Special Feature: Football’s best off-the-field U-turn “moments” – Part 3
There is always something fishy when a renowned footballer makes a move to lower divisions. If it wasn’t confirmed by Sol’s non-sanctimonious time at Nott’s Country, it was indeed given more weight by Tino Apsrilla’s shenanigans at Darlington. When in 2002,
Darlington’s chairman George Reynolds announced on the big stage that his club will be signing Tino Asprilla, certain eyebrows were raised in his direction.
With all due respect to Darlington, they were never seen as a marquee club which would attract the likes of Tino Asprilla, who had the finest moments of his career at Newcastle United. Darlington were back languishing in fourth
tier of English football, the less said about that the better because fourth tier is definitely no “English Premier League calibre”. But, Reynolds was adamant that his club had signed the Colombian striker. If this wasn’t enough, George held a proper press
conference in which he made the news public. However, the whole saga took a turn for the worse when Asprilla failed to even show up for his scheduled medical at the club and then the former Newcastle player couldn’t sign the contract due to his misplaced passport.
Despite losing his documents a day earlier, Tino found them within 24 hours as he made a quick escape from Darlington. He boarded a flight to Middle East along with his agent. When Darlington F.C came to know of the Columbian’s
escape, George Reynolds stated to the press, “We're friends, myself and Faustino (Tino), I wined him, dined him but he knew about this alternative offer two to three days ago. He didn’t even have the decency to say goodbye. The club offered him 20 percent
of gate receipts, plus salary, plus a car, plus a flat rent free. I’ll never talk to him again. He’s completely sunk me”. A moderately less emotional club representative from Darlington F.C stated it best as he told the press, “We've been well and truly shafted
“
If Tino’s U-turn wasn’t astonishing enough, Steven Gerrard’s X-turn in 2005 was truly remarkable. Liverpool’s captain fantastic, Steven Gerrard, their club legend was about to part ways with the club just five years ago in 2005.
In May of 2005, Liverpool overcame a three goal first half deficit in the UEFA Champions League final against A.C Milan to take the game to penalties, where they eventually won the match thanks to Andrei Shevchenko’s woeful spot kick. In a post-match interview,
Gerrard famously asked the press, “How can I leave on a night like this?”
During a 2004-2005 season which was filled with speculations regarding the player’s future at Anfield as reports linked him to a move away to Real Madrid in Spain or to Chelsea in London, Gerrard’s status as a Liverpool player
took a huge hit. The supposedly final nail in Steven’s coffin as a Liverpool employee came when in July of 2005, Rick Parry, the club’s chief executive announced, “Now, we have to move on, we have done our best but Gerrard has made it clear that he wants to
go, it looks pretty final”.
By Sunday, Liverpool were considering a 32 million pound bid from Chelsea F.C for their talismanic midfielder but the whole story turned on its head soon after as Gerrard revealed that he was intent on staying at his childhood
club. Liverpool took the easy route out in the end as they blamed it all on “communicational breakdown”.
Following Steven’s announcement that he would stay at the club, fans were divided in their opinion regarding the whole transfer scenario. Some called him a traitor while others respected his decision to stay afoot at Liverpool.
Some also voiced their thoughts on how Gerrard should quit as Liverpool’s captain as a sign of respect for the Merseyside club. However, such suggestions were eventually dismissed by Rafael Benitez, who retained Gerrard as the club’s captain.
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