Vince: When Michael was playing centre forward. And someone said, ‘Michael you’ll never make a centre forward until you kick the goalkeeper.’ Now you don’t tell kids that!
Lynn: He’s quite happy for others to take the press. Michael does what he needs to do for his job. He’s a great believer in charities and things like that. Hospital visits that need to be done. But apart from that he’s not bothered about all the limelight. If people want it they can have it. He’s married. He’s happy. He’s playing football at this time. He’s got his little kids.
Vince: I don’t think we’d have changed anything for either of them. Michael or Graeme. From the football side they’ve enjoyed themselves at boys club, they played the 5-aside that brought them into football and not just to be coached, they’ve learned thought the 5-a-sides and they’ve come through the 11-a-sides and then to West Ham and on.
Lynn: And they’ve had trips away with the boys clubs and things like that. When they were younger they had trips to Holland organised and things like that. And I just think you’ve got to remember that they’ve got to develop social skills and building up friendships and I’m a great believer that those go alongside whatever you’re doing.
Vince: Regards to education, there was one particular lad who just signed for Newcastle and the mother says to me, ‘I’m not bothered about education, he’s there to become a professional footballer he needn’t go to college twice a week. He’s gonna stick at his football.’ I said, ‘Sorry I disagree there, what happens if he gets an injury?’ You’ve got to go to college and you’ve got to have something to come away with, even if it means going to college once or twice a week.
Lynn: I’ve got to say that Michael let himself down a little there. Once he went away and was doing well at the football he didn’t get the grades he should’ve. But Graeme has always done well there, if there’s been coaching, or education, he’d be the type who’d say ‘I’ll go for that.’
Graeme: It was quite tough studying when you were going away a lot…well I found that. You’re travelling around at the weekend and going off to trials and you’ve got an assignment in, I found that bit tough. But I was injured a lot, so I had more time than Michael to do that.
Lynn: Whereas with Michael, the football was working for him. Yes it’s great, but we were mad at the time, because we felt they’d let him down and he’d let himself down.
26
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34