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 -DAVID, I want
to start at the moment when things were at their worst at Manchester United.
There’s a line in the book where
you say: “Rather than having your life broken apart by the game you loved, you had a choice: You could decide to retire
from football altogether.”
You mention that you even went as far as discussing it with Victoria. I think to
anyone who has watched your sheer love of the game and your skill at it, to think that you would even consider that is incredible.
-It was a time where it was tough for me and it did get to the point where I wasn’t considering playing anywhere
else and I was just going through a really difficult time.
I actually did discuss retiring with Victoria. There were
all sorts of things going on in my life at this time — Romeo had just been born, my parents were divorcing, there was
the relationship with the manager and the kidnap threats.
-How exactly did you mention quitting to her?
-I
just came out with it and she was quite amazed really.
-Can you remember where you were at the time? -I think
it was in the house in Manchester. I think I had just come home from training.
I’m sure people will read it
and think, “surely not, he’s just saying that to get a reaction,” but it was a serious thought of mine.
I never told anyone else apart from Victoria and my agent Tony Stephens. I really seriously considered it.
-That’s
Man U, England, the lot. You just walk away from the whole game?
-If I’d walked away from Man U, I couldn’t
have continued playing for England.
If it was possible then I would have done, but at that point I wasn’t enjoying
my football. I wasn’t enjoying the whole thing.
It made me sit back and think about it. Looking back at it now
I’m so glad that I didn’t make that decision. But it was one I did consider.
-If you were going to
do it, what would you have done? Can you imagine a life without football?
-Really, I didn’t even think what
I was going to do. I didn’t have a clue what I was going to do. I just knew I wasn’t happy doing what I was doing
at that time.
I wasn’t happy with the way things were. I wasn’t happy going into work every day and I
think that contributed to me thinking about that decision.
-It goes to show the pressure you were under at this
time.
-Yeah. And no one outside of friends and family sees that. I don’t think anyone knew how I was feeling
apart from Victoria and a few other people.
-It must have been a big thing to say, telling her that you were thinking
of giving it all up – what did she say?
-She was shocked. She knows how much my football means to me. She always
has done and she has always supported me through everything, through all the ups and downs. It shocked her because she realised
how serious I was about it. She realised there was a real problem there and that I really wasn’t happy.
I didn’t
want it to start affecting my family life and my children. So that’s why I sat down and really thought about it myself.
Of course I discussed it with Victoria, but the real decision came down to me. I’m sure you’ll get other
people reading this and saying, “Oh, you’re just saying that because you’ve got an autobiography out,”
but it was a serious thing.
-What did she say to you?
-She said, “I’ll support you whatever you do.” She was the one
who sat down and said, “Things are not really that bad. You’re going through a tough time at the moment, but look
at the positives.”
She was the one who changed my mind and turned it all around for me. She explained how important
Man U was to me and how important football is to so many people.
She said that I’d been given a great opportunity
in life. It just turned me straight around. I just got on with things.
-It says in the book you thought about mentioning
it to the manager, just so he knew how you felt.
-I did actually think about it but, as you can tell from the book,
my relationship with the manager at that particular time wasn’t that good.
That was one of the reasons why I
was so unhappy. I don’t know whether it was the right thing to mention it to him. In the end because I went in and had
a talk with him about something else, it smoothed out a little bit more.
But I think, I don’t know what he’d
have said if I had mentioned it to him.
-Do you think you were just emotional or were you being rational and saying
I just want to walk away?
-It wasn’t rational but I really did think about it. It was a serious, serious time.
There was a lot of thinking going on. It wasn’t just a bad day at work. It was quite a few weeks and months.
But
when I was thinking of doing this, I thought about a lot of things, I thought about my team mates my friends and that was
one of the reasons why I made the decision, and thankfully I did, to get down and work at things. I just couldn’t let
them all down.
-How do you think the country would have reacted if you had quit football?
-There would
obviously have been a lot of people saying I’d done the wrong thing. But there would’ve been a lot out there who
didn’t know the real reasons why I was thinking of leaving.
-That is because you felt people didn’t
understand what was going on inside the club.
-People wouldn’t have understood.
-There’s a
moment where Victoria said when you were at your lowest: “You didn’t smile or show any emotion from one day to
the next?” You couldn’t bring yourself to say two words to her or anyone else.
-That’s why I had
to get the problem sorted out because it did start affecting my family.
It wasn’t with the children, but as Victoria
said, I used to come home from training, didn’t smile, didn’t want to talk, didn’t want to talk about anything
or do anything.
I just wanted to sit in and do nothing. When it gets to that point, it’s not fair when it does
start affecting the family. That was when I had to really sit down and do something about it. It wasn’t fair.
-She
obviously noticed that.
-Victoria knows me. She knows when there’s something wrong. She knows when I’ve
got something on my mind. Obviously she was well aware of it at that point. Usually I’m an affectionate person who loves
my family and when she sees me not smiling and coming in every day being miserable, it’s not fair on her.
-Why do you think you felt
like that?
-I was in a place where I felt I couldn’t control things. I’m never, ever like that. I’m
always in control of what’s going on around me and what’s going on with my family.
But I just felt that
the only way out of this was to leave everything and not play football again. Because that was what was causing me to be unhappy.
It wasn’t my family. It was my work. I felt that it was my problem and it wasn’t fair to put that problem
on to them.
Victoria was the only one I actually discussed it with.
-How long did you talk for?
-Hours
and hours.
-So it was a really difficult time and conversation?
-It wasn’t just a one-off casual
mention. You know, I’m going to retire and then we eat our dinner and go to bed.
It was a proper sit down and
lengthy conversation about it.
-Were you upset?
-Yeah, very.
-Was it a tearful time?
-Briefly,
yes — because football is my life. Deep down it’s not what I wanted to do. But that was the only way I could see
of getting myself out of feeling like I did.
-Do you remember when this was?
-I can’t remember exactly.
-So this is after training. You’re deep in discussion with Victoria?
-It was probably two or three
conversations where I’d come home from training and was sat down with Victoria talking about it.
-There’s
a moment in the book that is quite surprising – Victoria says she didn’t know how much of it she could take. She
was obviously being affected by it as well.
-When it did start to affect the family, that’s when I did decide
to sit down and do something about it. I decided to sit down with Victoria. I think that the time Victoria is talking about
is just after the World Cup.
Because I remember we went away to Elton John’s place for a week and I remember
not showing her any emotion at all. I remember being low but not being able to do anything about it.
-So this is
a separate time from the Man U stuff?
-Yeah. Usually Victoria is one of the only people apart from my sons who can
actually snap me out of something. But not even she could do it that time.
-In a career with huge highs and lows,
this past year you’ve had that and the fallout over the World Cup.
-The past year has been one of my most difficult.
Just because of the way I felt. After the World Cup I was young and a lot of things had happened but I felt so strong that
I could overcome that and did.
But the last season I think that was one of the hardest times for me. It affected me
and it affected my family and I’ve never, never let anything affect my family, never. I felt that I had no control over
this.
-People see you as being the perfect couple.
-We are. As strong as me and Victoria are as a couple,
there are boundaries and limits and people can take only so much if they are not receiving the love and affection they expect.
-Where do you get that strength of mind?
-I actually don’t know where I get that from — it’s
just something I’ve been given. Looking back and reading the book, it even amazes me some of the things that have happened
and the way I’ve reacted and come out of things. It’s just God’s gift to me. I don’t know where it
has come from.
-Sir Alex seems to feel you have had too many distractions. Fashion, global brand. Does it get too
much?
-No I never let it get too much. I have enough people around me to tell me if it ever was getting too much.
I will never let it get to that point.
I can totally understand the way the manager thought. When you are a football
player, traditionally, all you are meant to think about is football. But for me, personally, I need other things outside of
football as well and that’s part of me and part of my life. I totally understand the way the manager was, but this is
me and this is the way I am.
-One question David. In the midst of your problems, did you feel it was necessary,
either then or afterwards, to seek professional help about how you were feeling?
-No. I’ve got strong people
around me that give me help. As much as people will try and say me and Alex Ferguson didn’t get on, we did and he was
one of the reasons I remained and became a stronger person after the World Cup.
As much as we had our ups and downs,
people have to remember he was a father figure to me for a long time and I’ll always remember that.
As much
as people like to think that we are at loggerheads each time we see each other it’s not true.
-How different
will your life be now you have moved to Madrid and away from all this?
-I’ll miss a few things. I’ll miss
friends, I’ll miss family that can’t get over there all the time, my nan and grandad. I’ll miss pie and
mash and jellied eels. Apart from that, I’m looking forward to life in Madrid.
Brooklyn just thinks it’s
a holiday. He’s out in the sun and in the swimming pool. He loves it out there, he just wants to be wherever his mummy
and daddy are. That makes him happy.
-Do you have any fears about going over to Madrid.
-No fears at all.
It’s a challenge that’s an exciting one and a hard one. But it’s a challenge that I put myself up for and
I feel that I can go all the way.
-Will the kids go to school there?
-Yeah.
-And Victoria’s
career?
-Victoria’s career will carry on like it did when I was in Manchester. She lived in Manchester but she
travelled to places when she had to work. She went to London and America and she’ll do the same in Spain.
-She’ll
be based in Spain?
-That’s what we have to do. We have to fully commit ourselves to Spain and to Real Madrid
and that’s what we’re doing.
-How do you feel about your wife’s singing career?
-The
latest record she wrote is amazing music. But I think some people make up their mind unfairly even before she’s even
put pen to paper or sung one note. So my respect goes to her because she carries on and on and on.
-Does she have
your support?
-She has my full support and she always will have. If she wants to do something, as a husband and a
friend I’m behind her.
-What after football? Do you have dreams of America?
-I like America and maybe
one day I might play there. At the moment I’m 110 per cent committed to Real Madrid. That’s all I’m thinking
about. That’s my future and that’s where my future lies.
After football I want to do soccer schools for
kids. Boys and girls. Management, coaching has never interested me. Coaching kids and seeing them develop in life and in sport
is the thing that interests me more than anything.
-Amazing – that’s a great ambition.
-It’s
because I was given so many helpful things at a young age. And for me to give something back to kids and see kids enjoy sport
and football like I do and be given the chances and also to keep kids out of trouble and off the streets. That’s the
thing that excites me.
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