‘I went away to England at 19 but I had the mentality of a 14-year-old – I was too raw’
Too much, too young, Michael Reddy lived the dream as a teen in the Premier League but was finished at 26
THERE’S no red carpet when you make it to the Premier League, no handbook on how to survive. For an Irish teenager, just months off that fabled boat from Ireland, it was sink or swim. Six games into his Premier League career, Michael Reddy was summoned from the bench by Sunderland manager Peter Reid to play at home to Manchester United. A United fan as a kid, Reddy was in uncharted territory: his family, who were at the game, would later tell him they noticed that, during his warm-up, he was staring in awe at the United players instead of focusing on his match preparation.
“I do remember coming on and I was up against Gary Neville,” says Reddy. “He had a few words with me, he just looked at me and said, ‘I hope you are better than your mate’, meaning the player I had come on for, Kevin Kilbane. He was trying to put me off my game.
“Only a few months earlier I was watching ‘Match of the Day’ on TV back home and here I was on the pitch in the Premier League, it was just surreal and I didn’t have time to adjust to it.”
Head-spinning
His game time against United that day, December 1999, was brief, just like his entire top-flight career: Reddy burst onto the scene with a move from Kilkenny City, and his 10 Premier League appearances with Sunderland (all as sub) were crammed into a head-spinning spell, from October 1999 to August 2000. Injury would force him to retire at 26, and forced him to find another path in life.
Despite the troubles forced on us all by the global pandemic, life in 2020 is good for Reddy: he recently turned 40 and became a father for the first time, the name of baby George a nod to Reddy’s all-time hero, George Best.
After 21 years living in England, a move back to Ireland could be on the cards. “We have a lot of cousins down in Kilkenny and it would be nice for my son to grow up with them, maybe have a hurl in his hand,” jokes Reddy, who works in marketing around the sports industry. This is his first interview in some time and for him, a trip down memory lane offers a ‘what if?’ moment.
“Some players look back on their careers and think they are happy with what they got out of it but I’m not, for me it’s frustration,” he says.
“I got injured at 25, retired at 26 but I should have done better than I did. If I had made better decisions, not stayed so long at Sunderland, gone to a club where I’d have played regularly. Those are my regrets.
“I’d love to go back and do it again, make better decisions. But you can’t do that. I was incredibly immature when I went over, I went at 19 but I had the mentality of a 14-year-old. I wasn’t streetwise, I didn’t take my opportunity and that’s my frustration now. But that’s life.”
Spotted playing locally by Kilkenny’s soccer guru, Jim Rhatigan, he was signed up by Kilkenny City and was pitched into the first team by Alfie Hale at 17. Goals for City and international exposure with Brian Kerr’s Ireland youths side gained attention and while Southampton were keen in the summer of 1999, the strong Irish presence at Sunderland persuaded Reddy to try his luck there.
“I did well in a trial game on the second day, I scored two and Peter Reid said he was keen to sort something,” says Reddy, and within days a deal was done.
An impressive outing in a reserve game against Everton was noted by
Reid and in October 1999, just three months after he signed, came a debut away to Wimbledon in the League Cup with a Premier League debut as sub, in a 2-1 win over Aston Villa a week later.
Shortly after came one of the biggest moments in his career, his only Premier League goal, in a crazy local derby against Middlesbrough: 10 players booked, one (from Sunderland) sent off, and a late flurry of goal activity. Hamilton Ricard scored to put Boro ahead, two minutes later Sunderland got a penalty which Kevin Philips took and Mark Schwarzer saved, but Reddy followed up on the rebound to score and earn Sunderland a point.
“I only saw the video recently, it’s embarrassing to look at it now, I didn’t know what to do after I’d scored, it looked like I was about to start crying, I think I was in shock,” he jokes. Reddy made eight Premier League appearances that season, including in the 2-2 draw with Manchester United. The 2000/’01 season started well, an appearance for Reddy in an openingday win over Arsenal but a League Cup tie on Halloween night in 2000 was the last time he’d be seen in a Sunderland shirt, though he would remain at the club for another four years. There were loan spells (five) and injuries but the longer he stayed there, the further away the first team became.
“I had major problems with my hamstring, that held me back and had an impact on my career there,” he says. “But I was out of the team and I lost focus, I hated reserve football.
“In hindsight, if I could do it all over again I wouldn’t go to Sunderland at 19, I’d go to a lower-league club and learn my trade, get experience.
“But I have only myself to blame for losing focus, I was going out a lot. When I moved over I rarely drank or went out, I was focused on football, I’d had a support base at home with family and friends. It was fine in the good times but when things turn difficult, you are on your own and I went down a wrong path, I went out way too much.
“I had friends in Uni over there and I’d be knocking on their window in midweek looking for a night out. I lost that focus and I was disillusioned, I was a million miles away from the first team, I had injuries, and it was the beginning of a downward trajectory for me.”
Reddy finally left Sunderland, for Grimsby Town, in 2004. “I had one really good year at Grimsby, 2005-’06, when I had my best football and I was a far better player than I had been at Sunderland, I was playing regularly, and it felt like my career was on the up.”
Operations
But injury ended that career, three operations unable to cure a hip problem and he had to admit defeat and retire in 2007.
At a crossroads, Reddy turned to education, relieved that he’d sat his Leaving Cert before heading to England, a strong tradition of education in the family as his mother and sister were teachers. He did a business and marketing degree in university in Manchester, graduating in 2012. “Since then I worked in different roles but mainly marketing, within the sports sector. It’s a different lifestyle,” he says.
“I’d kept it quiet, I didn’t want people in my class to know that I had played football, I was 28 starting Uni with the others all 20, it was a shock to the system to not be in football.
“I did move on but I did find it difficult. You always look back, you were living your childhood dream and then it’s gone. I hear players say they lose their identity when they retire.
“One of the biggest challenges I have found is trying to find something that I’m passionate about again that will replace the football. I’m probably still searching for that.”