Source: TheGuardian
Lee Bowyer: 'My life has changed – I don't need to justify myself to anybody'
The former Newcastle and Leeds midfielder is now assistant manager at Charlton, where he started his career more than 20 years agoIt becomes easier to understand what drove Lee Bowyer back into football when he describes his frustration at the outlook held by the school his eight-year-old twins, Charlie and Amelie, first attended. “It was all about taking part,” he says. “And I’m like: ‘That’s not life’. You should want to win, want to be the best at whatever you set out to do. You have to have that balance where you know that winning is good.”Bowyer was ultra-competitive as a player – too competitive, Terry Venables once told him – but the thought of transferring those instincts to the coaching side rarely occurred. Yet here he is, in an office at Charlton Athletic’s training ground, almost a month after being named assistant manager at the club where he started out. It is, he says more than once, “a fairytale” when he stops and thinks about it, particularly given that he had never formed a long-term plan to stay involved in the game. Related: Premier League at 25: fans from all 47 clubs on their best and worst memories Continue reading......read full article
