OLIVER HOLT: HOW CAN A FOOTBALLER BE ‘NORMAL’?

Imagine a night out turns sour because a ‘fan’ goes too far... and you’re the one in the news because you’re famous

TROY DEENEY and his wife, Stacey, had not been for a night out together for six months. But last Saturday evening they had arranged a babysitter to look after their kids. They drove home to Solihull after Deeney had played in Watford’s defeat by Manchester United at Old Trafford, got changed and went out to meet friends.

Deeney felt like being normal, just for once. Advisers have warned him before not to go out in Birmingham, the city where he grew up. They have told him it is asking for trouble. They have told him he cannot be normal any more. It is the speech every Premier League footballer gets.

We say we want them to be normal too. We say we wish they were not so detached. We say we wish they were not so separate and that they did not live their lives behind the tinted glass of fast cars and the high walls of immaculate mansions in gated communities. We want them to remember their roots.

But it is not always that simple. Because we want them to pay a price as well. If they object to a request for a selfie or a demand for an autograph while they are eating or drinking, then they are spoiled, ungrateful wretches who have lost touch with reality. They’re millionaires, right? They should be able to put up with anything.

Normally it’s the fans’ view of what happened that we see, the shaky mobile phone footage, the

I DON’T see why Mark Clattenburg should face criticism for leaving the Premier League to take over as the head of referees in Saudi Arabia. Maybe it’s not his main motivation, but until referees in England are allowed to get more support from video technology, then the job is going to get harder and lonelier and the alternatives are going to look better and better. JOE ROOT is a brilliant cricketer who is popular with his team-mates and comfortable with the media. He is a fine choice for England captain but the fact that Andrew Strauss also spoke to Stuart Broad and Ben Stokes was a happy reminder that, for all its recent struggles, this is not an England side short of leaders.

lurid account of a night gone wrong. What you are about to read is the other view; a glimpse of the footballer’s side of one night trying to be normal.

Deep down, Deeney knew his friends were right. It was asking for trouble. But he and Stacey are still in their 20s. They wanted to have some fun. They wanted to go to the kind of places they used to go to. Deeney and his Watford team-mates had been given a few days off so he and Stacey wanted to enjoy themselves. They headed for Birmingham and the Arcadian Centre in the middle of the city.

They spent a couple of hours at a place called Sobar, a popular bar and lounge with orange leather sofas. A steady stream of people came up and asked Deeney if they could take selfies with him. He was happy to do it. It is part of a footballer’s life now. It’s something you have to accept if you have gained a measure of celebrity.

They had had a good time so they decided to go to one more bar, Levana, a short walk away. It was a different kind of place, more raucous, bouncers on the door, a younger, more boisterous crowd inside. Deeney, his wife and their friends went in and took their place in a booth.

The selfie requests started again. No problem, Deeney said. No problem, no problem, no problem, no problem. Over and over and over again. Deeney didn’t mind. He remembers what it was like to be a kid growing up in Birmingham and having football heroes. He accepts there is going to be attention. He enjoys some of it.

A young lad came over, it has been reported. He asked Deeney for a selfie. Deeney obliged, same as with all the rest. The lad wasn’t satisfied. He kept coming back, taking pictures of Deeney sipping his drink. Then, people said, he started filming Deeney on his mobile phone. Deeney thought he crossed a line.

He should have left at that point and gone home with his wife and friends but it isn’t always easy to admit defeat and accept that someone is bringing your evening to a premature end. Deeney took the lad’s phone and deleted the file.

The kid, it has been reported, responded by throwing a punch at Deeney. Deeney kept his hands by his sides. Five years ago, the evening after his father had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, he got involved in a brutal brawl in Birmingham city centre and was sentenced to 10 months in prison. He vowed to himself that he would never, ever go back. The only time he would respond, he had told himself, was if his wife and children were threatened. He would react if a burglar invaded their home or if they were in danger in some other way. But apart from that, he would never get involved.

He was a big enough man to take a punch, he reasoned. So his face might be sore for a few days. It would pass. It was a lot better than the alternative. It was an awful lot better than sitting i n the dock that time in 2012 and seeing his wife weeping as he was sentenced.

So when the melee grew and another lad hit him, Deeney still kept his hands by his side. And when a girl entered the fray and landed some blows on him, Deeney kept his hands by his side. It only lasted a few seconds but it felt like a lifetime. Somewhere amid the fracas, someone threw a bottle, opening a gash in the head of another reveller. The bouncers began to clear the place. They did not discriminate. They marched Deeney and his wife out too. As they were being herded out of the club, the police arrived outside. Deeney was being pushed towards them by the bouncers. The police told him to stop. The bouncers kept pushing. Stacey told the bouncers to let her husband walk away. Things were still fraught. A policewoman pointed a can of pepper spray at her. Deeney stepped between them. He didn’t want his wife to be punished for trying to calm the situation. The policewoman yelled at him to get back. That was the picture that was used in a national newspaper on Monday morning: a police officer threatening Troy Deeney with pepper spray.

It didn’t look good. He knew that. Deeney has worked incredibly hard to redeem himself after the two months he served in prison five years ago. He said his time behind bars was the best thing that had ever happened to him. It woke him up. It changed him. He has been a model citizen as well as a model pro since then. He has taken his responsibilities as Watford captain seriously and become a hero in the town.

Only recently, he and Stacey launched the Troy Deeney Foundation ‘to raise money to help children with learning disabilities and life-limiting illnesses, and support local projects close to our hearts’. He has become someone to admire on and off the pitch.

A police inquiry into the incident at Levana is ongoing. No charges have yet been brought. A relative of someone who was inside the bar phoned Watford to ask for money. And Troy Deeney will wait a while before he experiments with being normal again.