When the FA Cup third round comes along I can't help but look back at my time playing in the lower leagues with fondness
In the early part of my career I spent some time developing my game in the lower leagues. It didn't bother me because at that time I was just happy to be playing a level of football that meant something to more than a handful of people turning up to a reserve game. I didn't care that the Gay Meadow pitch had been under five foot of water the week before or that Sincil Bank was similar to playing on a sandy beach. It was first-team football.
Each year when the FA Cup third round comes along I can't help but look back on that time with a certain fondness, usually because my club have been drawn to play against a team that I might well have played against when I was first starting out in the game. This weekend Cheltenham, Macclesfield, Swindon and non-league Tamworth will each pit their wits against Premier League opposition in the third round of the FA Cup.
Much is always made of the facilities Premier League sides will encounter while playing away in the lower divisions and, while it is true to say that many of the players in the top flight won't be overly used to cramped conditions and a less-than-perfect pitch, the media places too much emphasis on these things to build up the hype in order to set the scene for a potential giantkilling.
I have never particularly cared where I got changed. I have changed (and warmed up) on team buses when we have been late for games and I have changed in prefabs and outhouses. On one occasion I had to get stripped in front of the crowd as they arrived for the game after the ceiling of the changing rooms fell in under the weight of water that hadn't drained away. Not once has it ever made a blind bit of difference to me.
Lower league opposition playing at a Premier League ground can sometimes find themselves overawed. I had that exact feeling the first time I played at Liverpool where, incidentally, the changing rooms aren't particularly great. The character and history is everywhere, from the moment I saw the "This is Anfield" sign to when I walked up the steps from the tunnel to the strains of You'll Never Walk Alone. That was the moment when I felt football could not get any better ? a thought that it is all too easy to get swept up in.
I held back from taking pictures and sending them to my friends or touching that famous sign above the tunnel or looking up at the Kop just before the kick off as the fans hold their scarves aloft ? there is such a thing as too much respect. I've learned two important things about playing against more illustrious opposition: never look across in the tunnel unless you know someone and never give the impression for one second that you don't belong there, even if the surroundings are a million miles from what you are used to.
The contrast between those clubs at the top and bottom of the ladder is huge. At the lower-league club I played for we had a kit man who resented giving you your kit each day because he had to wash it on his own, one physio who treated everything with ultrasound because that was the only machine he had, and a common that doubled as a training pitch. My current club has numerous kit men, physios, masseurs and fitness coaches working at a training ground that has five practice pitches, full-time chefs and designated car parking. All of which is an endorsement for what football clubs can afford these days rather than what is actually needed.
And in football, less can definitely mean more. I personally loved playing in games where the expectations were relative and nobody knew (or cared) who I was. There was a certain amount of freedom at that point in my career that is impossible to get back. I was able to build my confidence on the back of an understanding that people expected a kid to make mistakes as he learned his trade. Years later, the slightest miscontrol or wayward pass would understandably end with a bollocking. That puts pressure on a player to be impossibly perfect, which in my case has lead to self-inflicted mental beatings and huge levels of frustration. What I am trying to say is that I would love to be able to add the innocence of my early playing days to my game today.
That said, the further down the football pyramid you go, the more obvious it is that for many of these players the game is a job that pays the bills. A lengthy injury at this level can be the difference between earning a new contract and finding a new occupation. At the club I played for the captain appealed against a two-week fine on the grounds that he wouldn't be able to meet his mortgage repayment that month. As I recall, the fine was subsequently reduced to three days, one for each day that the manager felt his performance in training had suffered from going out on a night that infringed club policy.
I learned a huge amount from spending time lower down the ranks. First and foremost, and this isn't meant with any disrespect, it gave me the motivation that I needed never to go back there, at least not as a player. I gained a huge amount from seeing a couple of bitter thirtysomethings going about in pity for themselves that the big money in the game had never found its way into their pockets while scolding anybody who dared to dream of bigger and better things.
Today I am far too pampered for my own good but at least those two players toughened me up and ensured that, to some degree, I kept my feet pretty close to the ground. Sometimes I wonder what became of them. Most of the time, however, I wonder what became of me.
Follow the Secret Footballer on Twitter @TSFguardian
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jan/06/the-secret-footballer-fa-cup
No comments:
Post a Comment