Michael Owen: Off the Record. Michael Owen
first 10 games for Liverpool and being worried that I wasn’t scoring an average of a goal every other game. I was playing well, but I wanted to score every week. I started to become disturbed. One advantage I had was that I’d been given a good grounding in the basic skills and duties of a striker. If you don’t have those you can’t progress to the higher levels. Take following in, for example. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred a good goalkeeper will gather an incoming ball and hold on, but if he spills it just once you’re going to end up with an extra goal. It’s all right knowing the theory, but you may have a hundredth of a second to react to an event and then turn it into an opportunity. It has to be second nature. Now, as soon as the leg goes back, before a team-mate has even thought about shooting, I’m already thinking about where I should be positioning myself. If it hits the post or the keeper, where will the ball go next? It’s about being one step ahead. The opposite’s true in front of our own goal. I just don’t have the instincts of a natural defender. If there’s a corner and I go back to mark an opponent, I might find their striker running straight past me on the way to goal. Logically, there is no reason why I shouldn’t be able to reverse my own thinking to second-guess an opposing striker when we’re defending our own line, but it’s easier said than done. I’ve had to work hard to improve my defensive capabilities.
In those early years I wasn’t always in full control of my aggressive streak. All top footballers have one, and as you mature you learn how to use it within the laws and to your own advantage. To begin with I was no angel on the pitch. I was no thug, either, but I understood the concept of self-defence. That September, playing for Howard Wilkinson’s England Under-18s against Yugoslavia in Rotherham, I was sent off for butting an especially annoying defender. The in-thing in those days was the sweeper system, which meant that there were permanently two man-markers on the two strikers. I don’t know why I reacted, because I was used to that system and all the extra difficulties that came with taking on defenders at international level; but I was just continually being booted and pulled back. Frankly, I don’t mind being kicked, because it happens to me every week, but I hate the shirt-pulling and the ‘girlie’ fouls. I prefer honest physical contact. If you’re going to foul me, boot me in the air. It’s equally irritating when you retaliate with a foul of your own and the defender rolls around on the floor. My head was exploding all the way through the game. Finally, my patience ran out, and after being fouled for the umpteenth time I rose to my feet close to the defender and pushed my head into his. Down he went, rolling around, and out came the red card.
I was so nervous about what my dad was going to say, because I had my whole family there that day to see me captain England. When I got sent off after 20 minutes half of them went home, though Dad stayed on to give me a lift. Not much was said in the car. I think he knew I would learn from it; he didn’t need to ram home a lesson I had already learned for myself. In life, I suppose, you have to do stupid things to know what stupid things are. And it’s better to learn at youth level than in the senior game.
But it wasn’t a one-off. Seven months later I was sent off at Old Trafford for a two-footed lunge at Manchester United’s Ronny Johnsen. I was going through a mad period. At Lilleshall, I had a six-month spell where I fell in love with the tackling aspect of football. I loved getting stuck in. I’d had enough of getting pushed around by defenders and decided to give some back, so I developed this passion for going in hard – sometimes unfairly. In December 1995, Keith Blunt had written a report that highlighted the need for me to control my aggression on the pitch. It read: ‘Michael has shown outstanding qualities as a front player both at school level and as an international player. He is a very good finisher and a highly competitive boy who only needs to control the occasional outbreak of temper to become an outstanding player.’ I still consider myself a tough player, but I no longer give back what I get. The Ronny Johnsen incident was a turning point for me. That was a head-down, lost-the-plot kind of day. Even an hour before the game I was sharpening my studs for battle. It was total red mist.
Ironically, at the time of the incident I had scored, we were 1–0 up and I was full of the right kind of adrenalin. Before the Johnsen tackle, I had jumped in on Peter Schmeichel and ended up hurting myself. I’d already been warned for a previous challenge on the United goalkeeper, but for some reason I remained determined to give him a dig. He reached the ball way before me, but I kept going and brought him down on top of me, which left six stud marks on my belly. That should have been my warning. Again, the ball had gone when I reached Johnsen, but I carried on with my challenge and the ref, Graham Poll, was totally right to show me the red card. Poll had warned me moments earlier: ‘Calm down or I’m going to have to send you off.’
I can remember feeling devastated as I took a shower, but still bubbling, still fierce. After about half an hour I felt my shoulders suddenly drop and all the air leave my body, as if I was coming down off an aggressive high. And then it hit me. I understood what I had done. I felt the tension drain. As I walked back down the tunnel to watch the second half, I saw Ronny Johnsen being taken off to an ambulance and felt truly awful. I was too embarrassed even to say sorry. It’s not an episode of which I’m proud.
A week after that England – Yugoslavia match in September I had a much happier experience: a goal on my debut in European cup competition, against Celtic in a 2–1 win in the UEFA Cup. Again, that was a special day for the Owen family and its Scottish branch. My dad was especially busy that week sorting out tickets for the Donnellys. My late uncle Terry was a mad Celtic fan and one of my biggest supporters. I didn’t comprehend what a big game it was until the warm-up. I’ve played around the world since, but the atmosphere at Celtic Park was up there with the best. The noise during the warm-up was the loudest I’ve known. When they played ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’, both sets of supporters sang. It was ear-splitting, and my blood ran cold.
A month later I found myself training with the England senior squad for the first time – with no intimation, of course, that I was on a path to the 1998 World Cup. Although I seemed to be advancing in leaps, my first full season in that famous Liverpool shirt was all about consolidating a place in the team.
It was February 1998 before events developed a fierce momentum. I raced through seven days that shook my world. On 7 February I scored twice against Southampton, then made my England debut against Chile in midweek before hitting my first Premiership hat-trick, against Sheffield Wednesday. That was special to me, because having made my debut for England at such a tender age I couldn’t bear the idea of not playing well for my club the following Saturday. I had a morbid fear of people saying, ‘Oh, this international business has gone to his head.’ I just had to do well.
Ten days later, Robbie Fowler was ruled out for the rest of the season with knee ligament trouble following an innocuous challenge on the Everton goalkeeper. Losing your main goalscorer always knocks the stuffing out of a team, especially in the last two months of the season. The consequence was that I was given more opportunities to play first-team football, which improved my chances of being picked in Glenn Hoddle’s World Cup squad.
Liverpool eventually finished third in the Premiership, behind Arsenal and Manchester United. I would characterize it as an OK season. The year before we had finished fourth, so it seemed we were creeping back up with a good young team, terrific camaraderie and a fine manager in Roy Evans.
In those days it was easier to win Premiership games than it is now, when the standard is infinitely higher. Perhaps it’s down to diet awareness, better equipment, improved tactical organization; whatever the reason, it’s so much harder to win games nowadays. The Premiership isn’t hugely better in a technical sense; the improvement has been physical, in fitness, stamina and strength. The only break you get nowadays is when top clubs rest their best players in the cup competitions. Everyone these days has got someone who can change a game, whereas when I started out it wasn’t unusual to come up against a team who had two workhorses up front. Then, 18 League goals could win you the Golden Boot. Some of the leading strikers in those days wouldn’t be able to compete with a Ruud Van Nistelrooy or a Thierry Henry. I can compete with these guys, but I need a season without injuries to be fighting it out with them at the very top of the list.
I was joint-top scorer in the League in my pre-World Cup season with 18 goals, level with Dion Dublin and Chris Sutton and ahead of Dennis Bergkamp, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Andy Cole. I got 23 in