Prince Harry asked me how I’d landed Abbey... which is a bit rich coming from him
Footballer hits back at taunt over his marriage
Mickey called but we binned him by pretending not to be in PETER BALKS AT A THIRD BOOZY NIGHT WITH ROURKE
Some people think they look like an odd couple – the lanky, towering footballer with the stunning model wife. Peter Crouch is used to playful ribbing about his relationship with Abbey Clancy but he was not expecting royalty to join in.
The former England striker was on the receiving end of some royal ribbing when he bumped into Prince Harry. Peter met the Duke of Sussex when he came into a dressing room during a charity football match.
Peter said: “His exact words were, ‘How did you bag Abbey Clancy?’ which I have to say left me taken aback. I’m not normally lost for words, but on this occasion I didn’t know what to say.
“I totally froze and then he was gone.”
The pair met during a match in aid of Unicef at Old Trafford in 2015. Peter, 38, was with fellow players Jamie Carragher and David James, when Harry made the dig about Peter’s marriage.
He said: “David and Jamie obviously thought it was hilarious and were laughing their heads off and, in retrospect, perhaps I should have said something like, ‘That’s a bit rich coming from a short balding ginger guy’, but I didn’t.”
Now retired from the game, Peter has something of a more sedate life, with Abbey, 33, and their four kids – Sophia, eight, Liberty four, Johnny one, and Jack, who was born in June.
But the star still has plenty of wild tales to tell from his days as a topflight player. One such time was a surreal 48 hours in Miami in 2006.
In his new autobiography, he reveals: “It was just after the World Cup in Germany and I went to Miami with some mates. We went to this club and I walked past this guy and went, ‘It’s [actor] Mickey Rourke’.”
Peter, known for his robotic celebration dances, said: “As I walked past, he went, ‘Oh my god. You’re robot boy!’, and I went, ‘That’s me.’ We had a drink by the bar, and then we got a picture of me and him doing the robot.” And the pair kept boozing together afterwards.
“We all went over to his table and carried on drinking. At the end of the night he said, ‘Let’s do this again tomorrow night. Meet me at this bar,’ and we thought, ‘Yeah, right, he’ll never turn up,’ but he did and the same thing happened the next night.
“It turns out he’s a huge football fan and had watched the World Cup so we bonded over that and the second night was just like the first. One massive party. At the end of that night it he was like, ‘Hey guys, let’s meet for dinner tomorrow,’ and we were like, ‘OK chum, it’s wearing a bit thin now.’ “We’d done two big nights, we’d had about five hours sleep in the last 48 hours. So we just headed back to our hotel room to recover after getting in at 4am.
“Then a few hours later there was a knock on the door and we could see through the peephole that it was Mickey, saying, ‘Hey guys. Mickey Rourke. Let’s do it again’. But were all like, ‘F*** this lads. Let’s bin him.’ So we binned Mickey Rourke by pretending we weren’t in, but that didn’t deter him. He posted a note under the door saying ‘Let’s meet here tonight,’ but we threw it away. We couldn’t hack it.”
This is just one of many tales in Peter’s new book I, Robot: How to be a Footballer 2. After 22 years in the game, a dozen professional clubs and 22 international goals, the 6ft 7in striker with “linguine” arms surely deserves some kudos.
But one celebrity who wasn’t the least bit impressed with his credentials was Madonna, who he ended up sitting next to at a restaurant on that same trip to Miami.
After spending some time signing autographs and FaceTiming the children of her four British bodyguards, he thought he’d earned at least a quick
chat with the pop star. But it was not to be. Peter explained: “Suddenly they got all serious and just said, ‘She doesn’t want to be disturbed. ’ I was like, ‘Neither do f***ing I want to be disturbed, but I’ve just spent half an hour with you’. “But they were just like, ‘No. We can’t ask her’, so perhaps being blown out by Madonna was kind of karma for blowing out Mickey Rourke.”
In the book, Peter also addresses more serious issues, such as the ongoing racism in the game. He said he first witnessed it on a Spanish club tour with Tottenham Hotspur in the late 90s. He said: “I grew up in London surrounded by a diverse mix of ethnicities so racism didn’t really register for me. I remember visiting a water park with Ledley King and a couple of other black lads.”
“As we were walking around, this woman started spitting on the floor at us. It was the first time I’d encountered racism and I couldn’t get my head round it. I know there have been a few incidents in the last few years but it’s got to be better than when I started out, but obviously it’s a fight that still needs to be fought.”
Peter then lightens the tone with tales of his favourite pastime – hedge jumping. He says: “I’ve always loved jumping bushes. Ever since I was a kid. We just find the springiest hedges and launch ourselves at them and then see how far they propelled us.
“I almost broke my neck once on a first-class hedge when I was trying to break into the first team at QPR. I spotted a beauty coming up, and launched myself, only to spot, at the very last moment, a large metal spike sticking up through the middle. Twisting in the air, I somehow managed to brush it with my leg rather than catching it directly where it surely would have killed me. I still sustained a brutal gash up my thigh.
“As I lay there on the pavement in agony, blood coming through my jeans, I thought, ‘Is this how it all ends? Is this how I go out of professional football, when I’ve barely even begun?’.” Thankfully for Peter, and his many fans, he lived to play another day.
■ I, Robot: How to be a Footballer 2 by Peter Crouch is published by Ebury Press on Thursday.
PETER ON RACISM HE SAW IN SPAIN IN THE 90S
We were out walking & a woman spat at the black lads that I was with