BACK FROM THE BRINK
Ex-Saints ace Stephen’s joy after he beats booze
He could have scored all the goals in the world... but Stephen McPhee insists it wouldn’t have mattered a jot.
Staring at the bottom of a bottle, he thought to himself he was done.
Not just with football. But with everything.
A once-stellar career curtailed by injury, the former St Mirren striker found himself without a place to turn.
It wasn’t as if he hadn’t had success.
From Coventry to Paisley, Portugal to the Premiership, he admits he had more than his fair share of the big time.
Having played in front of packed houses against the likes of FC Porto and Celtic, shared a changing room with the Craig Bellamys and Robbie Keanes of this world, McPhee knows he has nothing to be ashamed of.
But imagine having all of that – the adulation and the thrill – taken away.
Stuck in a rut, retired at 29 after a doctor threatened he wouldn’t be able to walk if he never gave up, McPhee sank into a deep depression.
Without a place to turn, his thoughts shifted to suicide.
“I was lost in life,” he told Express Sport. “I didn’t know what to do.
“I was digging a hole for myself. Every day just seemed like another slide towards oblivion.
“I was staying up late, I was drinking, I didn’t really know where to turn. I felt stuck but lost.
“Before I knew it I was contemplating suicide. Then I was attempting suicide.”
Beneath the glitz and glamour of a footballer’s lifestyle, the uncertainty of what will follow always lingers.
A career that can appear destined for the very top can be so cruelly taken away with one mistimed challenge, a stud caught in the turf, or the most innocuous of clashes in the middle of the park.
For McPhee, a knee injury sustained while on the cusp of promotion with Hull kick-started a turn of events that put the buffers on his footballing career.
A move to Blackpool followed, where admittedly he was unable to reach the level of expectation that he had once proudly put on himself. And with Ian Holloway’s side on the brink of the Premiership, McPhee made the decision to listen to the doctor’s orders.
Ollie, as the former Blackpool manager is affectionately known, was quick to hand his striker some salvation and promptly appointed him reserve team coach.
Little did he know at the time, but that day-to-day interaction at the training ground shielded him from having that void to fill in his life.
But when, following the side’s relegation the following season, McPhee decided to walk away, that’s when life started to spiral out of control.
McPhee said: “The injuries were the start of it all and ultimately led to me retiring when I did.
“They started at Hull and although they wanted me to stay, I felt moving to Blackpool was the best thing for it at that stage.
“When the doctor then tells you that it’s time to give it up then you listen. When he tells you that if you ever want to play football with your kids then you have no other option but to take his word for it.
“I had this all on my shoulders. And after quitting football, and without that routine, I felt like I had nothing.
“I was fortunate enough to be offered a coaching position by Ian Holloway with the reserves but when they were relegated from the Premiership I decided to walk away and from there on in, I didn’t know what to do.
“I knew I was depressed. No one really knew about it.
“Things spiralled out of control until it all came to a head. Things weren’t getting any better and I knew I had to sort myself out.
“I am thankful to this day that I did.”
But McPhee’s story is one with a happy ending.
With his parents living in Florida, the striker, who featured for the Buddies during the 2000/01 SPL season, jetted off to spend some quality time with his nearest and dearest when he needed it most.
Little did he know that it would be a trip that would change his life, opening up avenues into a new-found career that sees him focused on life outside of football, and that gave him something, in his words, ‘to live for’.
McPhee said: “I know myself better now than I ever did before. I look now and realise how much I have got.
“I had to find that something in my life to focus my attentions on, I needed that thing to keep