‘TIS the season to be jolly … but not for footballers. The festive period is the busiest time of the season, with games coming thick and fast.
This is a month in which players have to make sacrifices and stop themselves from indulging in alcoholic beverages. It is hard to turn down a drink over Christmas as it’s a time when everyone else lets their hair down and enjoys the festive spirit. We all become envious of “normal” people around this time.
The only time that players can celebrate is at their Christmas party. I’ve had a few good ones in my career. They usually last over two days, one of which is either fancy dress or has a Christmas jumper theme. One year, we decided to go to Dublin, and our whole squad – along with those from two other clubs, also in fancy dress – was packed into a pub in Temple Bar.
The drinks were flowing quite nicely and, as the afternoon went on, a few lads got a bit carried away. It ended up in a messy wrestling fight between the rival players. It must have been a great sight for anyone watching as Spiderman, from a club in the Conference, was choke-slamming Batman, a goalkeeper in League 1, in the middle of the pub!
These things happen every year and it’s the only time over Christmas that players can have fun and celebrate it. For the most part, being professional – both on and off the pitch – is crucial.
I have been unfortunate to have to train a couple of times on Christmas Day. The gaffer makes sure that you prepare right for the game on Boxing Day so brings the lads in for a short, sharp session in the morning or after your dinner in the evening. It is also to make sure that no one is out on the lash the night before, enjoying a Christmas Eve party.
I recall one year that the manager had us all in at 8.30am on Christmas Day. He came up to everyone, shaking our hands and wishing us Happy Christmas; he came right into our faces to try to smell if we had alcohol on our breath.
I knew a few of the lads had been out the night before so I gave them the heads up as I had clocked what he was doing. Luckily, a few of the experienced boys had rinsed their mouths with mouthwash just before heading out on to the training ground, so they got away with it.
It must be hard for the players who have young families and don’t get to spend much time with their kids over Christmas. There’s generally one game over this period that is at the other end of the country, which means the team travel the day before and stay over in a hotel in preparation for the game the following day. You are usually given strict orders about staying away from alcohol and not eating too much food.
It’s an important month in which to accumulate points and can contain season-defining matches. With so many games in such a short space of time, recovery is key. The fixtures on muddy pitches take their toll on you and this is when injuries can kick in as players don’t have much time to recover before the next game.
Adverse weather can also affect the team. When the weather was bad two years ago, most of the games around Christmas were called off. While this might sound perfectly timed for us to enjoy the break, it can nevertheless ruin the momentum of some teams and effectively kill their season.
Matches will be postponed and have to be rearranged, resulting in a backlog. This means that, later in the season, there is sometimes four games a week. For the part-time clubs, with so many matches, they won’t have hardly any time to train. They will generally have smaller squads so injuries will influence how their season pans out.
At a previous club, we were flying and top of the league until postponed games over the festive period proved costly. We went three weeks without a game and, after we’d had the fixtures rearranged, we starting losing. Postponements can definitely hinder your season.
At one of my former clubs, the gaffer enforced strict orders that if anyone was seen in a pub or nightclub, they would be docked a week’s wages. We also had to take an alcohol test every morning before training.
Two lads were still stupid enough to go out one night and got steamed, expecting to not only get away with it but to also pass the alcohol test. One of the lads never played for the club again.
We all talk about enjoying Christmas but it’s such a short career that there will be plenty of years to come when you can enjoy it and not have to worry about having too many mince pies and Baileys by the fire in your local. These are sacrifices that have to be made.
Yet there is still the odd player who shrewdly collects his fifth yellow card in the last game before Christmas, which results in a one-game suspension for the Boxing Day match. You can call this experience … or just purely unprofessional. Still, the player will miss out on an appearance bonus and run the risk of not getting back his place in the team.
However, this does mean that they can eat as much turkey and stuffing and drink as much mulled wine as they want. Likewise for the injured players, who will take full advantage of being unavailable. Mind you, when they are fit again, they will have to run their bollocks off and try to shed the pounds that they have inevitably put on.
I’ve also played with players who have ignored the orders about not going out on New Year’s Eve. On one occasion, I was guilty of this, but I somehow went on to have one of my best-ever games and scored one of my best goals. It’s the only time I have done that and will certainly be my last.
How I managed to play, considering the state I was in 12 hours before kick off, I will never know.
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