When millionaire footballers go astray

Kevin Kyle works 12-hour shifts stacking cargo at the port of Lerwick, capital of the Shetland Islands, 100 miles off the north coast of Scotland. It’s hard work and the pay is a modest £400 (Sh59,000) per week. So what’s so special about that?

Well, a few short years ago, Kyle was earning £10,000 (Sh1.4 million) a week playing football in the English Premiership and later for Glasgow Rangers. He was also a Scottish international.

Kyle’s downfall was gambling. He once admitted blowing £7,000 (Sh1 million) a week on bets. Eventually, mired in debt and unable to take the pressures any longer, Kyle quit football early.

Workmates say he has now kicked his gambling addiction but he will not talk about his football career. He says simply, “I’m trying to provide for my family.” He has three young sons.

The football season is in recess and the sports pages are full of stories of young players signing contracts for £100,000 (Sh14.7 million) per week and older ones leaving the game, millionaires several times over.

But it is not always like that and players who go astray often find themselves in trouble with the law.

A former Newcastle United prospect, Andy Mogwo, has just been given a suspended prison sentence for knocking a man out in a city centre attack.

Mogwo, 21, was a youth and reserve team defender but was thought by the club to be “temperamentally unsuitable” and was released.

Said his defending counsel, Tony Hawks: “He is waiting to see what comes along. He is hoping to play for Bishops Stortford,” three divisions down from Newcastle.

Another casualty is Nile Ranger, a tall, powerful striker who played for England at under 19. Let go by Newcastle United after failing repeatedly to turn up on time, Ranger went on to pile up a long list of court appearances. His latest club, Reading, has indicated it intends to fire him.

Wayward ex-stars number alcoholism, depression and financial troubles among their problems. The Guardian newspaper reported that three in five former players will be declared bankrupt, often the victims of bad financial advice, that at least 150 ex-professionals are in prison and that hundreds of current players face mental health and suicide issues.

The England midfielder, Paul Gascoigne, an admitted alcoholic, has been in constant trouble since leaving football, and a former England full back, Kenny Sansom, homeless and battling alcohol, admitted to sleeping on a park bench. He gave an interview in which he said he would be “better off dead.”

The Professional Footballers Association offers help to distressed ex-players, as do organisations such as the Sporting Chance Clinic. “There are systems and support mechanisms in place that we wouldn’t have dreamed of 20 or 30 years ago,” said association chairman Clark Carlisle.

The key is to make proud, once brilliant, footballers admit they are in trouble and willing to accept help.

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As I write, Europe is awash with ceremonies marking the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the 1914-1918 war.

So massive was the carnage, scarcely a family in Britain went untouched. Two of my own uncles were wounded. Professional footballer Jim lost an eye at the Battle of the Somme, which ended his career. His older brother, John, a carpenter, lost a leg shortly before the war ended.

Some two million British and empire troops were wounded in the conflict; 908,000 of their comrades lost their lives.

Sometimes forgotten in England is the contribution of African troops. Thirty million fought the Germans in East Africa, an estimated 9,000 of them being Kenyans. Estimates suggested 10,000 Africans died.

The total casualties of all combatants was 37 million, of whom 17 million died.

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Young people stay at home until their early 20s, then they marry and occupy their own homes. Right? Not any more.

More than one in four working Britons aged 20 to 34 still live with their parents because of high house prices and low wages.

The average house price for first-time buyers rose by 113 per cent last year to £186,512 (Sh27.5 million) while wages for under-30s fell by 13 per cent since 2007.

The housing charity Shelter said crippling costs were creating a “clipped wing generation,” like birds that cannot fly.

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A priest died and was told by St Peter that he must undergo a period of penance before being allowed into heaven. He then found himself shackled to an old, ugly and argumentative lady.

Looking across the torture chamber, he spotted his bishop, who had died a few days earlier, shackled to a beautiful, smiling, seductive young lady.

Outraged, the priest protested at the unfairness of this to St Peter. The keeper of the keys simply said, “You do your penance and let the young lady do hers.”

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