End of a legend

[smithdown]

The good, the bad and the downright ugly of Big Dunc

 

Nicky Campbell

Friday May 19, 2006

The Guardian

 

 

It is 20 years from now and Theo Walcott has called time on a wonderful career for club and country. A gangly big guy in his mid-50s winces with sciatica and glances at the headlines in the papers he is using to muck out his precious pigeons. "Hero Theo Waves Goodbye". Does he feel indifferent or does his heart ache for what might have been?

Icon, hooligan, man of principle, shameless mercenary, tender bird lover, vicious thug, generous team-mate, waste of space - take your pick. Image wise some liken him to Lee Bowyer but without the charm, while to others he is an Everton legend. Duncan Ferguson doesn't speak to the "scum gutter press" so we are left to surmise from prejudices and infer from facts. Here are some. He has played his last game of professional football. Never again will he be out with injury and/or suspension. There will be no more fines to add to the quarter of a million pounds paid to Everton over the years and no more opportunities to reach double figures in a season. He managed that once, at Dundee United.

I was thrilled when he leapt on to the scene in the early 1990s because I thought a great striker had come our way at last. Then the flaws emerged as he manifested the hair-trigger temper that was his undoing. He seemed a man on the edge, like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas, "You think I'm a funny guy?" He has attacked policemen, postmen, fishermen and a journeyman - when he head- butted Raith Rovers' John McStay on the field. The Scottish Football Association refused to let his match ban run concurrently with the prison sentence and Ferguson turned his dodgy back on the national team. But when you pull on that jersey you are not doing it for the benefit of some pissant panjandrum who may or may not have it in for you. You are doing it for kids with dreams.

Howard Kendall said: "We'll never know what he went through on that one" but a former international who played in the dark blue with Ferguson is contemptuous. "What're you writing about him for? Lining up in front of the anthem was the ultimate for me. Not for that imbecile." The estimable Craig Brown is more forgiving. "I like Duncan. He is a popular guy. A generous guy who will invite all the guys to play snooker in his house and buy all the drinks." He paused and added, "He is like Gascoigne maybe - too generous for his own good."

 

A former Everton team-mate, a model pro, took another view. "You wouldn't want to sit down and chat to him - put it that way. He is a lucky, lucky guy who got some big moves - a man who made an awful lot of money. He didn't like training, wouldn't prepare his body properly, didn't love football and just wasn't dedicated to it. He probably doesn't watch football." This player is scathing about the transfer to Newcastle. "[Ruud] Gullit must've done that deal in one of those Amsterdam coffee shops."

 

Brown is interesting on Ferguson's football ability. "He had terrific touch and aerial ability and superb game awareness. A real strength was peeling off round the back and finding himself unmarked." But he acknowledges Duncan was no natural goalscorer. "With Scotland he was supposed to be the cure to all our striking problems. In all the games he did play not only did he not score, we didn't score."

 

His former Goodison colleague is uncompromising. "He was a static footballer. He was good in the air and people say he was tough to play against but, if defences push out, you can't score a header from 20 yards. Not my cup of tea." Kendall thought differently. "Duncan was awesome in the air. I remember a goal at Arsenal when he just rose above Adams. Awesome. Without the suspensions, without the injuries - that's how it could have been."

 

And that is the nub of it. But why should millionaire Duncan Ferguson have any regret whatsoever in years to come as he caresses his champion pigeons? That requires a self-doubt he enviably lacks. Lucky, lucky guy.

 

 

shed a tear, here

[Cunny]

worst. talisman. ever.

[£440,000]

The man's a cat killer.

[Guest Decs]

The man's a cat killer.

 

 

 

....

[Bootle Buck]

Gid Riddance to a Bag of s****.

 

He will be penniless and in Walton Jail in 10 years.

[Sir Tokyo Sexwale]

a Guardian article 3-4 years ago identified that he'd averaged 400k per goal across his career to that time...