Lescott on the 2012 title triumph: We needed to win this
Joleon Lescott remembers the aftermath of the most famous goal in Manchester City’s history. There were 93 minutes and 20 seconds on the clock in the final game of the season when Sergio Aguero pierced Queens Park Rangers’ resistance and made City champions for the first time in 44 years.
He recalls running to celebrate, not with the scorer, but the physios. “They were a lot smaller than me so they felt the full weight,” he said. It is significant because, as Lescott recounts, physios make up part of the club’s fabric. “They work longer hours and get the least recognition,” he said as he rewinds the clock to 2012 to talks of the spirit in the camp.
Memories were made; relationships too. “I’ve got a lot of friends here that will be friends for life. Micah [Richards], Gareth Barry, James Milner, Joe Hart, Nigel De Jong, Vinny [Kompany], David Silva, Gael Clichy,” the former England international listed.
Lescott won two Premier Leagues and two Cups in his five seasons at City. The most remarkable was the most draining. “I wouldn’t wish that on the current squad, to win it like that,” he said.
The pressure was on City in their home game, a 1-0 derby win over United. “The chairman [Khaldoon Al Mubarak] came when needed to just give us a bit of motivation and credit to him, it was probably the only time he stressed we had to win,” Lescott said.
“We were just concerned about winning the derby, but when your chairman comes and tells you ‘we need to win this’ – then you know you really need to win it.”
Al Mubarak had helped persuade Lescott to join in 2009. “He made it known that the players are the most important people, which I’ve never heard at any club I have been at. But he also made it known that if we don’t perform, we won’t be here,” he said.
Leaving Everton, who had been a better team, for City was contentious. “Man City’s ambition was to win titles but that was the hope for Everton where City’s was an aim and a belief,” Lescott explained.
Like many of the early recruits, he had to face allegations he was a mercenary. “City were being portrayed as only trying to buy our way to success and as ‘the noisy neighbours.’ But as a group of players we believed we could mirror what United were doing,” he said. That they did owed something to an ex-United player. “It was assumed Carlos Tevez only joined for the money, but if you know Carlos Tevez, he was very determined to have success and all of us were in the same boat,” Lescott said.
Before winning trophies was a habit, the drive to succeed came from within the dressing room. “The mentality had to change,” Lescott said. “The professionalism was there from the get-go because we all knew what was at stake.”
Lescott credits three players to change that mentality - Vincent Kompany, Nigel de Jong and Micah Richards. “They were the three that impressed me the most because they train exactly how they play.”