‘Stan Collymore offers advice to young players’ – now there's a a headline you don't see every day.
Enough to send shivers down the spine of every parent of a talented football wannabe with stars and pound signs in his eyes.
Yes folks, this is the same Stanley Victor Collymore whose chequered career saw him stray from the straight and narrow on more than one occasion.
For every one of Stan’s highs - and there were plenty - there were a number of lows.
So perhaps what he’s trying to say to the likes of Jack Grealish is...don’t make the same mistakes I did.
Collymore, once a radio pundit, now a social media guru, has written an ‘open letter’ to Aston Villa’s problematic playmaker Grealish whose party-going antics are under investigation by one of Stan’s former clubs.
A lot of what Stan says actually makes reasonable sense although I’m still trying to get my head around his comment that ‘footballers are a produce, there to be milked like a cow’.
I once wrote about Collymore that he had the potential, early in his career, to be ‘England’s Ronaldo’ – the Brazilian version, not Cristiano.
On his day, with his mind on the job, he was virtually unplayable. As a striker, he had the lot.
He never fully realised his potential or made better use of the talent he had at his disposal, and I get that Stan the Man doesn’t want the same thing to happen to Jack the Lad.
I actually enjoyed Collymore’s cockiness and devil-may-care approach to life as a pro-footballer in the early days. I particularly enjoyed his response to a question I asked him the day he signed for Crystal Palace from non-league Stafford Rangers.
After admitting I knew little or nothing about him at the time, I asked Stan ‘how would you describe yourself as a player?’
His answer: “I guess I’m a cross between Steve Bull and Ian Rush with a bit of Ian Wright thrown in.” A fantastic answer, I’ve always remembered. Stan had arrived and he was determined that when he departed he would never be forgotten. Certainly not by me.
Collymore tells Grealish ‘to be more like Michael Owen...have a game of snooker, have a cup of coffee...play a computer game...become boring!’ Just like you, eh Stan?
Source: DSG
