One Shot at Glory

  Chapter Five

  ‘Slow down David, this isn’t an F1 car.’

  Glancing at the speedometer. Dad, as usual, is correct in stating the blindingly obvious.

  I put it down to the fact he is adjusting to being a passenger as we head to Lowfield Road on that crisp, Boxing Day morning.

  I can’t get enough of my new found ‘freedom’ – even with a nagging babysitter for company and a set of learner plates.

  I pestered him for lessons as soon as I turned 17 last month. Just like my football career, I don’t want to sit in the slow lane. For me it is taking my theory and passing my driving test. Simple.

  Dad’s favourite phrase at the minute revolves around learning to run before I can walk.

  Point taken.

  At least I can walk, run, play football. Go back 20 months or so and my life was on hold as I hobbled to my usual West Stand seat, broken ankle in plaster, crutches resting in the gangway.

  Wolston won that day but for the first and only time I hadn’t wanted to be anywhere near the most magical place in the world.

  Now I feel an uneasy sense of déjà vu as Dad shoves me out of the driver’s seat so he can squeeze into a tight parking space about five minutes walk from Lowfield Road.

  The ankle is fine. The first few weeks of the new season were tough but the hard work had paid off. I was training every day like a full-time footballer. I feel fit and strong.

  My body is okay. The head? Well, that is a different matter.

  Christmas at least means a break from the grind. A time of year when people reflect on the good and bad moments, the monster news stories, the funniest social media virals, biggest-selling records. For me, it’s an effort not to keep dwelling on how I salvage a disastrous start to my Wolston scholarship.

  Every road leads back to Norwich. The fallout had been brutal. My backside and various dugouts across the country became well-acquainted in the weeks that followed.

  I train every day like my life depends on it and all for a few minutes on the pitch if I am lucky.

  Olaf Thin’s star continued to rise as mine dipped over the horizon. Thinny is pure class. Duncan labels him the ‘Great Dane’, zero points for originality, but he was well into double figures in goals by the time he returned home to Denmark for the holidays.

  I’d notched a pitiful four. My worst ever tally at this stage, including the spell when I was recovering from injury. It isn’t just the lack of goals or starts. Now I’m skulking around in Thinny’s ever-growing shadow.

  Strikers are a breed apart. We’re selfish, vain and arrogant. We live to score goals because goals earn wins, wins earn headlines, pats on the back, a professional contract.

  I still have 18 months left to impress but the clock is ticking. This is no kickabout in the park or playing at school with my mates anymore, when the result didn’t matter and arguments over whether the ball went over the coats raged for days.

  Every second on the pitch as a scholar is precious, Wolston’s coaches constantly monitoring everything you did or didn’t do; each match, each training session a battle for survival, trying to prove you belong or watch a rival grab your spot.

  My self-confidence had taken a battering.

  I won’t lie, I’m happy to watch this Boxing Day derby against Didsbury from the sidelines rather than think I could or even should be out there.

  There’s still some jealousy on my part as I study the likes of Mark Pounchett, Bobby Hassall and Ryan Hamer go through their pre-match warm ups down below my West Stand seat.

  All three had come through the academy. They were living proof it worked. After another bad day I only had to look across the training pitches to the first team squad and watch those lads who had survived the same torture as me.

  Duncan’s rants, Dooley’s burning fitness tests, Kearns’ classroom drills. They must have had similar periods of self-doubt, when it seemed you couldn’t do right for wrong, but they all came out the other side.

  Now they were part of a Wolston team badly in need of a win, not for local bragging rights, just to climb up the Championship table.

  Mark Peacock is refusing to speak to the local press at present. They’ve been critical of recent performances and he’s taken major offence, which they in turn take as a sign the pressure is getting to him. He can’t win in my eyes.

  Matt Kearns had already warned us about the pitfalls of dealing with the media. Supporters only care about what they see on the pitch every weekend but, trust me, there is a lot more to being a footballer. Like the dangers from bad publicity or saying the wrong thing to the wrong people who will twist your words in print or social media.

  I already knew enough to realise the media hunt in a pack.

  We would see them on Thursday mornings in the canteen at The Lodge huddling in a corner waiting for the weekly press conference to preview Saturday’s game, ready to grill Peacock or his first team players, desperate for a headline and a soundbite.

  Most of them have never played the game but they were experts, ready to tell anyone who would listen where Peacock is going wrong.

  Then again, he needs all the help he can get. Rovers are in a dogfight at the bottom.

  Didsbury had always been the poor relations compared to us. Never once in the top flight, a solid, smaller club punching above their weight. Now they were coming to Lowfield Road comfortably in mid-table. It was a tough role reversal for us ‘Sky Blue’ followers.

  The stadium is bursting at the seams in the bright, wintry sunshine.

  A massive cheer greets the players. For a split-second I feel like a fan again – trying to cope with that nervous sensation welling in the pit of my stomach, the heart pounding, the rising sense of anticipation.

  City’s experienced centre forward, Rennie, blazes wide from 12 yards after controlling Hassall’s rushed clearance.

  Never mind the fans, the home players seem to be struggling with their nerves.

  Dad gets more and more agitated. I try to do what Bopper has always told me - watch the game within the game. My focus is on Wolston’s big-money summer import.

  Radek Raszi had arrived with an impressive pedigree and a glut of goals over the past two seasons, a Czech Republic under-21 international striker.

  Peacock said it was the best £750,000 he’d ever spent when Wolston pushed the boat out before the start of the season.

  The touch and technique are there for all to see. Even in the midst of a full-blooded English derby you can tell he has the raw materials, but his lack of goals to this point in a Wolston shirt paint a different story. Of a guy struggling for confidence.

  Just before the interval he miscues horribly inside the Didsbury penalty area and the ball balloons high into the East Terrace. It is the shot of a striker with two goals to his name all season.

  Raszi troops down the tunnel at half-time looking like a condemned man.

  I’m watching a mirror image of myself.

  ‘Peacock has a major job on his hands here, Dad,’ as me and my old man begin our usual half-time inquest.

  ‘This crowd is ready to turn, David. They can’t buy a goal at the minute. He needs his experienced players to stand up.’

  Just one problem, the majority were unfit for duty. I saw the depressing evidence with my own eyes every day at The Lodge. The medical suite might as well have been fitted with revolving doors. The physiotherapy staff and Wolston’s club doctor were rapidly becoming more important to Peacock than his crocked players.

  I look across to the tunnel area as players start to emerge.

  Raszi is now wearing a tracksuit. I follow his path as he walks, head bowed, along the touchline and buries himself out of sight in the back row of the home dugout.

  Robbed of any chance to set the record straight after his earlier howler, or the chance to avoid a sleepless night. Now he has to sit through the same dross as the rest of us.

  The lack of quality on both sides is painful. The second half drifts ai
mlessly to its inevitable conclusion. Rovers force a corner to ironic cheers.

  Dad is right. The natives are definitely getting restless.

  Wolston have loyal supporters but playing so poorly against arch rivals seems beyond the pale even for the West Terrace hardcore.

  City’s keeper clutches Pounchett’s tame strike and launches a booming goal kick towards Rennie. The veteran forward may have lost any pace he had, but his touch hasn’t deserted him.

  Rovers still have defenders trudging back from the corner. Rennie turns and lays the ball off.

  Didsbury’s winger takes two touches, looks up, and picks out his near post dart. The bald-headed striker doesn’t even break stride as his clever looping flick arcs over Wolston’s diving keeper into the far corner of the goal.

  One pocket of Lowfield Road erupts. For the other three sides of the ground this is the stuff of nightmares.

  Two old boys sitting in our row jump up and shuffle towards the gangway.

  ‘Rubbish. Sack Peacock. He’s clueless,’ shouts the white-haired ring leader.

  A trickle of disgruntled punters turns into a steady stream as each, suffocating minute slips by with no sign of any home comeback.

  The more Rovers try the more passes go astray. Peacock stands alone with his arms folded in the technical area. A visible target for the boo boys.

  ‘Going down, going down, going down,’ taunt the Didsbury fans.

  I can’t remember the last time they’d won here. Even Dad is scratching his head for the answer as the fourth official emerges with the time added on board.

  Rovers are going to ring in the New Year in the bottom three. So much for raising my spirits, I’m heading home even more depressed.

  My mobile starts to vibrate. I reach inside my coat pocket. Jim Cornforth’s name is on the dash.

  ‘Jimbo, how’s tricks?’

  ‘Aye not bad Davie. You at the game?’

  ‘Yeah boss. Absolute shocker. One down going into stoppage time. Their keeper hasn’t had a decent save to make all game. Peacock’s getting some serious stick off the crowd around me.’

  ‘Can you blame them? That’ll be ten without a win, proper relegation form.’

  ‘I know, I know, son. How’s your Christmas. Are you snowed in up there?’

  Jimbo was back in Scotland visiting his extended family. A loud chorus of boos greets the full-time whistle.

  ‘All over Jim.’

  ‘Peacock will be out of a job at this rate. Yeah, it’s not too bad up here. My brother and sister have gone up to Aviemore for a few days skiing. I’d love to join them but the club would kill me.’

  ‘Take it from me, a plaster cast and crutches is not a good look,’ I laugh. ‘I can just see Duncan’s face when you report back next week.’

  I nod to Dad as I follow him out of the stadium, weaving between a throng of glum faces as we head back towards our car.

  The old man looks annoyed at not having my undivided attention. Either that or the fact he has some serious flak coming from his Didsbury-supporting work mates after Christmas.

  ‘Duncan’s already going to be suicidal after what happened to Thinny.’

  ‘The Great Dane? Why? What’s the story there, Jim?’

  ‘You mean you haven’t heard, Davie? He’s broke his leg in two places.’

  I stop dead in my tracks, trying to process Jim’s bombshell. Dad moves on a good 50 yards before he turns around and gestures to pull my finger out.

  ‘Dave, Dave, are you still there, pal?’

  ‘…sorry Jim. That’s shocking. How did it happen? Who told you? How bad is he? How long is he out for?’

  My brain is working overtime. Olaf may have elbowed me out of the limelight over these past few months but I still didn’t wish this on him or anyone else.

  ‘I just rang him earlier to wish the lad Happy Christmas and his Dad answered. He told me Olaf is in hospital in Copenhagen. They were in a car accident. The smash happened a couple of days ago and they operated yesterday.

  ‘All I know is he was a passenger. His Dad says they were waiting at a junction and another vehicle slammed into the side. Brake failure, apparently.’

  ‘That’s terrible. But he’s going to be alright?’

  I feel guilty asking Jim the question as soon as the words leave my mouth.

  ‘The doctors have pinned his right leg. Olaf’s Dad thinks he’ll probably need another operation or two as well. It’s serious stuff, Davie, a double fracture.’

  Suddenly derby defeat doesn’t seem to matter. Or the pressure Peacock is under. Or even my old man’s hacked-off expression as he turns the engine. I just can’t get this image of Olaf laid up in a hospital bed out of my head, looking down at his shattered right leg when the painkillers start to wear off.

  I knew that pain. The mental torture, the dark place he is about to enter.

  Maybe I should ring him? Tell him he’ll get through it and he’ll come out the other side?

  Behave yourself, Shawsy. It took weeks and months to come to terms with my own injury. I am still struggling now, if truth be told.

  The final few days of our festive break drag. Olaf is never far from my thoughts. I decide this is not the right time for rationality or sympathy.

  Just leave him alone.

  Rovers pick up a vital New Year’s Day win.

  Perhaps the disgruntled white-haired old boy from Boxing Day will return for the following home game? For me, there were more important things going on in life.

  Look, I’d be lying here if I said I’d become good mates with Olaf. My gut instincts after our first meeting in the video suite at The Lodge were bang on. Duncan’s charm offensive to get him, those heroics against Norwich and all his goals since - Olaf Thin was a proper player and for however long he was out we were going to miss him.

  The rest of the lads clearly feel the same. The training ground is a desolate place that first morning back after the holidays. No laughter, no banter flying about, no tales of festive scrapes and mischief. Everyone knows the score as Duncan gathers us together in the same video suite we were first introduced to each other way back in July.

  ‘Gentlemen, before you go out for training I want to update you on Olaf Thin. Firstly, I’ve been over to Copenhagen last week and visited him in hospital. He wants me to pass on his thanks for the cards and get well messages of support.

  ‘I think it’s fair to say Olaf’s become a very popular figure in his short time here. We all know what a gifted player he is, but he’s also a great lad – which is why this news comes as such a big shock to everyone.’

  For once I couldn’t argue with Duncan.

  ‘Olaf’s doctors feel it will be at least eight or nine months before he can think about kicking a ball and it goes without saying he’ll get all the help he needs from the club to get back playing.’

  I look around at the lads. Some of them are visibly upset. Not me. I’d heard the same long sentence when I wrecked my own ankle. I was already hardened to missing something you love.

  ‘Now boys, we have to be professional about this. My message to you all is a simple one.’ Duncan’s voice rises a few decibels, like he feels the need to grab our attention again. ‘However hard it is to take you can’t let something like this affect you. I know its tough but injuries, serious ones at that, are part and parcel of football. Maybe not in such terrible circumstances, but that is life.

  ‘Some of you in this room have already experienced that side of being a young footballer.

  ‘We have to re-focus as a group and put Olaf’s injury to the back of our minds.’

  One selfish thought is already dominating mine. One I can’t share with the rest of the lads.

  Olaf’s car accident leaves a vacancy in Wolston’s under-18s strikeforce and I am going to stake my claim. At that moment I don’t care if Dooley’s hand has been forced. Or that a gifted Danish footballer lies in hospital facing an uncertain future.

  Dooley pulls me prio
r to our first away trip of the new year at Tottenham.

  I’d been waiting for this chat.

  ‘David, I’m sure you realise but this is your opportunity now. It’s your time. You have to make the most of it.’

  Finally, a fair crack of the whip from the sergeant major. That’s all I want.

  ‘Gaffer, I’ve worked my tail off every day since last summer.’

  This is a speech in rehearsal for months. I have it word-perfect now and Dooley is going to hear the full version.

  ‘I know I haven’t been the best of trainers in the past, when I was younger I mean, before my ankle injury, but I’ve tried to knuckle down. It might not come across like that but I want to be a professional at this club, just as much as any other lad.

  ‘Maybe the injury helped me grow up a bit, made me realise what I could lose and what I had to do to achieve my dream.

  ‘Whatever you, Rob Duncan or any of the academy coaches think about me, you can’t question my work rate or my attitude this season.’

  Dooley looks slightly taken aback.

  Perhaps he expected a routine ‘yes boss’ or a shake of the head. Not a full-on plea in mitigation in the case of Wolston versus David Shaw.

  This summit meeting is long overdue in my book. All the frustration, all the games sitting on the bench kicking my heels start pouring out of me.

  Dooley walks on a few paces in total silence before pausing. One of the ground staff at The Lodge is buzzing away on his small lawnmower cutting the grass on the nearest training pitch.

  I get a sinking feeling I’ve gone too far.

  ‘Do you know Rob Duncan tells me every week application, not ability, is what may hold you back?’ he says. ‘It was actually touch or go whether we offered you a scholarship deal last summer.’

  Fantastic. This is just the confidence booster I need from a man who feels I’m a poor substitute for Thinny.

  I don’t need reminding of Duncan’s ‘lazy’ jibe either. I can sense the anger bubbling. I’m not in the mood for diplomacy. Not where Rob Duncan is concerned.

  ‘I really rate you David,’ Dooley reaches out to put an arm on my shoulder. ‘I think Rob is wrong. And I’ve told him so. I believe you have knuckled down and you can do special things. I’ve seen it in training many times, but producing in the games is what sets a young footballer apart.

  ‘Olaf and Phil Warwick were obvious starters a few months ago, because you weren’t strong enough to cope with the physical demands. That stuck out to me like a sore thumb in pre-season.’

  Dooley was right on that score. I did struggle to adjust to the full-time demands of being a footballer.

  ‘You see David, my job is not just about the here and now. It’s about the future.’ Dooley’s consoling arm guides me to one of the dugouts next to the pitch where Peacock and his first team squad are practising set pieces.

  ‘All the academy staff here must work to one goal and that is developing young players to join those professionals over there. You were injured for months at a critical time when your body was still growing and changing.

  ‘To come into this level of football is a huge step. We play the best clubs in the country every week. To do that you need to be at your peak.

  ‘Listen, I know how difficult it is for someone who has been a regular starter to sit and watch games. You probably go home cursing me most weekends.’

  I look straight at him. I’m warming to this guy. He’s a sharper operator than I gave him credit.

  ‘…but you have to take that on board because it’s all part of your education. If you make it, when you make it,’ Dooley has Duncan’s dramatic pause down to a fine art, ‘there’ll be times in your career when you will be out of favour, when you won’t be an automatic first choice, and it’s how you react.

  ‘We, and I mean we, Rob, myself, the other academy staff, we all felt it would perhaps take until after Christmas for you to really come to the fore, alongside Thinny. I haven’t seen anything in our league so far this season that would be a better front pair. Now Olaf is out of the picture we need you to step up to the plate. You have to shoulder that extra responsibility.’

  Never mind extra responsibility. At that very moment it feels like a huge weight is being lifted. Just to hear Dooley say he believes in me, like Bop had done all those years.

  Everything makes sense, the part about holding me back for my own good, not throwing me in before I was ready.

  Why couldn’t this chat have happened last summer? Saving me a lot of stress in the process.

  I can’t wait for Spurs. It’s a re-arranged game due to Tottenham’s FA Youth Cup run.

  We’d gone out early before Christmas with me sat in the stands, of course. Tottenham were genuine title challengers at academy level as well. Even with Thinny’s goals we were no higher than halfway in our league.

  My new strike partner against Spurs has his own agenda. Phil Warwick is running out of time to grab a professional contract at Wolston.

  Second years face the cruellest cut of all, falling at the final hurdle. It’s a stark choice. Earning a pass to the best job in the world or a decade slogging away in junior football with nothing to show for it at the end. Thanks but no thanks.

  I doubt most football fans feel any sympathy when they see the cars, the houses, the bling lifestyle that comes with the high-profile public image.

  But for every pro count the thousands who fall by the wayside. No fame and fortune for them, my friends.

  For me, Warwick is a dead man walking. Sorry. That’s how I feel. Even more so after Dooley’s training ground pep talk listening to him rave over the Shaw/Olaf dream team.

  Tottenham start the match like a side riding high in the league who fancies an FA Youth Cup double.

  Mike Usher tips over a long range effort from Paxton, Spurs’ playmaker and Scottish youth international.

  ‘Jimbo, you’ve got to track him,’ I shout across. ‘otherwise he’ll run off the back of us all day.’

  Jimmy doesn’t need my advice. Paxton is an international colleague. Jimbo practically hi-jacked Dooley’s pre-match team talk warning of the danger in our midst.

  Jim was now emerging as the true leader in our group, even with Goddard in the ranks.

  ‘Aye, pipe down. I know.’

  Jim cuts Paxton down the next time he receives the ball. No room for sentiment here. He takes a yellow card for his pains, but worse follows when Paxton’s floated chip clips the end of our wall and loops up over Usher into the back of the net.

  I watch Mike bawl at the lads in the defensive wall as Paxton smirks at Jimbo before being mobbed by his mates.

  I roll the ball to Phil Warwick to restart. It’s my third touch in 30 minutes, so much for the big statement. I’m a virtual spectator as we get to half-time without any further damage.

  ‘Well done lads, great defensive effort. We’re still in this.’

  Dooley’s calm tone catches me off-guard. Bop would’ve ripped into us. Spurs had given us the run around.

  ‘Right boys, I want to change the system here. We need to match up with two holding players in midfield.’

  I feel a chill from the substitutes’ bench down my spine. This sounds like Norwich, away, only in reverse, with me making way for lumbering Warwick to fly solo.

  ‘Paxton is having an armchair ride,’ Dooley is doing his best to justify the tactical switch to a disbelieving Dave Shaw, ‘he’s got two team mates doing his dirty work in the centre of the park where Spurs are out-numbering us. If we can’t get hold of the ball then we can’t get Shawsy into this game. Phil, off you come son.’

  Warwick grabs a Rovers’ tracksuit top from a pile in the centre of the dressing room floor. Jack Goddard, sat next to him, whispers something in his ear. He was kitted out in the same dark blue tracksuit, another member of the bomb squad.

  I watch Phil pull the top over his head like he’s been handed a straightjacket.

  It was another nail in the
coffin for me.

  I keep on staring as he massages the back of his hamstring. I knew he’d had a niggle for the past month or so, but the body language screams this is a player who realises his time is nearly up.

  ‘Shawsy, plenty of intelligent runs along the line,’ Dooley is standing over me now, ‘you need to keep their defence busy and give us a mobile target that we can play around.’

  That isn’t my natural game. I prefer to run in behind and do my best work inside the penalty box, but I nod. I know it could easily have been me getting hooked.

  I take a long swing on an energy drink. I figure I’m going to need it, this 45 minutes.

  Jimmy Cornforth is now Paxton’s minder, Joe Louisburgh our creative spark in midfield.

  I veer into the left-hand channel a couple of minutes after the interval. Tottenham’s big centre-back is in two minds whether to follow. He doesn’t fancy being dragged into uncharted waters.

  Joe looks up and carves a first time pass with the outside of his left peg.

  I pull the ball down.

  It’s a one-man operation here or wait for the cavalry to arrive.

  My marker finally reacts. Too late. I feint left, lurch right with a cute step over. He makes a grab for my shirt but I’m away.

  One, two, three paces before I let fly at the edge of the box and watch the ball loop miles over the bar.

  Too rushed, too eager, the shot of a man finally let off the leash and desperate to impress.

  I could look at the turf and repair the ‘mystery’ divot that caused my embarrassing slice as the smiling Tottenham keeper retrieves the ball.

  ‘Hey, c’mon. That’s better lads.’

  I run back into position, clapping the boys. I’d never been the most vocal on the park, never a bawler like Goddard, but I sense it is time to make my voice heard.

  Steve Bolder’s last-ditch tackle breaks up another Tottenham raid. The counter is on.

  Jim pivots in the centre-circle, looks up and pings a crossfield pass to the feet of Justin Burt.

  Burty is a year older than me, a second year scholar like Phil Warwick, but that’s where the similarity ends. Burty is already a regular at development level; playing one step above us with the older lads on the fringes of the first team. A prime candidate to earn a first professional contract.

  Spurs’ left-back shows him wide but Burty is comfortable on either foot. He checks back and catches the defender off-balance.

  I scream for an early ball, take my marker away to the back post on a diagonal, before a dart in front.

  Yes, good lad Burty.

  He’s seen my run and clips a pass across Tottenham’s six yard box. I launch myself forward to power a header underneath the diving keeper.

  1-1. Game on.

  I haul myself quickly to my feet and barge a Spurs’ defender out of the way to race into the goal, grab the ball and run back to the centre-circle.

  I look over at Dooley. He has his hands to his temple in the technical area.

  Stay concentrated, stay focused.

  Tottenham make a double change before the restart in a bid to wrestle back the initiative.

  Even at our level they are the big fish. We are small, unfashionable, Wolston. No one cares too much about us outside our remote part of the country.

  One of Dad’s favourite sayings pops into my head.

  It’s only 11 against 11, son. Don’t play the history or the badge on the shirt.

  Tottenham have better players, youth internationals throughout their squad, but we are a unit and we are on top now. Usher barks orders at his defenders, Jim and Joe have the upper hand in midfield as Paxton fades, and Wolston’s re-born striker is waging a one-man crusade up top.

  Burty’s pace earns us another corner. Tottenham’s two defensive midfielders are failing to track his runs. The left-back is having a nightmare.

  He jogs over to take the set piece. We know our jobs. Dooley is a brute when it comes to set piece drills. Corners, free kicks, re-starts.

  Don’t tell him but sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night practically sweating over his flip charts and positional diagrams.

  My role is to disrupt the keeper, stand in front of him, mess him about, anything I can get away with to prevent him coming out to claim a corner cleanly.

  Burty raises his left arm, the signal for a big one towards the back post.

  Goddard’s nemesis, Jamie Green, rises highest. I have my back to goal and the Tottenham keeper for an overcoat as Greeny’s glancing header drops towards me.

  No chance of a touch in such a confined space.

  I stick my backside out to stop him coming around me just to buy a fraction of a second for a cheeky back heel. I look over my shoulder after making contact. It’s barely got enough pace on it, but the element of surprise does for the Spurs’ keeper as it trickles between his legs and over the goal line.

  Get in. Not smiling now, you clown.

  Greeny practically throttles me. I stumble forwards with three team mates clambering on my back.

  Fluke or finesse? I’ll let you choose. Do I care? No chance, but I know it’s the type of goal only a poacher scores.

  Ask me to explain what just happened and I can’t. In that sliver of time, when everything and everyone seems frozen, a natural scorer gets a moment of clarity. You can’t coach it, in my opinion. No amount of diagrams can coach that.

  Five. Dooley holds up five fingers. Time for cool heads in the remaining minutes. Four. Spurs throw on one final substitute as they pile bodies forward. Three. Dave Shaw’s hat-trick.

  Oh yes.

  It’s a pure leg race between me and the defender to gather Greeny’s pressure-relieving punt. No contest. I gallop clear, bring the bouncing ball under control with one touch and slot past the advancing keeper from 10 yards.

  Sheer elation mixes with sheer relief. Like a pressure valve finally gives way after me pushing against it all these months; straining every sinew to loosen one stubborn nut.

  Half an hour or so later, sat in the far corner of the away changing room, it starts to sink in.

  My first hat-trick since coming back from the ankle injury. Three goals against Arsenal a week before my world was turned upside down. Three more against their bitter north London rivals to signal I am back in business.

  After the hellish journey in between I know life no longer revolves around me. The brilliant Olaf Thin proved that, but this is my moment. I’d overcome every setback, every obstacle, every challenge and I am going to savour it.

  ‘You look how I feel,’ laughs Dooley. ‘Anyone would think you’d just run yourself into the ground.’ Dooley leans in closer, just for my benefit, as the music pumps and the walls vibrate to the sound of happy footballers.

  ‘No looking back now, Dave. You’ve really come of age with that performance. Well done.’

  Dooley pats me on the head before helping to carry a crate into the corridor outside to load back onto our team coach. Both of us were going to enjoy the journey home this time.