Gazza: My Story (28 page)

I drank mostly at home. I only went now and again to a pub, usually the Duck Bay near my lodge on Loch Lomond, which I returned to after Shel had left Scotland. I might start there with a few drinks, and then go home. It wasn’t really social drinking. I never went out much with the other Rangers lads. I mainly drank on my own. Jimmy would often be with me, but he wasn’t drinking much. It was just me. He didn’t try to stop me. He knew he couldn’t. He knew why I was doing it. I would drink two bottles of wine on my own, red or white, it didn’t matter which, then about nine or ten o’clock, I’d pass out. Jimmy would put me to bed. But I wouldn’t be able to sleep, so I’d take sleeping pills.

I didn’t realise at the time, but alcohol is a depressant. It might make you feel good for a while, get you out of yourself, but it doesn’t help in the long run. Drink can actually make you more depressed, so I’ve since been told. But at the time, it was all I wanted to do. Anything to stop my head going round and round.

It was also at Rangers that my pill-popping got
worse. Because I couldn’t sleep, which has been a problem my whole life, I was on sleeping pills. This is when I discovered Zimovane, which seemed to be good at first, then I needed more and more to have any effect. So I went up from one to two to three a night and became addicted to them.

So, while I loved Rangers, and those first two years were probably about my best ever for football, the last few months were about the worst in my life personally. The worst up until then, anyway. So I was quite pleased to get away.

I arrived at Middlesbrough in March 1998, just in time to get fitted for my Cup final suit. Good timing, eh? This was for the League Cup final, or the Coca-Cola Cup final as it was called that year, or that week. I do find it hard to keep up with all the name changes. Boro had beaten Liverpool in the semi-finals and were due to meet Chelsea at Wembley on 29 March.

Boro were lying in third position in the First Division when I turned out for my first league game for them. I had joined to help them get into the Premiership, and also because of Bryan Robson, their manager. It was strange to be calling him Gaffer after all those years of playing alongside him. I was also attracted by the thought
of playing with Paul Merson, another friend from the England team, and Andy Townsend. The transfer fee was pretty good as well. Middlesbrough paid Rangers £3.45 million for me, which meant that Rangers got most of their money back. I was on a basic wage of £16,000 per week but if we did well and got promoted I was on course to make a million a year.

In my last three months at Rangers, I’d had ankle and groin problems and had only played one full game, so I was still recovering and getting fully fit again. Bryan Robson told me it was a perfect opportunity for me, having a new challenge, at a new club, to get back to my best form. I should then be able to secure my place in the England squad for the 1998 World Cup in France. When people asked him about my record off the pitch, he said he expected I would give him a bit of grief, but he was sure it would be worth it, which was good of him.

It was exciting going to Wembley again for a Cup final, my first since 1991 with Spurs, which we don’t talk about any more, but I felt a bit of a fraud being in the Boro squad. I hadn’t played any part in getting the lads there, and on the day I only came on as sub, for Ricard. Chelsea beat us 2–0 in extra time. I got a medal,
as a member of the losing team, but I gave it away to Craig Hignett. He deserved it more than I did. He’d made all the games and yet hadn’t even been named as sub for the final.

My first league game for Boro was away to West Brom on 4 April. Their crowd gave me some abuse, of course, and it didn’t help when I fell over with my first touch of the ball, and then, with my second touch, gave the ball away. I came into it more later, but I didn’t do that much and we lost 2–1. Not a good start. Presumably some Boro supporters were wondering why they’d bought me.

After that, though, I played in six of the last seven league games of the season, missing one through injury. We won five of the last six and drew one, finishing runners-up in the league to Nottingham Forest. So Boro were back in the Premiership. I’d achieved what I’d set out to do: help Boro win promotion.

It was nice to be back in the north-east again after ten years away. Middlesbrough was very handy for Dunston, so I could see the family, and it was very easy for Jimmy to come and see me. I went back to my old school several times and gave them some kit and stuff.

I’d first returned there after the 1990 World Cup. I
happened to be in Gateshead, having a drink with some friends, and realised we were near my old school, Heathfield High. ‘Keep an eye on my pint, man,’ I said to my mates. ‘I’m just going out for a bit.’ I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. I went into my old school, found the old classrooms where I’d sat, and tracked down Mr Hepworth, still giving his geography lessons. I marched into his class and said, ‘Mr Hepworth. Remember me?’

‘Yes, I remember you, Gascoigne,’ he said.

‘And do you remember what you said to me?’

‘Yes, Gascoigne. And you were the one in a million who did make it.’

I made another unannounced visit after that, just to mess around and give the kids a bit of excitement. I walked along each corridor, sticking my face against the window of each classroom, making silly expressions till everyone in the class had seen me – except the teacher. Once I’d reduced the whole class to uproar, I moved on to the next classroom and did the same thing, till the whole school was in uproar. Then I went out and stood in the main playground and waved to the entire school, all watching me through their classroom windows.

After I moved to Boro I became friends with many
of the staff, and used to pop in for a game of five-a-side football with the teachers.

When I first arrived at Middlesbrough, while a house was being found for me, I stayed in a hotel. One of the tabloids sent a reporter and photographer, posing as a real couple, to book into the same hotel and keep an eye on me. They were convinced I would be binge-drinking, shagging all the chambermaids, wrecking every bedroom, and they tried hard to get something on me. They got fuck all, and left after three weeks, empty-handed. I didn’t, of course, know they were there until they had gone. If I’d realised they were spying on me, I would have thumped them.

I eventually moved from the hotel into a big, six-bedroomed mansion at Seaham, on the coast, along with Jimmy. My team-mate Andy Townsend moved in as well. We didn’t have any staff and that, we just looked after worselves. And no, we didn’t wreck anything.

I had already bought my parents the house of their dreams in Dunston, best part, of course, which cost about £120,000. Then I bought a house each for my two sisters and my brother, all in the same area – in fact two were in the same street. Keep it nice and cosy.

I gave them cars as well. I bought a Rolls-Royce,
which I gave to me dad. He put on his personalised number plate – JG 369 – which he’d had on the new Jaguar. It wasn’t a brand-new model, but only a few years old, a Silver Sprite, and me dad, the daft sod, drove it to the dole office when he went to pick up his money and left it parked outside, for all to see. No wonder he got his dole money stopped. He had remained unemployed ever since he collapsed and nearly died when I was young, but he wasn’t ill all the time. He was usually fit enough to hold up a pint or two, smoke a few ciggies, kiss a few lasses and come and see me in London, Italy and Glasgow. I wanted him to enjoy himself, after what he’d been through.

He’d had another dodgy time when his eyesight started to go. They said he had varicose veins in his head – at least, that’s what I was told – or it could even be a brain tumour. He had to have an emergency operation, and it was life or death. I was terrified he was going to die. As he went under for the op, I promised I would get him a brand-new Range Rover if he recovered.

When I heard he was OK, while he was still in hospital, I went out, traded in his Rolls and bought him a top-of-the-range Range Rover. But I forgot all about his personalised number plate. I didn’t save it, or get
anything extra for it, when I sold his old car. He tells me all the time it’s now worth £10,000, and I let it go for nothing.

Another time I went to see my dad and he told me he’d bought this new boat. He said it was a smasher, a right belter. I asked him how much it was worth and he said £8,000. I said I’d give him £5,000 for it. He told me he didn’t really want to sell it, as it was so brilliant for going out deep-water fishing, but in the end he said, ‘Oh, all right then, as it’s you.’ But he insisted I had to give him the cheque there and then. And he wouldn’t let me have the boat, or tell me where it was, until the cheque had cleared. So I gave him the cheque – and he rushed straight off to the bank.

The first time I saw the boat I went with my mates Cyril, Vinny and Hazy and a few others to watch it arrive at Whitley Bay. They saw it before I did, this little orange tub, and were pissing themselves laughing. I said, ‘That’s not it. My dad told me it was a belter, perfect for deep-sea fishing.’ Of course, it did turn out to be the fucking little orange tub. One of the lads got on the dock tannoy and announced for everyone to hear: ‘Class boat now coming into the harbour.’ The first time I took it out to sea, the steering wheel fell off. It was
hardly worth a packet of fish and chips, let alone £5,000. In the end, I gave it away.

Just after I joined Boro, in 1998, my parents split up for good. They’d had rows in the past, and had separated before, and me dad had lived away for various spells, but now they decided, finally, to get divorced. I suppose they got on each other’s nerves so much that in the end they couldn’t stand it any longer. Me dad’s a good-looking man and there had always been girls hanging round him, but in the past me mam had been able to just laugh it off. They both enjoyed life and I always thought they enjoyed being with each other, despite everything. So I was very upset about the divorce. But one good thing is that at least they’re still pals.

As if that wasn’t enough, stories reached me that not only Anna and her husband, John-Paul, but also Lindsay and her husband, Tim, were going through difficulties in their marriages. I invited them all to have a pub lunch with me in Dunston, worried about what I was hearing. I knew from my own experience how emotionally destructive marital strife can be, and I wanted to help my sisters.

I invited John-Paul and Tim to the toilet, and locked the door. I said, ‘What the fuck is going on? I’m not
unlocking this door until you promise to try harder. If I find out you haven’t, I’m going to smash both of yous.’ They promised, of course, so I let them out.

Next I invited my sisters into the toilet – the same one, the men’s. I said to them: ‘You’ve got two weeks to get things sorted. And if not I want yous divorced.’

In the end, they both got divorced, like my mam and dad. And me. I paid for all their divorces, all the legal fees. Around the same time, Carl got married, and I paid for his wedding as well. I don’t know why they chose to make that reality TV show about the Osbournes. I think the Gascoignes would have made much better television.

When my parents split up, they sold the big house I’d bought for them, divided the money between them and bought another house each, a bit smaller, round the corner from each other. Me mam recently moved even nearer to me dad, into the same street, in fact only a couple of doors away. I’m not sure if he’s too thrilled by me mam being as close as that, and able to see everything he does. Apart from Anna, who lives a few streets away, they are in the same street now – Carl, me mam and me dad. Lindsay’s just round the corner. They all get on fine. Mam still goes round to me dad’s
and makes the odd Sunday lunch for him. One of the things that has given me greatest pleasure in my life is having been able to provide nice homes for everyone in my family.