MY OWN DREAM WAS CRUSHED BY INJURY AND THEN ADDICTION

BY

JOE SEALEY onced dreamed of following in his father’s footsteps as a goalkeeper – now he fancies owning a football club.

The son of the late Coventry, Luton, Manchester United, Aston Villa, Blackpool and West Ham keeper had his football dream crushed by injury just days before his dad suddenly died in 2001.

Now he is a successful businessman living in Wilmslow with wife Nicole and the pair are part of the reality TV show ‘The Real Housewives of Cheshire’.

Nicole signed up to the show when Joe (above) was looking to buy Macclesfield Town before it went bust because he felt it would be good for exposure.

But, having worked as an agent in football, he is still in the market for a club.

“The only thing I want to be involved with in football is to buy a club but it needs to be the right club with the right boxes we want ticked,” he said.

Sealey has rebuilt his life after admitting his dad’s sudden death in 2001 from a heart attack sent him into a dark place with addiction.

“This sounds awful but at the start drinking and drugs saved me, it took away my feelings and changed the way I felt,” said Sealey. “At the start it made me feel happy but at the end I was drinking neat vodka out of a bottle and taking cocaine in a Travelodge watching Jeremy Kyle.

“I went on a 10-day bender once and I thought I was going to die. I realised I had to stop it.”

Eventually, Nicole “saved his life” after dragging him out of his hotel binges and getting him sober. Now they are a power couple with a starring role in a reality show.

“If she dies before me then I’m f **** d,” said Joe, who has chronicled his life and his dad’s in a new book called ‘On Days Like These’.

“If football had been still there for me then I don’t think I would have lost my way. I wanted to play football.

“Maybe the addiction side of my brain makes me drive hard at work now or would have made me play football to a high level if I didn’t get injured.”