Steven Gerrard: My Liverpool Story (26 page)

Tough, but not impossible. There is a lot said about the way teams play under Roy. Negative is a harsh criticism of him. Cautious? Maybe. That’s fair. But then Gerard Houllier and Rafa were cautious as well at times.

When you are playing against the best teams at the top level, if you are not sensible, if you are not disciplined and if you are not cautious, then you are going to get beaten. It’s common sense. But I wouldn’t say England were cautious when we were losing 2–1 against Sweden at Euro 2012 and Roy sent on Theo Walcott to help the team win 3–2. His style could have worked.

Managers become good managers with good players and the right personnel around them. Don’t forget that at that time, Javier Mascherano left Liverpool and once again not all the money was being reinvested into the team. Roy was also on the trail of Luis Suarez at that point but we couldn’t afford him, and some of his other signings, like Paul Konchesky and Christian Poulsen, didn’t work out.

Still, there is no point making excuses. Roy also knows football is about results and we didn’t win enough matches.

You could smell pretty quickly that it wasn’t going to work out. We lost to Northampton in the Carling Cup and Blackpool at home in the Premier League and were soon on a downward trajectory. The atmosphere was deteriorating.

I remember after we lost 1–0 to Wolves in December, a defeat that ended with boos ringing around Anfield again, going to my car and a fan shouting over towards me. ‘Hey Gerrard, you’re the captain, get it sorted. You want to have a look at yourself,’ he said (and that’s minus the swear words) as he peered through the huge iron gates by the Centenary Stand.

My initial reaction was to go over to him and front it up face-to-face, but I ignored him. It wouldn’t have looked good if I’d started rowing with a fan. Someone with a camera phone takes a picture of us and the next thing I am on the front of a national newspaper, adding to the problems. We had enough of those without me making it worse. I did the right thing.

Liverpool fans are the best in the world. That is not just me being biased. There have been hundreds of football people who have no ties with the club, but have visited Anfield and said the same. Fact. But like with everything, there are a handful who are daft. It’s like the supporter who took £20 to burn one of my shirts outside Melwood in front of the Sky Sports cameras around the time of all the stuff about me going to Chelsea. I understand the frustration, but from the first time I pulled on a Liverpool shirt I have been doing everything I can to ‘get it sorted’.

If the fan who shouted at me after the Wolves game sits back and thinks about my contribution over the years, then hopefully he will recognise that he was wrong.

Roy was sacked not long after that debacle, the shortest reign of any Liverpool manager, but he is a good man and an honest man, and my respect for him is not diminished by his time at the club.

“You could smell pretty quickly that it wasn’t going to work out.”

The 500 Club

When I walked off the pitch on my debut against Blackburn, it was with a real sense of accomplishment. Never mind I had only been on a few minutes, I’d played for Liverpool. It was a dream I never thought I would realise. Then you get greedy. You want to play again and again and again.

To pull on a Liverpool shirt 500 times is something I am hugely proud of. It was nice of the club to commemorate the milestone with Rafa and managing director Christian Purslow presenting me with an award as I hold Lilly-Ella and Lexie. The next target is 600, which isn’t too far away.

Rallying the Troops

I would always prefer to lead through my actions rather than words, but sometimes the occasion demands it. I try not to rant and rave as a captain, but look to choose my moments to speak. Otherwise, people can switch off if they are hearing the same voice over and over again. There have been a lot of changes at Liverpool in recent years, new players coming in and young, foreign players arriving – that is when I have to step up as skipper. It is important to make people feel welcome off the pitch and make sure that on it they understand what playing for Liverpool is all about.

Blood, Sweat and No Tears

Beating Everton always pleases me because I know how badly our fans feel when they turn up for work on a Monday morning and have to take a load of stick from their Evertonian mates. David Moyes has done a really good job at Goodison Park and helped Everton finish above Liverpool on a couple of occasions in the Premier League. That hurts, but we still have a good record in head-to-heads against them and that means a lot. Arms aloft, teeth gritted, you can see what winning against our neighbours means to me.

I’m No Dummy

You can imagine the stick I took when I walked into the dressing room the day after this shot appeared in the papers. I’d kept it quiet that I had been approached by Madame Tussauds because I knew what would follow. Carra and Pepe Reina were the ring leaders, passing comment on my hairstyle and my nose among the cleaner stuff I can reveal. I was hugely flattered, if a little embarrassed, when they said they wanted to produce a waxwork dummy of me. I think the likeness is really good. The real Steven Gerrard is the one on the left just in case you can’t tell.

These Boots Were Made For Talking

As soon as I signed a boot deal with adidas as a teenager, they put ‘Gerrard’ on my boots. It was a bit embarrassing at first because I’d only played a handful of games and some of the senior players at the club might’ve thought I was a ‘Big Time Charlie’. Nowadays, of course, it’s odd if you don’t have your name on your boots.

It’s a nice touch. This is the perfect boot for me because it’s black. I can’t be doing with those boots that are yellow, pink or orange. Maybe I’m boring, but give me a standard black boot any day. But I am on my own on that one it seems. Recently adidas were saying to me that black boots don’t really sell well these days.

Always a Poignant Day

When my cousin, Jon-Paul Gilhooley, was nine he went to Hillsborough with his family to watch the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. He did not come back. Jon-Paul was the youngest fan to lose his life that day. It is important for the club to never forget what happened at Hillsborough and never to forget the 96 fans who lost their lives supporting the club they love. Each year on the anniversary of the disaster, Liverpool hold a memorial service at Anfield. The players and staff attend and pay their respects to the dead and their families. It is personal for me because of Jon-Paul, and I will never forget. For the families of the Hillsborough victims, the battle for justice continues. Hopefully their persistence and dedication is going to pay off soon and the truth about what happened that day will finally come out in public. I admire their fight and resolve. I am with them.