Peter Crouch book

I’ve read a lot of sports bio’s, mostly football. I have almost a library of Forest books, all signed by the players, going back years to the early sixties. Wouldn’t say any of those are bad, but some of the others were. One of the best I read was Jimmy Case, another former Liverpool player and one that no one in his day wanted to be tackled by. Many of them are all “me-me-me” and are just stories of good games they played, with excuses for the bad ones. But Crouchie’s was funny, your missus will enjoy that.

The only one who disappointed me when I met him, was Bobby Charlton. What a boring bugga he was! I’ve been told that his brother Jack is totally different by an old mate who met him on an Irish fishing trip. In Ireland they love Wor Jackie after he managed the national team in the World Cup. The most entertaining player I ever met, a really funny guy, was”Robbo” – John Robertson, the player Cloughie called “A little fat Genius”. Last year he was voted Best Ever Forest Player in a poll of thousands of supporters, old and younger. Robbo came to lots of Supporters Club ‘do’s’ in many places, I met him at two of them. He had us all in stitches. Never wore anything but jeans and T-shirt, drank vodka neat, smoked like a chimney and could turn defenders inside out. I’ll never forget the sight of Larry Lloyd carrying him on his shoulders after the Euro Cup win in Munich.

I can understand not wanting to meet your heroes, but for me I like to see what they are really made of. I once met Keith Richards behind a marquee at a Dortmund concert. The marquee was a massive toilet between the stage and backstage and it was full, with a big queue, so I went round the back for a leak and there was Keith, smoking some Waccy baccy. He was OK, just a normal guy and no Big Star krap to him. Had a good conversation, he asked me which songs I liked best. In the second spot, he dedicated the song to “A squaddy I met tonight called Bob – This is for you, fella!” Jagger was noticeably annoyed at that, but off they went with “The Last Time” which is one of my favourite Stones tracks. I was proper chuffed.