine. But on the first day of pre-season back up in the north-east, it still didn’t feel right. The brace was off by then but I was in quite a lot of discomfort as soon as I even started jogging. I had to go back inside straight away. I was worried.
I wasn’t ready for the start of the new season. I missed the Champions League qualifying round ties against the Bosnian side, Željezni, which we won 5-0 on aggregate, and I had to sit out the opening Premier League games against West Ham and Manchester City, too. We had let Sylvain Distin go in the summer, which was a mistake, but we had signed a decent Portuguese kid called Hugo Viana from Sporting Lisbon and even though expectations were much higher, I thought we’d have another decent season.
I came back on September 2. Sir Bobby brought me off the bench at Anfield when we were 2-0 down to Liverpool and I helped get us back into the game. Speedo and Shearer both scored in the last 10 minutes and we rescued a draw out of it. I played well and people were saying what a relief that I was back as good as new. But I knew I wasn’t back. I knew my knee still wasn’t feeling that great.
I wanted to play for Wales in a European Championship qualifier in Finland the following Saturday and Newcastle said I had to prove my fitness in a midweek reserve team match against Blackburn. The whole thing turned into a saga. I played in the reserve match but then my flight to Helsinki was cancelled. I rang the Wales manager, Mark Hughes, and told him what had happened.
Things had been a lot more professional under Sparky and he took this on as a test case. He asked the Welsh FA to charter a private plane to get me out there. He fought and fought for it and in the end they bowed to his demands. I was pleased. It showed we were getting serious at last and that we wanted to have a proper shot at qualifying. It sent a message. We won the game.
While I was waiting for that flight, I had a call from Eric Harrison, the guy who was the youth team manager at Manchester United when they won the FA Youth Cup in 1992 with that side that included Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Nicky Butt and Gary Neville. Eric did some work with Wales, too, and now he was ringing to say that Sir Alex Ferguson had asked him to call me.
Eric wanted to know who my representative was so I told him and soon after, Steve Horner and Peter Robinson went to meet Ferguson at United’s training ground. Ferguson told them he wanted to sign me but didn’t think Newcastle would sell me.
I was flattered, obviously. But I was worried, too. I was unsure about my knee. It was constantly hurting. There were times when I couldn’t do what I wanted to do when I was on the ball because the pain was getting in the way. I didn’t want to make movements or runs that increased the pain. I knew that if I went to Manchester United, I would have to make an immediate impact and I didn’t feel I was in the shape to do that.
There was also the small matter of the fact that I was very happy at Newcastle. I had just had a great season; we were in the Champions League; I was PFA Young Player of the Year and I had a brilliant manager who loved me. Everything seemed bright. It was nice to know United were interested but I thought perhaps it would be something that happened further down the line.
We made Newcastle fully aware that if they didn’t meet my contract demands, I would run my existing deal down and go to United. I had a meeting with Freddy Shepherd about it. He asked me how much I wanted and I told him £50,000 a week. I knew what other players were getting. It was my market value at that time.
Freddy just got up from his seat and walked out of the room without saying a word. He didn’t even have the decency to tell me to fuck off.
I didn’t pay much attention. It was all in the future anyway and I was more concerned with the Champions League. We had been drawn in a tough group with Dynamo Kiev, Juventus and Feyenoord but I was still confident we could go through. I was excited, too. To be playing in the Champions League was another one of the targets I had set myself.
The first game was away in Kiev in the middle of September. Instead of playing in the Olympic Stadium, the match was at the Lobanovskiy Stadium, a beautiful old ground ringed by trees on a hill overlooking the River Dnieper. This was my first taste of the biggest stage of all. We walked out on to the pitch and the Champions League music was playing. This was football. This was where I wanted to be.
But Dynamo were a tough team, particularly in Kiev. They played three at the back and Alan and I were both man-marked. My marker, a defender called Tiberiu Ghioane, followed me absolutely everywhere, which was a new experience for me. They were two goals up after an hour and I began to get frustrated. My knee was hurting and Ghioane was trying to rough me up.
In the last few minutes, he cleared the ball upfield and followed through so he made sure he kicked me. The game was already lost but he was getting to me. In stoppage time, he gave me a nudge in the back and I turned around to confront him. As I squared up to him, I head-butted him. It was a pathetic thing to do but I thought I might have got away with it. The referee didn’t see it and nor did the linesman. It wasn’t the best head-butt and to the fella’s credit, he didn’t even go down.
I played in the next match against Feyenoord at St James’ Park the following week. I hit the bar and had a shot cleared off the line by Brett Emerton but we lost 1-0 and everybody said that was the end of our chances of making it through to the next stage. Things got worse the next day when Uefa announced that they had reviewed television footage of my incident with Ghioane.
They released a statement. It said: ‘In the 91st minute, Craig Bellamy deliberately head-butted an opponent in the face. Since the referee did not see the incident, the decision was rendered on the basis of video evidence.’ I was given a three-game ban for violent conduct, which was heartbreaking. I had worked so hard to play in the Champions League and now I was going to miss out on two games against Juventus and the return against Kiev.
I’d be back for Feyenoord away but I thought we’d probably only have pride to play for by then. While I was suspended, we lost the next game to Juventus 2-0, courtesy of two goals from Alessandro Del Piero. We had lost our first three games. Our Champions League campaign was turning into an embarrassment.
The only positive was that the ban gave me a chance to go back to Colorado to see Richard Steadman again. I was worried that the operation on my knee had not been a success. I needed to have a check-up. Dr Steadman said he didn’t want to operate again. The patella tendon was healing, he said, but he gave me very specific instructions about my continued rehabilitation.
He said I needed to do less shooting and no double sessions. As far as I was concerned, they were the kind of instructions that meant I wouldn’t be able to play football again. ‘You can’t tell me to do this,’ I thought, ‘I’m a striker.’ Part of the manic drive I had stemmed from wanting to improve and training was where I did that. I always wanted to stay to the last second of every session. I loved being out there until the last kick. Now I was being told I couldn’t do that any more.
I hated leaving training and seeing the others doing extra finishing. I resented it. I grew bitter about it. I knew I needed to improve but I couldn’t do it unless I was practising and I couldn’t practise because I would put more stress on my tendon and then feel the effects a day later. I became a miserable bastard. I was horrible to be around. This was my career on the line and I became consumed by anxiety and anger.
I was playing off and on. I scored a few goals in the Premier League but I felt like I was getting away with it, not excelling. Some games I was brilliant but the next week I couldn’t do it again because my knee was suffering from the week before. There was one ray of light. We had beaten Juventus at St James’ Park and then we beat Kiev in the penultimate match of the group, too. That meant that if we beat Feyenoord at De Kuip and Kiev lost to Juventus, we would finish second in the group. It was an unlikely scenario but I was available for the Feyenoord game. It gave me something to aim for.
I love De Kuip. I love that stadium. It’s a beautiful ground, a real proper football ground. We trained there the night before the game and it was cold and crisp. It felt like a proper European night. I could tell it was going to be a great occasion. The next day, we got on the coach to go to the ground and there were loads of Feyenoord fans around our coach, banging and shouting. It was hostile but it was great.
Both teams had so much to play for because we could both qualify if we won. The warm-up was as hostile as anything, which is right up my street. If I need any extra motivation, that’s it. I love it when fans scream at me. It puts me right in the mood. For once, my knee felt great, too. I missed one good chance but then Alan flicked one on from a kick out by Shay Given just before half-time and I ran through and scored.
Four minutes after the break, Hugo Viana made it 2-0. We still thought it was unlikely we’d get through to the next phase of the competition because most people expected Kiev to beat a weakened Juventus side in Ukraine. Our main focus, really, was on finishing third and getting into the Uefa Cup, rather than finishing bottom of the group and going back home with nothing.
They sent on a big forward called Mariano Bombarda midway through the second half and he pulled one back. Then, with 20 minutes to go, they equalised. We were right under the cosh but every time we broke we looked like scoring. It was a brilliant game. A few minutes from the end, I thought it was all over. Paul Bosvelt shot from the edge of the box and I thought it was in. Time stood still, Shay didn’t even dive. But the shot flew a few inches wide.
We were holding on but then, in the last minute, we pumped a free-kick forward towards Alan. He won it in the air and suddenly Kieron was bursting into the box. He hit his shot low and to the keeper’s left and when he palmed it out, I ran on to it. It was almost on the byline by the time I got to it but I just thought ‘hit the target’. I hit it hard and true and even though the keeper got his body behind it, he couldn’t keep it out. “Extraordinary,” the television commentator bellowed when it went in.
It was extraordinary, too. It was a brilliant, brilliant night. I thought I’d salvaged a Uefa Cup place for us. I was delighted. The home crowd went silent. Sir Bobby was telling us to concentrate. Then the whistle went and next thing I knew someone said Juventus had beaten Kiev and we were into the next round of the Champions League. What a moment.
To be back on that stage after missing three games felt great. And to qualify in the dramatic way we did made it even better. No one had ever done that before: lost the first three games and then won the last three to qualify. It was a great thing for the city and the club. We were all on a high. I signed a new contract with Newcastle around that time. I got what I wanted. I don’t think Sir Alex Ferguson was too happy with me but it was the best thing for my career at that time.
The Champions League format that year meant the second round was another group stage and we were drawn with Inter Milan, Barcelona and Bayer Leverkusen. That sent the excitement soaring even higher on Tyneside. We were doing okay in the league – we were ninth in mid-November – but this season the focus was more on Europe.
Two weeks after the drama of the victory over Feyenoord in Rotterdam, we were lining up to face Inter at St James’ Park. It felt as though it would be another special night. I was going to be up against players of the calibre of Fabio Cannavaro, Javier Zanetti and Hernan Crespo. And I was about to make history. Just not the kind I hoped for.
I wandered down the tunnel to go out for the warm-up and Marco Materazzi was standing there with a teammate. I didn’t know that much about him then although he had already played for a season with Everton. He was later to gain notoriety for his ability to wind people up. He provoked Zinedine Zidane into head-butting him with taunts about Zidane’s sister in the 2006 World Cup final.
Materazzi stared at me as I walked down the tunnel. He never took his eyes off me. I thought the guy realised he was in for a hell of a game against me that night. Nothing could have been further from the truth, sadly. Inter went a goal up in the second minute when Domenico Morfeo turned in a cross from Zanetti. It was a terrible start but worse was to come.
Four minutes later, I ran after a ball down in the corner. As it went out of play, Materazzi grabbed at me and pinched me. It’s very rare in our game we get pinched. Well it is in my experience, anyway. I swung my arm round to say ‘fuck off’ and it caught him around his midriff. He hit the deck and he was rolling round. I thought ‘shit, this doesn’t look good’. I saw the linesman flagging and I knew straight away I was off. I felt sick to my stomach.
I didn’t mean to hit him. I’m not exactly Mike Tyson. I couldn’t deck someone of his size with a punch. He had reeled me in beautifully. I suppose you have to give him credit for that. I bet he was surprised how quickly I bit. It must have been the easiest night’s winding up he’d had for a long time. The referee showed me the red card. It was the fastest sending-off in Champions League history. I was out for another three games.
I felt terrible. I was desperately disappointed with myself. I couldn’t believe I had been so stupid. We lost the game 4-1 and I felt totally responsible. Most of the other players were brilliant with me. Alan didn’t say anything but then Alan never really did. I just felt I’d let everyone down. I walked through the mixed zone where the players speak to reporters after the game and I took the blame. Not that I had much choice.
I wasn’t going to ask for forgiveness or make excuses. But I thought it was right for me to take the brunt of it. I didn’t want to hide because I had let everyone down. After the Inter game, I had to face up to everything. It was a tough period but it was my own fault. One of the local radio stations gave me a lot of stick, the local paper ran a page of texts about what an idiot I had been. I had to swallow it. I had had enough praise in the good times.
My form in the league was okay and by Christmas we had crept up to sixth but I felt sick about being suspended for the Champions League game against Barcelona in the Nou Camp. What a missed opportunity that was. Again, all my own fault. We lost that match but then we beat Leverkusen home and away to give ourselves a chance of qualifying.
I played against Inter in the San Siro and we drew 2-2. My pal Materazzi wasn’t playing this time and I managed to avoid getting sent off. I set up our first for Alan and we went into the last game at home to Barcelona with an outside chance of making it into the quarter-finals. I missed a couple of good chances early on and when I did get a shot on target, Victor Valdes pushed it on to the post.
We pressed and pressed but Xavi and Gaizka Mendieta began to take control and Patrick Kluivert put them ahead after an hour. I missed a chance to equalise, then hit the bar before Thiago Motta put the game out of reach 15 minutes from the end. Nothing had gone my way but then perhaps I didn’t really deserve any luck. It felt like karma. I was being punished for my two red cards. The adventure was over.