Lennon’s case brings stress of pros in focus
Aprofessional footballer, if he is fortunate, begins his career as a child and ends it as an adult having known nothing but the same well-organised, rigorous daily schedule.
There are even some of us who spend all those best physical years of our youth and adulthood at the same club.
Institutionalised is a description I would apply to my life as a footballer at Manchester United. I had been there from the age of 14 to 42, and my life had been so distinctively shaped by the rhythm of life at Old Trafford that I realised, when it was coming to the end last year, I had to make some preparations for the change.
Aaron Lennon’s story has made the mental health of footballers an issue again and I think that for his sake and everyone else’s in the game, it is important to be open about how we feel as professionals, and how we cope with stress. I know that those outside the game will point to our wages and the kind of lives we live and to an extent that does cushion us from the challenges that many face, but it does not make us immune.
When my life as a player and then coach at United came to an end last summer, I was at a major point of transition in my professional and my private life. I decided to see a psychiatrist to learn how best to cope and some of the suggestions he made served me well in adapting to a new life outside United.
He suggested that I keep busy in the immediate aftermath, and I did that, going to the European Championship in France last summer as a pundit and then to India for a futsal tournament I had been invited to play in. There were little things too. I joined a gym for the first time in my life, and his simple suggestion that I join one half an hour from my home forced me to make a routine.
Mapped out
My whole life had been mapped out during my 28 years at United. From my schooling and then my life as a player, week after week, year after year, even the close-season summers.
Then finally I had never been busier than the last two years as a coach under Louis van Gaal.
I was looking forward to watching my son play football at the weekend for the first time, and being able to do that has been fantastic. Spending time with my children these past 10 months has been a great pleasure, but they have their own school lives and the hours between drop-off and pickup have to be filled too.
I do not know what has affected Aaron, but I always struggled in the periods that I was out of the team or playing badly. I had a feeling of worthlessness.
As a footballer you wonder if your teammates are looking at you and asking the questions that you are asking of yourself. Why can’t he hit a decent pass? Why is he always injured? What is wrong with him? I took defeat personally, and there were times after we lost a big game that — if we were not required at the training ground — I would not come out of the house for two days.
I know now that it is not helpful or normal — but it is hard to know what is normal when you are in that environment.
The one thing I felt was unique to a footballer’s stress was that every day when I left my house I never knew what I would encounter.
I have seen teammates changed by their experiences: David Beckham after the 1998 World Cup, Phil Neville after Euro 2000. They had to distance themselves from events. They had to become stronger. At times you have to put on a face for the world. Fame — notoriety if you can call it that — is a strange thing, and you have to handle it as best you can.