Casper Ankergren talks us through his football memories
First game you watched live? The one I remember is going to watch the club that I ended up playing for which is Brondby but I can’t even remember who they played. I would have been 10 or 11 years old maybe.
It is slightly different in Denmark – it is not like here where you grow up and your family supports Brighton or Arsenal or whoever – my Dad liked football but nothing too serious, we rarely went in fact.
I remember Brondby were playing Liverpool one year in the UEFA Cup. They actually beat Liverpool 1-0 and a guy called Dan Eggen scored – that is probably my first memory of watching English football. First football hero? Oh, it was Peter Schmeichel of course! He came from Brondby and I ended up playing there so obviously it has to be him.
I actually used to pretend that I was his son. I was about 13 when Denmark won Euro ’92 and I remember wearing the kit he wore and because his son was called Kasper too, I just used to run around telling people that he was my dad! First football boots? I remember being quite disappointed because my Dad came to Birmingham on a work conference and I was desperate for him to bring me back a pair of boots but when he came home they were astroturf boots – they didn’t do anything for me.
The first actual boots I had were a pair of Lotto boots. They were all black with a luminous green logo on the side with a huge tongue. I loved them, they were really nice. First kit? That could have been an Aston Villa shirt that my dad bought for me and I think I have probably still got it somewhere.
The one I had that I remember the best is the Liverpool shirt, all red with Carlsberg on the front, Adidas logo and white stripes on the sleeves.
My Grandma used to sell sewing machines and she actually used to just make the shirts that I asked for so I had a lookalike Juventus shirt and she would even make them for my mates – so that was cool. We just had what we wanted. First professional game? I was about 17 or 18 and I was playing for Koge in the second tier of Danish football against Viborg who were favourites to win the league.
I had a good debut and I think we drew 0-0 in that and then in the second game I didn’t do so good - I got sent off. First professional goal? I’ve never scored – I wish I had. I played outfield when I was younger and I was great from set-pieces. I actually played outfield in a tournament when I was a kid, scored loads of goals and we won it.
We got given a really nice green tracksuit after that so I was very happy. First red card? I was very young at the time and actually it was quite a bad challenge. There was a through ball and I slid in to dive on it and he just continued and jumped straight into me with studs showing in my chest.
I just lost it and tried to get hold of him – I just launched myself at him and so obviously I got a straight red.
The manager was quite good with me. He phoned me up and said, “Casper, you can’t do that.”
We both knew I had made a mistake but he was good to me.