Last night we watched one of the most appalling tackles of recent years as it shattered the leg of Seamus Coleman of Everton and the Republic of Ireland. It was reckless beyond belief, and for everyone who says Taylor is “not that kind of player” the clip should be replayed to them on an endless loop. If he’s not, then what the Hell was that?
Coleman faces one Hell of a journey back. He is a cracking player and all told exactly the sort, possessed of an iron will, who can do it. But let’s not kid ourselves, there’s never any guarantee with these things. He might return the same player and he might not.
There are examples of footballers who did, and there are, sadly, some who couldn’t.
John Kennedy got injured on international duty, and it would be a tragedy had it only cost him the three years of his career he spent getting over Ganea’s vicious challenge. It was bad enough that I had to watch the Coleman incident again in doing the research for this piece; I honestly couldn’t bring myself to re-watch the shocker that effectively ended our young star’s career. It’s too raw. It’s too sickening, even all these years later.
Likewise, even if it’s available to view I’ll not watch Neil Simpson’s on Ian Durrant, which might as well have been a career ender as he came back a shadow of the player he had been. The Aberdeen fans who’ve always taken a perverse pleasure in that one ought to be ashamed especially as that tackle arguably ended two careers.
It’ll follow Simpson around till the day he dies, as it should. I know of only two players – Roy Keane and Andoni Goikoetxea, The Butcher of Bilbao – who ever considered one of those thuggish tackles a source of pride.
Keane’s on Alfe Inge Haland is the worst I’ve ever seen; hands down. Keane’s open boasting about it in his book, a year after the fact, resulted in a five match ban for bringing the game into disrepute. He was lucky it wasn’t longer. Goikoetxea’s own disgraceful assault on Maradona, when the Argentine genius was at Barcelona, may well be even more notorious, especially as he claims to have kept the boots he wore that day in a glass display case in his house. There’s something wrong with taking such satisfaction from that.
I couldn’t watch any of those tackles either, but I did watch the awful clip from that night in Lyon, when the King of Kings went down with his own diabolical injury. Because although i never gets easier to watch there will always be a silver lining; Henrik came back even better than he was before, as if he spent every single day that he was out of the team driving himself so that he would make up for all that lost time. By God, he did that and then some.
I remember that night like it was yesterday, watching it in The Tolbooth Bar.
It was 21 October 1999, my birthday.
It was the worst birthday present I’ve ever had, and my mate was so furious that night over that incident that he almost killed a guy in a clownish Scotland t-shirt who had abused Larsson the whole match for not being a home grown player. (No joke, my mate turned to him when the King was on a stretcher and asked if he was happy about it. I still shake my head in despair at the suicidal nature of the reply.)
On the Friday night when I came back into the pub I was still so upset about it that I offered the staff £150 if I could get the ball they were trying to raffle just because Henrik’s name was on it. Thankfully my mates talked me down from that particular ledge of insanity.
But despair was the natural state of all of us after that game.
The King had been sensational. He’d scored 12 goals in 12 games. It was the finest start to a season for a Celtic forward that I’d ever seen. We were a long way from Easter Road , where he made his debut and his mis-placed pass allowed Chick Charnley to score the winner for Hibs and start the Year We Stopped The Ten in the worst possible way.
Of course, he scored on the day we achieved that goal as well …
I also remember where I was on the day Henrik scored against Italy, after his injury was gone. It was the goal that effectively announced his comeback to the world. I was strimming in a cemetary (back in the Parks days) and listening to the game on the radio. There are people who must have been there that day, as mourners, who saw the completely barmy sight of me and my mate actually throwing down our strimmers and doing a dance along the path.
I was there at Tannadice for the opening day of the following season, hoping he’d come all the way back, and being delighted when he scored and I was Ibrox when he scored goal number 50 in that campaign. There has probably never been a greater comeback from serious injury in the history of football.
If Seamus Coleman needs to take inspiration from anywhere, that’s the man. Martin O’Neill was the prime beneficiary of Henrik’s determination; I’m sure he can put them in touch. Henrik’s conduct throughout his time out was exemplery. All he wanted to do was get back on the pitch, and his self-belief was incredible.
Nobody ever likes to see a player go down like Coleman went down last night.
I am sure everyone wishes him a speedy recovery. But in truth, any recovery which seems him playing again will do.
Best of luck, Seamus, and hopefully be back soon.
