It sounds mercenary and it smacks of rats leaving the sinking ship. But get real, when everyone is bailing out, you don't want to be the last man standing.

Anyone who doesn't learn from Ian Rush needs shooting.

I sometimes think I've needed a bit of an arm around me in my career - which I've not always got from certain managers and coaches who didn't understand me.

Time always seems long to the child who is waiting - for Christmas, for next summer, for becoming a grownup: long also when he surrenders his whole soul to time and I am as happy as anyone to be here. It is great to be back at my first love.

The treble parade would have been the most perfect moment of my footballing life, but for the two people standing behind me, clearly already plotting their next move.

I get paranoid about people staring at me. Even now I don't deal with people looking at me. I can't do it sometimes. I can't go out. I don't know how to react when people stare.

Nothing had changed in my routine, except that when I went down the chippy and got me special fried rice, it would be wrapped in a newspaper that had my picture all over it.