Craig Bellamy - GoodFella (28 page)

Kenny has dealt with a lot of grief. He has seen too much grief. He knew how to deal with mine.

“Go home, Bellers,” he said.

I went back to my apartment in Sefton Park. It was only a few miles. It was the worst journey I’ve ever taken. It was horrible.

I didn’t want anyone else to share in my grief. I wanted to be alone. Despite our troubles, my wife wanted to come up to be with me. I said no. I regret that. It wasn’t fair to her. After all the years we had been together, I should have let her in.

I sat down and watched the television. I had it on Sky News. There were pictures of Shay standing in a line of Aston Villa players before their game against Swansea at the Liberty Stadium. He was crying.

I spoke to Speedo’s dad, Roger. God knows how he managed to speak to anyone.

I spoke to Shay after his game. I don’t know how he played.

I didn’t sleep that night. I was thinking about his kids. He adored his kids. I couldn’t believe he had left them.

And you know what, I felt angry with him, too. I adored him and looked up to him and had the highest respect for him. And now he was dead and I felt angry with him. I felt angry with him for leaving. I felt angry with him for leaving like this.

It started to scare me a little bit as well. If he is capable of that, what chance have the rest of us got?

Some time later, at the inquest into his death, his widow, Louise, described him as ‘a glass half-empty man’ and she was right about that. He got down easily. There was always a line with him. He was very cheerful but he could get down and he could get uncontrollably down. When that happened, you stayed away from him. Don’t say anything because if you say anything out of turn, he will flip.

There was a side of him which could go. Just go. If you took liberties, or he was worried about something, you could see it in him. You could see the tension. You could see him ready to explode. A lot of players were like that. Not just him.

I was determined to play against Chelsea on Tuesday. I had to play. I needed to play to help with my grief. I needed to do something to try to escape what had happened.

I travelled down to London on Monday. Kieron came to see me. Monday night was another sleepless night. There was a minute’s applause for Speedo before the Chelsea game. I stood in the line with the rest of the Liverpool players. I felt okay.

Then the Liverpool fans started singing his name. It was real to me then. That was when I started crying.

I’m a man’s man. I’m not supposed to cry. I didn’t like Chelsea fans. I didn’t want to cry in front of them. But I couldn’t help it. The Chelsea supporters didn’t sing his name but I don’t expect that from them. They’re not my cup of tea. They’re not the type of fans I’d want to play for.

‘I’m going to play fucking well tonight,’ I thought.

Jamie Carragher was great. He didn’t say anything. He just gave me a little pat. When I wiped the tears away, I thought ‘let’s go’.

And Chelsea couldn’t get near me that night. It was one of the best games I have ever played. We won 2-0 and I set up both goals. The game was easy after the two days I had just had. It was a performance worthy of Speedo’s memory.

Kenny brought me off 10 minutes from the end. He gave me the biggest hug when I got to the touchline, which is typical of him.

Then I sat on the bench, put a coat over my head and cried.

28

Winning And Losing

I
was happy about signing for Liverpool again in August, 2011, but it also represented a significant moment in my personal life. After a year in Cardiff, I was moving away again. I didn’t consult Claire about joining Liverpool. I didn’t really give her an option. I don’t think she really cared anyway by then. But this was the final straw. When I hit the motorway for the drive north for the beginning of pre-season training in the summer, I knew my marriage was slipping away.

Our prospects of staying together had been hurt by the way I’d acted when I was living at home during my year of playing for Cardiff. It was a difficult season for me on the field and my behaviour at home was often surly and withdrawn. And now it was either Liverpool or my wife. That’s how I felt. And I took Liverpool. The way I saw it, playing for Liverpool was my destiny. This is what I was here for. I was born to play this game and Liverpool was my team.

It was a joy to be back at Melwood. Some of the players from my first spell were still there, of course, Jamie Carragher and Steven Gerrard among them. They were just even bigger legends now than they had been four years earlier. The most significant change, as I say, was that Rafa had gone and Kenny was now in charge.

People talk about Kenny being the greatest Liverpool footballer of all time. He probably is. But you know what, he is the greatest man who has ever played for Liverpool Football Club. There is no shadow of a doubt about that. To be involved with him was just a huge honour. He was brilliant to play for.

He had such a calming influence over everyone at the club. He was just The King. He was a true man. The humility he shows constantly on a daily basis to everyone was overwhelming. When I say ‘everyone’, I don’t just mean the players. I mean all the employees of the club. The impression you get of him on the television, defensive and monosyllabic, is the exact opposite of what he is like when the camera is turned off.

We started the 2011-12 season reasonably well without being outstanding. We were inconsistent. We had a good win at Arsenal but we were heavily beaten by Spurs. We drew matches we should have won. I didn’t start that many matches. In fact, my best spell was around Christmas and the New Year when Luis Suarez was banned after he was accused of racially abusing Patrice Evra during the Liverpool-Manchester United match at Anfield on October 15.

I was on the bench for that game against United. I didn’t have a clue what had happened. There’s no reason why I would. The referee came in after the game and I saw him speaking to Kenny and Luis but I had no way of knowing what had happened. All I knew was that Liverpool often seem to get a raw deal from the authorities and that Manchester United wield an awful lot of power.

I liked Luis. He was an incredible player and a lovely guy. He trained hard and he worked relentlessly during matches. People talk about him diving but he took a hell of a lot of punishment, too. He would take his socks off after a game and his calves and his ankles would be black and blue from where he had been kicked. He was a brilliant professional.

Luis was accused of calling Evra ‘negro’ during the match against United. I’d heard that used before. The first time was when Nolberto Solano was speaking to Lomana LuaLua at Newcastle.

I pulled him up on it straight away.

“You can’t say that,” I said to Solano.

Nobby looked surprised.

“Why?” he said. “He’s my black friend.”

I heard Luis using the same term when he was speaking to Glen Johnson, Liverpool’s right-back, too. Johnno certainly didn’t take any offence and he speaks fluent Spanish, too. He knows a little bit about the culture. I didn’t really see what the difference was between that and what Luis was alleged to have said to Evra.

Some people said it was all about the context. If it was said in an angry way, it took on a different meaning. It all got very complicated.

Liverpool closed ranks. I was 32 and I’ll be honest, I didn’t want to get involved. I had enough troubles of my own. I liked Luis. I certainly knew he wasn’t racist. The other players in that squad knew he wasn’t racist. I knew because of the way he interacted with the black players in our squad and the way they interacted with him.

I stayed out of it. Five days before Christmas, Luis was banned for eight games and fined £40,000 by the FA over the Evra incident. The next evening, we played Wigan at the DW Stadium and in the warm-up before the match, we all wore t-shirts with an image of Luis on the front to show our support for him. Kenny got a lot of criticism for that but we all wanted to do it.

I was happy to wear it. I wouldn’t have worn one if I thought Luis was a racist but I knew he wasn’t. And I thought the ban he had been given was harsh. I thought he’d been set up, actually. I think most of the players felt aggrieved about the way he and the club had been treated. If it was a Manchester United player, I think it would all have turned out very differently.

Luis was banned when we played the first leg of our Carling Cup semi-final against Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium in the middle of January. It was a loaded game for me but even though I wasn’t on great terms with Roberto Mancini, I really didn’t feel any great desire for personal revenge or anything like that. I had a great deal of respect for the club and especially for the City fans. I certainly didn’t harbour any bitterness towards them. I felt a bit calmer about things.

The news about Speedo had hit me incredibly hard at the end of November. Some time after his death, I went home to Cardiff for a couple of days. Those days are just a blur. I can’t remember what it was like. I wish I could tell you that I was comforted by my wife or my family but I don’t know. Then I went up to Speedo’s house. I knew Ed was a big Liverpool fan and I wondered if taking both the boys into Melwood might give them a tiny bit of relief from what they were going through. They were all smiles about that so I took them and Speedo’s dad into training with me.

You know when you take people to Melwood that you are taking them into the greatest club in the world. Moments like that make you realise why. The boys were greeted with open arms by every single person at that club. They had kits and boots lined up for them. Kenny was there waiting for them. That’s Liverpool Football Club. I have always been proud to support them but that day was the best.

The days went on and I still found it very difficult to come to terms with what had happened. I was haunted by what I heard people saying about Speedo, about how it was sometimes difficult to get a conversation out of him, about how he didn’t have very many close friends, about how he would shut himself off, about how most people didn’t really know what he was like. I was haunted by it because it sounded like they were talking about me.

I started to feel afraid. What’s going to happen to me in a few years’ time? My personal life is gone, my marriage is basically over, I am extremely unhappy. What am I going to do when I stop playing football? Who am I going to be? There were so many questions left unanswered.

While I was in this state of mind, Liverpool’s club doctor, Zaf Iqbal, approached me. He told me I needed to see someone. For the first time, my guard was down. I knew he was right. I agreed. He recommended Steve Peters, a psychiatrist who was working with Britain’s Olympic cycling team. And when I sat down with him, not one single person in this world has ever made more sense to me than him.

Steve took a lot of the anger out of me. All the bullshit about getting back at people was gone. So I felt like I didn’t have anything to prove to anybody at Man City. They knew I was a good player. I got on well with the lads there, too. I had good relationships with Nigel de Jong, Carlos Tevez and Micah Richards. They held me in high esteem and I did the same with them. I wanted to enjoy the matches against them. Over two legs the best team would go through. Whatever would be, would be.

We won the first leg at the Etihad 1-0 with a Steven Gerrard penalty. I felt confident after that. For them to get to the final, they would have to beat us at Anfield on a midweek night in front of a packed house. It was going to take a performance from Man City that would have to be out of this world. And if they were capable of that, then they would deserve to go to the final.

Nigel de Jong put them ahead after half an hour and we equalised with another Gerrard penalty just before half-time. Edin Dzeko put them 2-1 up midway through the second half but then 15 minutes from the end, Glen Johnson and I exchanged passes in front of the Kop end and I darted into the area and slid the ball past Joe Hart into the corner of the net. City couldn’t score again. We were through.

And so I had scored the goal that had given this incredible club that I loved so much the opportunity to go back to Wembley for the first time since 1996. Kenny brought me off two minutes from the end and even the Man City fans applauded me. I loved them for that. City were class, actually. The players I’d played with came up to me at the final whistle and hugged me. I shook Mancini’s hand and wished him all the best in their bid to win the league title.

I wanted them to win that but I knew I had a chance now to lift a trophy with Liverpool. A trophy with Liverpool with Kenny Dalglish as your manager. That was why I played the game. It was why I wanted to be involved in the game. It was a wonderful night. I also felt calm. I had things in perspective. Speedo’s kids were at the game. Stevie G lent me his box and the kids and Gary’s father came.

There was something else special about reaching the final. We already knew who we would be playing: Cardiff City. I had never played against Cardiff before and I had never wanted to. I didn’t want to upset people at home. I didn’t want people to feel I was trying to beat Cardiff. I had never felt comfortable with the idea of putting myself through that. But there was no way around it this time. It was the final.

I spoke to Steve Peters the night before the game. On the morning of the match, I found myself looking at pictures of Speedo as I sat in my hotel room at The Grove. His kids were going to be at Wembley too. I made sure all the people who had been there for me had tickets. People like Andy Williams, the knee surgeon, and Garry Cook, City’s former chief executive, who had been forced out of the club by then. I was going to make sure I enjoyed the day. I wanted to win the trophy but I was prepared to lose as well. And if Cardiff won, that would be fine.

Kenny named the team and I wasn’t in it. I was surprised but I wasn’t down. I would have loved to start because I thought the game would have been made for me and Luis up front but I was happy to be involved. I knew I would be coming on, too.

Before the match, the manager showed us a short film that illustrated what Wembley meant to Liverpool and what it meant to the club being back there. I sat there watching Shankly talking and Kenny scoring that magnificent winner against Bruges in the 1978 European Cup final. And I thought about all my years of growing up and wanting to be part of this club. When the film ended, there were tears in my eyes.

Twenty minutes in, we went a goal down against the run of play. But we dominated the game and Kenny brought me on for Jordan Henderson 13 minutes into the second half. It was nothing to do with me but two minutes later we drew level when Martin Skrtel scored from a corner. The game went to extra-time and Dirk Kuyt put us ahead with 12 minutes left. It looked like it was over because Cardiff were exhausted but in the last few minutes, they pinned us in our own half.

They missed one great chance when Dirk cleared off the line but the ball went for a corner. Peter Whittingham bent a brilliant delivery into the box and Ben Turner scored. Credit to them. There is even a picture of me smiling after they had scored. I admired their refusal to give up.

So it went to penalties. Kevin Keen had asked me if I wanted to take one of our five and I said ‘yes’. Then I thought about it. I didn’t want to score a pen to win a trophy for Liverpool but cost Cardiff the chance of winning one. But I didn’t want to miss a penalty and be responsible for one of Cardiff’s greatest moments. For the first time in my life, I asked to be left out of it. I think they put me down for number six or seven.

I wasn’t needed. We missed our first two penalties but scored the next three. That meant that Steven Gerrard’s cousin, Anthony, had to score Cardiff’s fifth penalty to keep their hopes alive. He put it low to Pepe Reina’s right but it went wide. The trophy was ours. Most of the lads sprinted over to leap on Pepe. I didn’t go with them. I went to see the Cardiff players straight away. I congratulated them and Malky Mackay. It was a good moment for me but I had been playing with those players the previous year and I was proud of the guts they showed that day at Wembley. I had so much respect for them.

Even when we lifted the trophy, I was speaking to the Cardiff owners. If you look, I’m not even in the team celebration photo. I was speaking to the Cardiff physios and players. I was sharing the moment with them. I had got my trophy. This was what I’d chased all my career. I was happy but I was happy before. I just didn’t know it.

I had other things to think about as well. I knew that the problems I had been having with my marriage were now beyond repair. When the adrenaline stopped, I went up to see my wife and kids in the area where the families had been watching. This was going to be the last time. My wife was happy for me but I knew there must have been part of her that felt exasperated, too. ‘You’ve chased this your whole career and now you’ve got it,’ I imagined her thinking. I knew my marriage was over by then.

I went back to Cardiff with her after the game and we didn’t really talk on the way home. There was nothing more to say. Once you have been 18 years with each other, you separate, then there’s an in-between where you can’t live with them but you can’t live without them, then there’s divorce. It was a lot for us both to adjust to. Because of the work I’d done with Steve Peters, I’d suddenly become a nice guy. She didn’t want nice. She needed to hate me. So she resented me even more.