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Authors: Craig Bellamy
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very difficult physically and I was fatigued by playing twice a week. That meant my performances were inconsistent. My body was still maturing and I was still growing but I wasn’t rested because we had a lack of players. There wasn’t really anyone else they could draft in. Some games I felt drained. Some I felt great.
Robert Fleck and Iwan Roberts played up front and Darren Eadie scored plenty of goals, too. Eadie was decent. He was quick and direct. He wasn’t a clever player but he could do something. He scored plenty of goals. Iwan struggled with his weight a bit. I liked Fleck. He knew he was on his way out. He knew he was coming to the end of his career and his legs were gone but he was always generous to me with advice.
During that year, a guy called Peter Grant came in from Celtic and played alongside me in central midfield. He had been a cult figure at Celtic because of his love for the club and his combative style. His attitude was immense. He was in his early 30s by the time he arrived at Carrow Road but I was impressed by the way he looked after himself, the way he trained, the weights he did and the commitment he showed.
I kind of attached myself to him and he took me under his wing. A lot of the other players were a little bit intimidated by his work ethic because there was still a bit of a drinking culture in the game in those days. After every game there was a crate of beer on the bus, that kind of thing. Actually, a lot of the time, I’d be pouring the beers on the bus. As the youngest member of the team, it was one of my duties. I bit back occasionally but it was just the way it was.
Some of the other senior pros resented me. I seemed to rub them up the wrong way. They thought I was a bit of an upstart. So in training that season, one or two of them would try to clean me out with flying tackles. They wanted to bring me down a peg or two. They were suspicious of the fact that I wanted to work hard. Again, that was the way it was then.
There was a guy called Kevin Scott, a lad from the north east, who had been signed from Tottenham in February 1997 for £250,000. He was a big defender and there was one training game in particular where he took it upon himself to boot me up in the air the entire match. I was nearly in tears. I felt like walking off. Iwan Roberts looked out for me a bit and told me not to bite. The coaches didn’t do anything, though. They were in on it. They didn’t want to penalise Scott, so I just got on with it.
I had to learn the hard way but the thing that kept me going was that I knew I was going to be better than them. I looked at Scott and I thought ‘I ain’t going to be like you. You can say what you want and treat me how you want, but I am going to be a better player than you ever were or ever will be’. They probably knew I felt like that. I didn’t care.
I loved Norwich and I will always be grateful to them for everything they did for me, everything they taught me and the patience they showed me. But I wanted to go on to bigger and better things. I knew I had to work hard and, as far as I was concerned, people like Scott were the example not to follow.
I felt the club had too many players with the wrong attitude. I respected many of them but even though I was a young player, I felt they needed to earn my respect. I was getting players in their 30s who thought they were the best footballer in the world because they once finished fourth in the league talking to me as if I was a piece of shit. But if I had a go at them, if I told them they should have passed the ball earlier or covered back more quickly, they found that impudent and disrespectful. When I play in a match, giving everything to try to win, if I feel you are not doing something right, I am going to tell you. It’s just the way I am. I had Peter Grant on my side, too.
“Wee man,” he used to say, “I wouldn’t change you for the fucking world. You got something to say, you say it and I will back you
Robert Fleck and Iwan Roberts played up front and Darren Eadie scored plenty of goals, too. Eadie was decent. He was quick and direct. He wasn’t a clever player but he could do something. He scored plenty of goals. Iwan struggled with his weight a bit. I liked Fleck. He knew he was on his way out. He knew he was coming to the end of his career and his legs were gone but he was always generous to me with advice.
During that year, a guy called Peter Grant came in from Celtic and played alongside me in central midfield. He had been a cult figure at Celtic because of his love for the club and his combative style. His attitude was immense. He was in his early 30s by the time he arrived at Carrow Road but I was impressed by the way he looked after himself, the way he trained, the weights he did and the commitment he showed.
I kind of attached myself to him and he took me under his wing. A lot of the other players were a little bit intimidated by his work ethic because there was still a bit of a drinking culture in the game in those days. After every game there was a crate of beer on the bus, that kind of thing. Actually, a lot of the time, I’d be pouring the beers on the bus. As the youngest member of the team, it was one of my duties. I bit back occasionally but it was just the way it was.
Some of the other senior pros resented me. I seemed to rub them up the wrong way. They thought I was a bit of an upstart. So in training that season, one or two of them would try to clean me out with flying tackles. They wanted to bring me down a peg or two. They were suspicious of the fact that I wanted to work hard. Again, that was the way it was then.
There was a guy called Kevin Scott, a lad from the north east, who had been signed from Tottenham in February 1997 for £250,000. He was a big defender and there was one training game in particular where he took it upon himself to boot me up in the air the entire match. I was nearly in tears. I felt like walking off. Iwan Roberts looked out for me a bit and told me not to bite. The coaches didn’t do anything, though. They were in on it. They didn’t want to penalise Scott, so I just got on with it.
I had to learn the hard way but the thing that kept me going was that I knew I was going to be better than them. I looked at Scott and I thought ‘I ain’t going to be like you. You can say what you want and treat me how you want, but I am going to be a better player than you ever were or ever will be’. They probably knew I felt like that. I didn’t care.
I loved Norwich and I will always be grateful to them for everything they did for me, everything they taught me and the patience they showed me. But I wanted to go on to bigger and better things. I knew I had to work hard and, as far as I was concerned, people like Scott were the example not to follow.
I felt the club had too many players with the wrong attitude. I respected many of them but even though I was a young player, I felt they needed to earn my respect. I was getting players in their 30s who thought they were the best footballer in the world because they once finished fourth in the league talking to me as if I was a piece of shit. But if I had a go at them, if I told them they should have passed the ball earlier or covered back more quickly, they found that impudent and disrespectful. When I play in a match, giving everything to try to win, if I feel you are not doing something right, I am going to tell you. It’s just the way I am. I had Peter Grant on my side, too.
“Wee man,” he used to say, “I wouldn’t change you for the fucking world. You got something to say, you say it and I will back you
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