LAID BARE
His height, his rejections and his mum’s heroics... Brighton goalkeeper Mathew Ryan has plenty to get off his chest
Mat Ryan first dreamed of playing in Premier League football while sitting cross-legged in front of the tV at 4.30am as a kid in Sydney’s Western Suburbs.
But maybe it was not until the night of May 4 this year that the Brighton goalkeeper finally felt he had arrived.
that was the night Brighton beat Manchester United 1-0 at the amex Stadium to secure their place in the English top division for another season.
Ryan has a classic australian ‘can do’ attitude to sport. never stop, don’t look back, only forwards. But even the 26-year-old said this week that if last season’s win over rivals who are back in town tomorrow should not exactly be viewed as a career pinnacle, it was certainly a significant staging post.
‘When I was growing up, I was in awe of the football in Europe and never ever thought I would be good enough to play here,’ Ryan told
Sportsmail. ‘Watching on tV and thinking, “Wow, they are so good” and being blown away by it.
‘now, to be over here and beating teams like United and surviving when everyone had said we would go down… it is amazing.’
Ryan is engaging and charismatic. When he removes his shirt for our photo-shoot, he reveals a boxer’sxers build. as a kid in new South Wales, he was a good enough at tennis to consider a career in the sport.
But his football journey has been a tough one. In his early years he was told constantly that he was not good enough and not tall enough to be a goalkeeper. He failed numerous try- outs for australian state teams and, six years ago, trials at tottenham and West Brom ended with a polite but firm ‘ no thank you’.
‘I trained with Gareth Bale and Luka Modric but at the end there was nothing for me,’ reflected Ryan.
He eventually arrived in England last summer after two spells in Belgium and an unhappy period playing for Gary neville’s Valencia in Spain. He was an australia international with a World Cup behind him but he started last season as an unknown here, with everything to prove.
Ryan is only 6ft tall, short for a modern goalkeeper. David de GGea, his opposite number tomorrow, is not regarded as a giant but still stands three inches taller.
Ryan is thickset and powerful but not particularly imposing. Even so, he is an unqualified Brighton success story — a player who has repaid manager Chris Hughton, who placed faith in him when others would not.
‘I know I am not typical of a big English goalkeeper,’ nodded Ryan, ‘but Brighton wanted me for my qualities and that was what I wanted to hear.’
Ryan played every minute of last season for his club and the stats show he faced more shots than any other Premier League goalkeeper. a total of 560 equates to 15 per game or one every six minutes. Only 54 went in so it seems he was doing something right. ‘yeah, it’s been a journey for me,’ he smiled. ‘When I have moments to reflect on how far I have come, a little boy growing up with a dream in Western Sydney, to be where I am today, it’s quite something. Last season against United was one of the biggest nights of my career. It will stay with me forever.
‘that’s why I live and that’s why I do what I do. that is why I have tried so hard to be here.’ at the age of 13, Ryan thought maybe he was not going to make it. Maybe he should have stuck to tennis, a hobby he had jettisoned two years earlier to concentrate on football. nobody ever said he was too small to play tennis.
‘the height factor is something I copped as a kid and into my career,’ he said, ‘but I can tell you, if I have played some bad games over the years, none has ever been because I was too small.’
In 2005, after another state team rejection, his mother, Carol, intervened. ‘Do you want to be the best at 13 or when you are 22?’ she asked rhetorically.
Ryan grinned this week when reminded of this. Later he refers to Carol again when explaining how the tattoo of wild animals on his right shoulder serves to indicate a parent protecting its young.
‘My mum played the most influential role in my life,’ he said. ‘My parents split when I was 10 and she was working two jobs to try to provide for my sister and me. She had to pay my football fees and school feels in instalments because we never had the funds to pay them in one hit.
‘I was lucky to have the right things instilled in me. the impor-
‘It’s in the culture here to criticise goalkeepers’
tance of how to treat people, having manners and respect and all those fundamentals.
‘I had the right advice — to be good and hard-working. I was lucky. I would not be here in Brighton without all that and mum was the catalyst.’
We met this week after a Brighton training session at the Amex that was open to the public. Told Ryan would be ready in ‘five minutes’, he eventually emerges 40 minutes later after holding an impromptu autograph-signing session.
‘I was in their shoes when I was a kid growing up,’ he said.
‘If I went to a sporting event and got a high five from a player I wouldn’t wash my hand for a week. I know how much happiness that brought me so if I can give back some of that to these kids here in Brighton then I try and do it the best I can.’
Ryan describes himself as a ‘typical sporty kid’ growing up. He was a decent rugby league player and gifted at tennis. Some of his contemporaries have subsequently played at Wimbledon.
‘I chose football as I had mates that went that way but it is probably just as well,’ he said.
‘I was a bit of a sore loser, banging my rackets a few times, breaking them with my mum watching and her not being happy and having to buy new ones.
‘Then her grounding me and me getting punished. Losing got to me a little bit too much as a kid and I got in trouble. That was another reason I went towards football.’ So exactly how good was he? ‘I have never been one to pump my own tyres but I like to think I was a bit of a natural,’ he replied.
‘I developed a nice friendship with (former world No 1) Kim Clijsters when I was playing in Belgium and I have had a hit with her on the Wimbledon courts. I guess you will have to ask her what she thinks of my ability…’
Ryan’s love for English football developed as he watched Thierry Henry and the Arsenal Invincibles in 2003-04.
‘We didn’t have pay-TV so couldn’t watch the Premier League but the Champions League was on free at 4.30am and 6.30am,’ he recalled.
‘I used to watch it before school. That was how I fell in love with Henry and Arsenal.’ Brighton beat Arsenal too last season but Ryan has yet to meet his hero. He may have heard him in his role as a TV analyst, though, and Ryan has an interesting take on the way goalkeepers are judged in the English media.
‘It’s in the culture of England to be critical of goalkeepers all the time,’ he said. ‘It seems to start with the pundits and go down to the fans.
‘Don’t get me wrong, not everyone is the same and everyone is entitled to an opinion but what you don’t get here is an ex-goalkeeper on the panel who has played the position and really understands what it is about.
‘I mean there are things about being a striker or midfielder that I don’t understand as I have not had the experience in that position so I wouldn’t judge.
‘But this is just how I see it a little bit. I am generally OK with opinions.’ ONE of Britain’s most highly rated TV pundits was Ryan’s manager at Valencia. La Liga didn’t work out for Gary Neville — who was sacked after fewer than four months — or for Ryan who made only 10 league appearances before being loaned to Racing Genk in Belgium.
Ryan is phlegmatic about the experience. ‘I always judge a place on how the football goes and from that point of view it was not great,’ he shrugged.
‘One thing I am proud of is that I went to Spain and learned the language and immersed myself in the culture.
‘You either let bad experiences affect you or you decide you are going to use them to improve. I have tried to do the latter.’
What does surprise him is Neville’s stated desire not to return to management.
‘When he came back to the UK I was waiting to hear what he would do next so, yeah, it’s a surprise,’ he said. ‘Everyone was very critical of his time there but you need to look at the situation he was in and look at the managers that followed him.
‘ They didn’t have any more success. He was very professional in his approach and very meticulous in terms of things like the qualities of hotels we were in, iPads for analysis and the rest.
‘The Spanish lifestyle is a bit more relaxed. If the bed is not so good they are like, “Oh well, you know… it’s fine”. They are laidback, but Gary was insistent that we would not have that. He did his best to implement the things he thought would make him a successful coach. It just didn’t work.
‘I was waiting for him to one day go back to coaching but he is very popular in the TV business. He makes his decisions on what makes him happy, as we all do.’
Neville may well be in Sussex with the Sky team as United return to the Amex tomorrow.
Brighton need a result and a better performance than they produced in losing 2-0 at Watford last weekend.
‘We have set high standards and fell short last week,’ Ryan said. ‘We were a little bit naive and we got what we deserved.’
United will arrive on the back of an opening win over Leicester City, the first goal scored by Paul Pogba from the penalty spot.
Pogba’s unusual run-up sparked debate but Ryan was not one of those who raised his eyebrows.
‘We goalkeepers get that kind of information and he has done that so many times before,’ he said.
‘Yes, exactly the same with just as many steps. So slow, so slow, so slow… and then he sticks it in a spot. Everybody has their own technique and method and I guess for him that is the one that works.
‘Facing him this weekend I will be looking at it to see if I can gain an advantage or any little bit of help that I can use.
‘Though it would be better for us if he just doesn’t get the chance in the first place.’