Rodwell isnât related to a footballer . He is English and athletic and ergo he commanded a wage and transfer fee that wasnât commenserate with his ability .
Sunderland appear to be in a ferocious mess financially .
He didnt try an ounce ⌠a gutless fucker.
1 Like
I cant believe youâre sticking up for Sunderland, a fucking sham of a Club. They deserve everything they get.
Sunderland are a noble football club. Great people.
Get rid of the rot like Rodwell and theyâll be back.
Heâs a mackem mate. They got their karma for playing a paedo
If youâre looking for someone to blame for Sunderland woes and rodwells contract look no further than
Thereâs a lot of people at fault, her included.
Coleman sacked.
I have always said that Lee Cattermole was as alright a sort that you will find. Great interview with a top pro
âI do things others arenât willing to doâ â Dutch experience the Lee Cattermole Effect
By George Caulkin Sep 16, 2019
23 
Lee Cattermole is standing at the top of the 63 steps that lead down from the dressing rooms towards the artificial pitch at De Koel. Dressed in blue suit and white trainers, he is âabsolutely buzzing.â It is Saturday night and he has just played his first 90 minutes since Sunderlandâs defeat in the League One play-off final and, aside from a touch of cramp, feels good.
He looks around this tiny stadium, to the beer stand blaring out Europop. He laughs.
âDifferent, isnât it?â he says.
Cattermoleâs home debut for VVV-Venlo, the Eredivisie club, has ended in a 2-1 victory over FC Groningen. His team rode their luck but he was in his element; shirt tucked in, shorts hitched high, cajoling, directing traffic, breaking up play. There is a moment in the second half when he chases down possession, pressing high. The crowd respond. âLee, Lee, Lee, Cattermole, Cattermole, Cattermo-oo-oleâŚâ
When the final whistle goes, Venloâs players congregate in front of the home end â there are banners which read: âThis Is Our Houseâ and âYellow Brick Armyâ â and sing with the crowd, dancing, lifting their arms. Cattermole is at the back, bouncing unconvincingly; your uncle at a family wedding. âI said to one of the lads, âMate, I feel so uncomfortableâ,â he says later. âBut, hey, Iâm chucking myself in.â
https://cdn.theathletic.com/app/uploads/2019/09/16124719/DVB1909140052.jpg(image larger than 4000KB)
Media duties done, Cattermole makes for the sports bar where Barry, his dad, and a couple of mates from back home are waiting. There is a crooner belting out Blue Suede Shoes over a deafening backing track. The room is thronged. Stan Valckx, the sporting director, is in here, players, fans, all mixing together. Cattermole leans over and shouts, âThis is fucking nuts!â He is laughing again.
It feels like a long way from the Stadium of Light and, as Steve McClaren, his first manager at Middlesbrough puts it, it also feels like a âbrave moveâ for a player who is 31 â a new life, new country, new league â but Cattermole is a surprising man. On the pitch, he is no-frills (âmy favourite niggling bastard,â a friend calls him) but off it, he is smart, self-analysing, hungry to âspread my wings a bit.â
Football is brilliant at cementing stereotypes but Cattermole is nothing like his. âPeople see things because they Google your name,â he says. âI signed here and they think youâre a certain type. Itâs ridiculous, really. One of the young guys here said, âYouâre so nice and chilled. Then you play ⌠and youâre a beast!â You get a reputation and it sticks.â
It stretches from the professional â âI came on in my first game, made a tackle and it was a yellow card. I didnât even think was a foul!â Cattermole says â to his private life. âIâve married into a family of Newcastle United fans,â he says. âClaire, my wife, is a corporate lawyer. Six or seven years ago, she has to go home and tell her parents sheâs going out with me. Imagine the response! âYouâre fucking joking. Isnât he meant to be a âŚ?ââ
A what, exactly? Who is this man who made his debut for Middlesbrough at 17, whose early mistakes were public, who spent 10 years at Sunderland as they clung on in the Premier League and then dipped down the divisions, who is now in Holland, starting again and considering coaching? Why is he in this picturesque Dutch city, a few hundred metres from the German border?
On Friday lunchtime, he sat down with The Athletic to tell his story.
âIâd like to think Iâm old-school values, a bit of a gent,â he says. âI like to speak to people. Iâve got this thing where, every day, Iâll try to communicate with someone on a good level. It might just be buying something from a shop, asking someone if theyâre having a nice day. Basic things. If Iâm travelling on a train, I always ask for help. People just use their phones and it takes for ever. People donât ask any more, do they? Talking is good.â
He did it this summer. After their honeymoon, he and Claire returned via Saint-Emilion in France.
âI like wine and I go on all these wine tours and nobody knows anything â thatâs what I think, anyway,â he says. âBut Saint-Emilion was beautiful. Loved it. It reminded me of being in St Andrews for the golf because youâre surrounded by people who all have the same passion. You could just stop and talk to anyone.â
Cattermole had been due back at Sunderland for pre-season training on July 8 but a call came when he was away and a compromise was reached on the two years remaining on his contract. He was gone. âItâs been crazy,â he says. âGetting married, Wembley twice (they also reached the Checkatrade Trophy final), leaving, so much to take in.
âI could have gone to three or four clubs in the Championship and probably be in the bottom half but it was like moving out of a house you really love and trying to find another one you feel the same about. My missus asked me one day, âDo you actually want to carry on playing âŚ?â
âI was doing ridiculous stuff to keep fit; running up and down the garden, the dogs chasing me, Claire serving me volleys. I was interested in playing in a different country and then heard about VVV. I looked into it, found out about the pitch ⌠but Iâve hardly missed a training session in two years since my hip operation. So I came over and loved what they wanted from me. It ticked every box apart from one and the money wasnât even a discussion.â
Valckx was impressed. More than that, he was âsurprisedâ, he says.
âI knew about Lee and we were short of players in his position, but is this realistic? In the Premier League, heâs used to big, big wages and we have one of the smallest budgets in the Eredivisie. Our annual budget for the whole team, including salaries, for houses, cars, bonuses, is âŹ3 million (about ÂŁ2.4 million), so he hasnât come for the money. Straight away, we were all convinced he could fit in very well.
âVenlo is a small city where football is important but itâs not the most important thing. People enjoy the good life; dining, a drink now and again. Thatâs the mentality. We have 19, 20 players. That means, in the end, they need each other. We want no-nonsense types. Itâs not FC Hollywood and we will not win every game but enjoy it. Thatâs what we believe in. Lee was interested in a new adventure, somewhere he could have joy. We are a cult club and he is a cult icon.â
Valckx, 55, is a legend here, a former centre half who played for VVV in the mid-1980s before leaving for PSV Eindhoven, then Sporting Lisbon. This is his fifth year as sporting director. âWe have no scouts,â he says. âI do all that. Sometimes, I am the barkeep, too.â McClaren, who had two spells as FC Twenteâs head coach, is someone he knows well. âLee is Stanâs type of player,â McClaren says. âA real chopper.â
Founded in 1903, VVV have plans to develop their 8,000-capacity ground, which nestles in a dip, surrounded by trees, to turf their pitch, but these things cost and cash is tight. âOur television income is âŹ1.7 million for one season,â Valckx says. âWe are a small miracle. You donât see many trophies here! The main target is to survive in the Eredivisie.â
Valckx conducts an impromptu tour of the ground. He stops at the 63 steps (he skied down them once, during a particularly harsh winter). âYou hear the sweetest words in the world here,â he says. âWhen opposition teams come they must climb and descend these stairs eight times; arrive, warm-up, first half, second half, 504 stairs. When they lose, all you hear is âthese fucking stepsâ.â
https://cdn.theathletic.com/app/uploads/2019/09/16110105/DVB1909140017.jpg(image larger than 4000KB)
The following evening, Groningen are beaten. They traipse up those fucking steps.
âStan and the chief executive were in the dressing room,â Cattermole says. âEveryone is mucking in. I went to Wigan (Athletic) for a year and it feels the same. Itâs full of volunteers. Sometimes clubs, training grounds, can be too big. Little keeps everyone close-knit. You canât drift off into corners.â
That has never been Cattermoleâs way. His first start for Boro was a Tyne-Tees derby match at St Jamesâ Park in January 2006. âWe had bad injuries,â McClaren says. âSteve Harrison, one of our coaches, said âStick Cattermole inâ. I said, âYouâre joking, heâs only 17â but he had fight and character, so we did it. He was unbelievable, head and shoulders above everyone else.â It was a 2-2 draw.
âIâm tingling thinking about it,â Cattermole says. âI was nervous beforehand; biggest stadium Iâd seen. After the game, I remember Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink saying, âHey Lee, I thought it was only me you kicked in training but you kick everybody.â That was a compliment. In training now, I see young players standing on the fringes but youâve got to be bold. Itâs always been inside me. Itâs caused me problems at times.â
At the end of that season, Cattermole was named captain in McClarenâs final league match. He appeared in the UEFA Cup final. He was still a kid. âGrowing up, Iâd got it into my head that I was going to play for Boro for free,â he says. âI donât know why⌠but they were my team and I just wanted to play. I was obsessed. I was always practising, on my own, any time I had. When I was 10, Iâd set up drills outside my house.
âWe had a great group of young lads at Boro, all breaking into the team. I didnât even think about where I was. I was loving it. We were young, we were going out in Middlesbrough. It was a totally different time. The awareness of life wasnât there as much as it is now; there was a big drinking culture, card schools on buses, betting. That was the norm, but I was 17.â
He was also prominent. There have been a couple of high-profile incidents over the years â one during those early days, another while he was at Sunderland â but whatâs the worst thing any of us have done with drink in the belly? Did anyone find out? Was it plastered over the papers? Is it still on Wikipedia?
âThat was the hardest thing for me,â Cattermole says. âI went out on Yarm High Street; small place, drank too much, probably with too many people. I look back now and none of my best friends were there⌠Itâs never been malicious, anything Iâve done. Itâs never been fighting. Iâve never been a bad drunk. Iâve always enjoyed having a drink but itâs completely different to what it was back then. Thatâs growing up.
âFootball stunts you in a lot of ways. You have a career from 16. Most peopleâs careers donât start until theyâre 24. They have their student life to get stuff out of their system, to figure things out. I was young and I had money. The rewards are massive, so letâs not kid ourselves, but there have been incidents when Iâve been walking through Newcastle and people say stuffâŚ
âOr in a toilet, some guy will take his top off and try to⌠for what reason other than me doing what I love doing? Itâs like, âCome on, mate.â Iâve had two or three incidents in my whole career. Itâs not so bad. There are a lot of situations which I think Iâve handled really well. Nobody sees that.
âAnd Iâve had a better sense of who I am for five or six years. It comes hand-in-hand with meeting Claire. I wasnât enjoying going out and if youâre not enjoying it, you end up having more to drink. When youâre in different, nice environments you donât get into bother because people arenât interested.â
Joining Wigan in 2008 began the process of maturing. It had been âa crazy time,â at Middlesbrough, where Gareth Southgate had stepped straight from the pitch to the dugout, the team was struggling, and Cattermole was being asked to play out of position. âI arrived at Wigan the same age, one day later, but went from being a young player to an established first-teamer overnight,â he says. âI felt like an adult.â
There were two red cards that season but his star was rising. Rafa Benitez, then the Liverpool manager (and now a columnist with The Athletic ), was an admirer. âThe Wigan chairman pulled me and said, âStay with us one more year because there are big clubs talking to us about youâ,â Cattermole says. âItâs all ifs and buts, isnât it?â
When Steve Bruce left Wigan for Sunderland the following summer, Cattermole left with him. âI think I would have been a more rounded person earlier if Iâd stayed away from the North East for another three or four years but Sunderland is a massive club and Iâd had such a good season with Brucie,â he says.
He stepped onto the rollercoaster. âWe had a good team,â he says, âAnd there was a mint buzz about the place. Steve wanted to build a team that was really aggressive, on the front foot.â Sunderland finished 13th and then 10th but big players left, the drift started and Bruce was sacked. He would be the first of Cattermoleâs 10 permanent managers at the Stadium of Light.
It became dizzying. âSunderland and Newcastle are so volatile because theyâre so big,â he says. âIf you look at Rangers and Celtic, thatâs Sunderland and Newcastle. Imagine Celtic not winning. You donât realise how big those clubs are unless youâre in them.â
Cattermole and Bruce at Sunderland (Photo: Andrew Matthews/Getty Images)
There was so much churn on Wearside â new dawns, new systems and a cycle of dismay, clinging on in the Premier League and then failing again. âI always tried to find a way to be positive but it just wasnât right, the club,â Cattermole says. âYou canât put your finger on it. We fought for three years to stay up and probably didnât deserve to.
âThe only season we didnât change managers was the year we went out of the Premier League. With some of them, you canât say it shouldnât have happened. Like (Paolo) Di Canio. The turnover was massive. There were always new beliefs. Iâve tried to follow every manager; you go again, you get some hope back, this is what weâre going to do and then, âFor fuckâs sake, itâs happened againâ.
âThe owner would make a plan â one year, three years, five years â and then as soon as you lose four games, the planâs gone. Thatâs where the club was at. We could never build. The Bruce era was good, Gus Poyet was changing things â I donât like the word âidentityâ but we were playing in a different way, holding the ball â but itâs that volatility, that size. You lose, confidence goes, fans donât like what theyâre seeing, it filters onto the pitchâŚ
âYou were constantly building relationships. Brucie knew I was good to have in the dressing room but maybe the next manager comes in and thinks, âThis guy is causing havoc.â If Iâm seeing things I donât like, do I say something? Is it because the manager wants a more relaxed environment? Do I fly into people in training if the manager thinks Iâm upsetting everyone? You lose your stability as a player.
âI was a big player there for a long time and so I hold a lot of responsibility for whatâs happened but when I went through the gates for training every morning, I always tried. You had to stick your chest out because younger players, staff, would be looking at you. Iâd like to think I was always demanding in training, that I kept people going.â
Cattermole can only be associated with Sunderlandâs successive relegations but as Stephen Goldsmith of the Wise Men Say podcast puts it, âWhen the house around him continued to burn down, he was the one standing firm and fighting back.â
Cattermole appreciates that. âItâs a brilliant, beautiful club,â he says. âItâs got loads of amazing people, but we needed leaders. Leaders at every level. People talk about having leaders in the dressing room but that counts for nothing. Nothing. Unless your club is looking after itself. How can we be leading in the dressing room if itâs kicking off everywhere else?â
What really hurt is that as Sunderland tumbled, Cattermoleâs body proved treacherous.
âI played with a lot of injuries,â he says. âThe season before my hip operation, I had three epidurals, which is huge â I was put to sleep and had a numbing injection, so I could go out and play. It was pretty horrific but we stayed in the Premier League and I wanted to do it.
âThe injury was complicated and the pain would come and go. I was going to bed on a Friday night not knowing if I was going to be OK or not. Thereâd be a good day and then a bad day, and Iâd be wrecked. Psychologically, it was tough. Sometimes, Iâd go to sleep and then struggle to turn over. So it was the old pillow between your legs. There were a lot of painkillers. It got to the point where I was letting the team down.â
A decision was made to look at his hips; he was dispatched to Dr Richard Steadmanâs clinic in Colorado. âI was flying over to America thinking, âI could be done hereâ because thatâs how bad I felt. Thatâs when I first started really thinking about coaching. But we got it sorted. I had a torn cam (in his pelvis) and my bone was pretty much banging against it. Iâd been playing and living in pain for two seasons; longer really, because the symptoms were there from when I first joined.â
He could do little to prevent Sunderlandâs first demotion under David Moyes. âI had two bad seasons in my eyes,â he says. âThe year I was injured and then the season in the Championship; we couldnât keep a clean sheet and we couldnât score a goal. We didnât know what we were doing.â He cannot bring himself to watch Sunderland âTil I Die, the Netflix documentary which chronicled it. âI lived through it,â he says.
In spite of the disappointment of Wembley in May, when they lost to Charlton, Cattermole believes he left Sunderland after âa real positive year. Weâd had the takeover, the crowd was coming back, Jack Ross and his staff brought a new lease of life. I was fit. The clubâs in a good position. And winning is good, wherever you do it. I know a lot Newcastle fans who enjoyed their season in the Championship more than the Premier League.â
All the upheaval has not put him off, whether playing for as long as he can or coaching.
âI like to encourage people,â he says. âI love the game. Thatâs where I was this summer. Unless I could carry on playing and do something I really wanted, Iâd have happily said, âIâve had a real good blast, Iâll do my badges and start wherever, the lowest level.â Community stuff might be enough for me or it might be trying to push for the highest level possible.â
He is in the right place to absorb information. After Boro and England, McClaren won the title with Twente and, he says: âI knew nothing about football until I went to Holland. My coaching went up 10 levels. Lee will learn there. Itâs a terrific move for him. Itâs very tactical and technical and thereâs a player culture in terms of responsibility.â
https://cdn.theathletic.com/app/uploads/2019/09/16124934/DVB1909140051.jpg(image larger than 4000KB)
As with the post-match dancing, Cattermole has thrown himself in. âI donât sit with the English-speaking lads when the manager is talking in Dutch because I want to follow what heâs saying from his emotions, the way heâs expressing himself. Hopefully, Iâll pick the language up. Iâm more invested in myself now. I couldnât be somewhere if I wasnât learning. There have been so many different things. Itâs life-changing.â
After three weeks in a hotel, he now has an apartment. âThereâs nothing in it! So Iâm going to stores and picking stuff up. Claire will be over in the middle of October. There are lots of cities to explore close by; Antwerp, Bruges, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Dusseldorf, Dortmund, Monchengladbach, Cologne. Thatâs what weâll do on my days off.â
He is looking forward to her being there.
âWe see things from totally different angles,â he says. âSheâs clever. Sheâs made me realise I canât always be so direct. Footballers are impatient. You know what you want and you go after it. But youâve got to think about everyone else. We talk. We sit down at night and sheâll tell me all about her day, her work.â
His own graft is often about the âindustrial stuff which allows the players with more ability to express themselves,â but isnât tackling a precious talent in itself? âIn the same way I need players with pace around me, they need my organisation,â he says. âI do things others arenât willing to do or canât. âNiggling bastardâ or âchopperâ, Iâll accept. I enjoy that side of the game.
âI remember going to Newcastle with Sunderland in 2012, the season after weâd lost 5-1 there and didnât lay a glove on them. I got a yellow card within a minute. All week, I knew I was doing that; not getting booked, but making the first tackle because I wanted us to make an impact. I remember Martin OâNeill telling Phil Bardsley to calm me down but I was completely in control.â At the end of a 1-1 draw, Cattermole was sent off for swearing.
âFootball changes but it feels like everybody wants to play one way now,â he says. âI still think youâve got to let the opposition know theyâre in a game â donât give them time and space to play in the first five or 10 minutes.â
https://cdn.theathletic.com/app/uploads/2019/09/16124357/DVB1909140028.jpg(image larger than 4000KB)
At half-time against Groningen, Cattermole makes himself heard. VVV have just conceded an equaliser. âI could feel there was a bit of self-doubt,â he says. âI just said, âLetâs not have any regrets.â Weâve got talented players but theyâre young. Thatâs how I am. I couldnât not be like that.â The second half is much better. In a different context, but thoroughly recognisable, the No 31 claps, shouts, runs, harries.
The week before, his new team-mates had played a little prank, joining him on the pitch with their shirts tucked in and their shorts pulled up. The clubâs Twitter account called it the âLee Cattermole Effect.â
âBrilliant,â he says. âBut they all started saying, âDo you know what â this feels good!â By the end of the season, theyâll all be doing that.â Once more, Cattermole laughs. âI tell you whatâs funny, as I walked off, the chief executive pulled my shirt out â one of our main sponsors is on the bottom and Iâve been tucking it in. Shit. I said to him, âCome on, mate. I get that. But this is who I am.ââ
3 Likes
I see Julie Louis Dreyfus has bought Sunderland
Iâd say she paid a fair whack. Yer man Stewart Donald is a tough negotiator
1 Like