Ross vows to silence his critics once and for all...
HIS career could have been over, his reputation permanently damaged. Now, Ross McCormack is back in familiar surroundings and on the road to recovery once again.
The striker will put his stats up against anyone and defend his record, whether it be at Cardiff, Leeds United or Fulham. It is his character that he has had to guard in recent times, however.
The tale of how McCormack missed training at Aston Villa due to faulty electric gates at his home is now infamous. He reckons Steve Bruce, his then boss, had it in for him, though.
“There was something massive that happened before that,” McCormack says as he reflects on his career and the breakdown in his relationship with Bruce. “That’s what disappointed me the most because, no two ways about it, he hung me out to dry with that.
“I was going to be late. But I would have been in on time. Everyone at the club knows that. The gate problem is real. I never said I wasn’t coming in. I just said I’m running a little bit late.
“The next thing, the headlines. I think it came because Villa were 2-0 up at home to Preston and conceded two late goals. Being clever, he probably tried to shift the blame on me, which is fine but, in the process, as I said, something big happened before. Going down that route publicly was probably not helpful.”
That episode was the final chapter of his Villa career. A £15 million move from Fulham looks to have been the beginning of the end of his time in England.
Bruce insisted he wouldn’t pick McCormack again unless his fitness and his attitude improved. The Englishman admitted himself he had never publicly shamed a player in that matter before. The damage had been done long before then, though.
“I don’t think it was a personality thing,” McCormack said. “I think it was personal. A lot of things had been said. It didn’t happen instantly. A lot of things I will keep to myself for now.
“Looking back, I actually started his first game in charge so it wasn’t as if he has just come in and said, ‘I don’t fancy Ross’. I’m not sure if I started again after that.”
McCormack admits that he left Craven Cottage too soon and, if he had his time again, he probably wouldn’t have switched Championship clubs in the summer of 2016.