Money - it's the root of all evil

It's hard for people like me who remember with fondness Stan Collymore's all too short time at Roots Hall to see him as the "monster" he is often portrayed by the media.

Hardly a day goes by without some horror story concerning Collymore, who was always the model pro while at Southend United.

I can only assume that the incredible wages players like him can now command has turned their heads.

Figures like £20,000 a week are now considered normal every day salaries in the Premiership and even the most ordinary player can command money which the fan in the stand can only dream about.

Typical of how crazy things have become was a story I heard last week about an Arsenal player who has turned down a £2,000 a week rise - the sort of money real super stars like Stanley Matthews and Tom Finney would be lucky to earn in two years.

No, the whole of football has gone money mad and it was interesting to read Charlton manager Alan Cur-bishley's comments recently that some of the riches should be handed down to the likes of Southend struggling to keep their heads above water in the lower divisions.

A great suggestion but one which I fear will fall on deaf ears in a game in which the rich get richer and the poor go down the drain.

Beer we go, beer we go!

Former Southend United superstar Stan Collymore has been in the news yet again for all the wrong reasons after a boozy trip to Spain with his new Leicester City pals.

And another of soccer's bad boys Paul Gascoigne, never renowned for being last up at the bar, was also hitting the headlines when his challenge on an Aston Villa player left him with a broken arm.

It seems to me that some footballers are continually on a suicide mission and never learning from their mistakes, but that's certainly not something new.

I can recall many years-ago going on a mid-season break to Spain with Southend United - a trip supposedly designed to relax the players and recharge their batteries.

But, for the most part, it turned into a competition to see who could drink the most alcohol, eat the most food or do the most outrageous things. One notorious drinker in the Blues party consumed more beer in one night than I would normally expect to drink in several months.

When he reported for a training session the next day he was physically sick and struggled to even take part in running along the beach.

But did he learn his lesson? No, he was back at the bar again the next night swilling it back as if an alcohol ban was about to be imposed at any minute.

And sure enough he went through the same agony the next morning when put through even the lightest training schedule.

And I hear some worrying stories of some of Blues current crop of young players who seem to think an evening spent in one of the town's nightspots just before a game won't do them any harm.

Unhappily there seems to be an ethos among footballers in this country where drinking before and after matches is seen as the norm. Is it any wonder that we lag way behind many other international teams on the world's soccer stage?

Until our over-paid and under-worked players realise they are pros and should act in a professional and responsible manner then I am afraid we will always remain a third rate footballing power.

But it's up to the club's to set the ball rolling and slap a total no drinking order on their players during the season. Come on Blues chiefs, let's see you take a lead.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.