1996 AND ALL THAT
Gazza and McAllister reflect on 90 seconds they’ll never forget
TWENTY years have passed since that June afternoon, yet the images remain stunningly familiar. We are in the 79th minute of a European Championship match at Wembley, and England lead Scotland by a goal. David Seaman has just saved Gary McAllister’s penalty, and now helps launch an English counterattack. Enter Paul Gascoigne.
Moving on to a cushioned pass from Darren Anderton, he collects it in full stride, lifts it over the lunging challenge of Colin Hendry with his left foot and scampers through six nimble steps before meeting the dropping ball with a brutally conclusive right-foot volley.
He then flings himself flat on his back, arms stretching, mouth gaping, before being buried beneath the bodies of ecstatic colleagues. Poor Hendry stares on in headshaking wonder. Truly, it is a goal for the ages.
Gascoigne makes a vague attempt to describe what was going through his mind at that moment, but soon he shakes his head, sits back and smiles. Like so much of his football, so much of his life, it was pretty well unplanned. It just seemed like a good idea at the time.
And for Gascoigne, that summer of ’96 was one of the good times. He smiles as he flicks through the names of the England players: ‘Dave Seaman, Stuart Pearce, Tony Adams, Alan Shearer, Teddy Sheringham... terrific players, good lads.
‘And Terry Venables; he let us get on with it. He knew what it meant to me. I went to a health farm for eight days preparing for that tournament.
‘I remember Terry saying he was gonna make me captain, but then he said: “I can’t, cos there’s already enough pressure on you and I’ll just get stick for it”. I said: “It’s all right, when I play I’m always captain”.’
He goes into his tale: ‘First game, Switzerland. Bit of a let down. I’m not at me best; never really got into it. Terry took me off with 20 minutes to go. He told me: “I had to do it, Gazza, I didn’t think your mind was on the game”.’
The Scots were next up, not that Gascoigne was worried. ‘I never used to watch teams I was playing against,’ he says. ‘I just knew my own ability. But the night before the Scotland game I couldn’t sleep and I thought: “Gaffer’s not gonna play me. I know it”.
‘So I went and knocked on Terry’s door at half past 10 and I said: “Am I playing tomorrow?”, and he went “No”.
‘I had tears in me eyes and I asked him why not? “I know it didn’t go so well first game but give us another chance”. But he said: “No, I can’t.” And he kept this up for half an hour, then he said: “Course you’re f ****** playing. Get to bed!”. He was brilliant.’
Gascoigne is about to speak of that match, perhaps enlarge upon his goal, when we are joined by Sir Geoff Hurst, with whom he shares an agent.
Gascoigne greets him like a fan. ‘Now, Geoff Hurst achieved something,’ he says. ‘Incredible. A hat-trick in a World Cup Final! I saw him on the telly the other day, and he said that, when the game was all over, he couldn’t believe he’d done it. So he went back in the stadium and looked at the scoreboard and it read: “Hurst 3”.
‘I could understand that, cos it’s what I’d have done. I’d have checked. Just to make sure. That won’t ever be done again.
‘And to do it at Wembley, of all places! I loved Wembley. It was a real pity they knocked down the old place. They should have kept it up so people could go and walk round the stadium to see what the lads had done in 1966.’
When the fancy takes him, Gascoigne speaks of football with the bubbling enthusiasm of a young boy. It is the game which gave full rein to his glittering gifts.
Had things worked out differently, then he would be remembered as the great entertainer, whose talent put a smile upon the face of his sport.
Tragically, events took a sombre turn. Many footballers drink, some to excess, but few have ever matched his excesses.
He acquired the habit, and it devoured him. His rise to fame had been conducted beneath the public spotlight and his decline was played out in the same unforgiving glare.
It was the voracious drinking, and its consequent calamities, which created the feckless image he carries today. That image has come to define him. An entire generation has reached maturity believing Gascoigne to be little more than a laddish warning or a crass headline.
The truth is more complex. On his good days, he is bright, excellent company. Today is such a day, when he can cast off the tragi-comic figure known as ‘Gazza’, and remember that he was, at his peak, a quite extraordinary footballer.
‘The outstanding player of his generation,’ insists Hurst. And certainly Gascoigne had power, balance, touch and vision, along with an enormous heart and an insatiable appetite for the game. But things happened to him. Never more than in that remarkable Euro 96 tournament
GASCOIGNE says: 'The only match we were really worried about was the Dutch match. But we played them at their own game, passing and that. Everyone thought we'd lose, but we just kind of clicked (England won 4-1). ‘It was our high spot. People started making comparisons between us and the 1966 team. Me, I’m not too sure, I think the ’66 side would have beaten us.
‘They were so strong where they had to be. When Geoff played, there were guys like Alan Ball and Nobby Stiles who were happy to do the graft. Nowadays, you get everyone wanting to get the ball and play it sideways, whereas those old players wanted to win the ball, get stuck in and give it to the front men, like Geoff.'
By now, Gascoigne is back to the match which never leaves him. England had beaten Spain, fortunately, on penalties in the quarter-final, and now for Germany. It
I watch football but if it’s c**p I’ll turn over. I hate seeing a player on 150 grand a week who couldn’t trap a bag of cement...
was a game which, quite unjustly, would be used in evidence against Gazza in any assessment of his career.
It hinged on his miss, in extra-time and with the teams playing to the ‘golden goal’ rule, which meant that the first goal would determine the result. Shearer struck a low cross from the right, Gascoigne was waiting at the far post, and...
‘I paused for maybe half a second because I thought their keeper would get a touch. But when you hesitate, it’s gone. I can honestly say that if it was Geoff or Shearer or Gary Lineker, they would have scored. Every time I look at it, I swear.
‘I don’t think about the goal. I think about my celebrations, what I would have done, you know. I’d have just kept running, round and round and round the track.’
Hurst was in the Wembley crowd that night. ‘So unlucky,’ he says. ‘They were that close to getting through. That ’96 team was one of England’s best.’
England went out on penalties and Gascoigne took it personally. Yet he had enjoyed playing for Venables, with England and with Spurs, where Gazza’s talent blossomed, along with a reputation for manic eccentricity. He says: ‘I’d been there a couple of weeks and the players started to wind me up.
“Gazza, we heard you were crazy, but now you’re no fun”. So I’m thinking: “What can I do?”. Anyway, I passed this zoo and I thought: “Ah, a zoo!”.
‘So next morning, eight o’clock, I went to the zoo and I knocked at the door, and I said: “Can I borrow an ostrich, please?” And this feller said: “All right. But I want it back”.
‘I’ve got my first new car, a Mercedes, and I’m well excited. So I put my No 8 shirt on the ostrich, stuffed it in the back of the car, and drove to the training ground. As I’m driving, people are giving me the thumbs up. I’m thinking: “Oh, they recognise me”. I’m smiling back. I’d forgotten the f ****** ostrich, and he’s going mad on the back seat.
‘So I waited till the lads started training, and I brought out this ostrich and I went: “Gaffer, I’ve got this new player for you. He’s quick as f***!”. And the ostrich ran on the pitch. It was funny until the lads finished training at half past 12 and I finished at 5.30, trying to catch the b ****** ! Didn’t get it till it was worn out. I went back to the zoo and said: “Cheers mate. Can I borrow an anaconda tomorrow, please?”. He went: “Gazza, get away”.’
Like so many of his stories, you sense it has expanded with the telling. No matter; he gets the reaction he was seeking. Hurst heaves with laughter. ‘Can you imagine Alf Ramsey if he’d turned up with an ostrich? Imagine Alf’s face,’ says the England legend.
THE manager who seemed to understand Gascoigne best of all was fellow North-Easterner Sir Bobby Robson. He realised that most of Gazza’s problems stemmed from hyper-activity, and when he was bored, he searched for distraction.
‘I remember going to Albania with England,’ says Gascoigne. ‘It was bad. We were there for two days before the game, and I was bored. I looked out of the hotel window and there were chickens in the yard. So I was throwing bars of soap out the window trying to hit these chickens, and Sir Bobby comes in. He asked: “What you doing?”. I said: “I’m trying to hit these chickens with bars of soap. I’m bored”.
‘He looked down and said: “Can you really hit them chickens?”, all serious, like. And I said I could. I threw the soap and he shouted: “Mind your arm, don’t hurt it. Oh! You nearly hit that one. Come in now, son. You have a match tomorrow”. That was Sir Bobby.’
In truth, Robson was sorely tried by Gazza, notably when the player rode a pedalo out to sea just two days before a World Cup game. But the manager thought he was worth the trouble.
Hurst understands. ‘I know he could drive people mad with his joking, but he always played as if he enjoyed his sport. And sport is meant to be enjoyed, isn’t it? A player like Gazza does a lot for team spirit. We didn’t really have anyone like that. Alf never had a funny side.’
The stories roll out. Occasionally, tears of laughter come to Gascoigne’s eyes as he tells another tale. He loved it all; the playing, the nonsense, ‘the lads’.
But slowly, as the body yielded to injury and the onset of fierce drinking, the good days ebbed away. The man who had played for some of the greatest clubs in Europe was now compelled to lower his sights.
‘I went to Boston United,’ he says. ‘That was a nightmare. I was sitting in me Dad’s when the phone goes and a fellow says: “Hi Paul, d’you wanna sign for Boston?”.
‘I put me hand over the mouthpiece of the phone and I said: “Right, Dad, get your flip-flops packed. We’re going to Boston”.
‘They gave me the directions and they told me to get off the train at such and such. And I said: “Oh s***, Dad, I think there’s another Boston”. I didn’t know about this one in Lincolnshire, see.
Their chairman was clever. He says: “Gazza, it’ll be a nice few grand a week. Any crowd over 2,500, you’ll get the money”. So I thought that they’ll get a full house if I play and I’ll get decent wages. So I signed.
‘Then I found it only held 2,250. So I shook the chairman’s hand. I said: “That’s class, that is”. I suppose I’m mad.’
Unlike Hurst, who has had a fulfilling business career, Gascoigne was unready for retirement.
‘Well, for 20 years or so, football was all I knew,’ adds Gazza. ‘I remember Kenny Dalglish asking me what I would do when I finished. I told him I had a few years left. I’ll be all right. Then, before you know it, your career’s over and you’ve not planned anything. That’s maybe why I took to drink heavily. To pass the day.’ Some say things might have been different
had he decided against joining
I got an offer to sign for Boston — but I didn’t know there was a Boston in Lincolnshire!
Spurs, that London held too many temptations. He scoffs at the notion, saying: ‘I could have gone to Man United, but I didn’t think I’d get a regular game.
‘They say Man U would have kept me under control, but Wayne Rooney’s been in trouble, Rio Ferdinand’s been in trouble, Ryan Giggs has been in trouble, and Eric Cantona two-footed a bloke in the crowd! Maybe their control wasn’t all that tight after all?’
So how would he fare today? ‘I’d be playing where Rooney plays,’ he says. ‘Except I think Rooney’s playing too deep. I normally just followed the ball.’
Gascoigne is not enthralled by the modern game. ‘I watch it for 15 minutes, but if it’s c**p, I’ll turn it over. Especially when I see a player on 150 grand a week who couldn’t trap a bag of cement.’
Yet he finds features to admire in the England team: ‘(Kyle) Walker, good engine, decent skills. There’s (Jamie) Vardy; sharp, quick. They have something to build on.’
He nods, reflectively. ‘But they don’t have anyone who’s scored a hat-trick in a World Cup final. And none of them’s ever borrowed an ostrich, eh?’