CARRAGHER ON TIM KRUL
SO IT seems you are either with me or firmly against me: there doesn’t appear to be a middle ground after my comments about Tim Krul.
It is a week since I criticised Newcastle United’s goalkeeper for appearing to congratulate Jermain Defoe at half-time during the WearTyne derby after the Sunderland striker beat him with a brilliant volley. I’m still struggling to work out why Krul did what he did.
I have nothing against Krul, personally or professionally. He’s been one of the few players who have performed consistently for Newcastle in recent seasons, which led to him being part of Holland’s World Cup squad last summer.
But coming together with an opponent and smiling after he’s scored against you in a match of such importance? No, I’m sorry. I can’t understand why any player would feel the need to do that. At the end of the game? That’s not an issue — there is no more appropriate place for sportsmanship.
Think about the iconic image of Pele and Bobby Moore swapping shirts after Brazil had beaten England 1-0 at the 1970 World Cup or how two boxers will embrace after they have gone the distance — that is fantastic to see.
When Liverpool beat Chelsea in the 2005 Champions League semifinal at Anfield, the first thing I did at the final whistle was go over to see John Terry to offer my respects for how well he’d played over the two legs. Would I have told him that at half-time with the game in the balance? No chance!
We were talking about this subject at Sky on Monday morning. I bumped into former England rugby centre Will Greenwood and he told me a story about the end of the Rugby World Cup final in 2003, when Australia’s Elton Flatley scored a penalty with the last kick to take the game into extra-time.
Will said he went up to Flatley after that successful conversion and said to him: ‘Well done — you’ve got balls as big as houses for that.’
That is great sportsmanship but I’m not sure I could have done the same if I’d seen the World Cup ripped out of my hands.
Andrew Flintoff,ff, who famously went to console Brett Lee at the end of an Ashes Test in 2005, joined in the debate on Twitter.itt He clearly felt I had been harsh on Krul and he told me cricketers applaud the opposition batsman when heh passes 50 or 100, quitequit often with a handshake.han That’sT all well and good.go But will a batsman walk up to a bowler and pat him on the back after havingh his stumps uprooted?u We have neverne seen that happen nor are we likely to. You don’tdon’ congratulate the oppositionopposi at a time when your team have been put on the backfoot.t
I carried that approach during my career. There were more talented players than me but I had desire, focus and would never lose my intensity. I never, for instance, ever considered shaking hands or hugging an opponent in the tunnel before a match.
The attitude stemmed from my childhood. Growing up as an Evertonian, I would work myself into a frenzy in the week before a derby match. I despised Liverpool then and I wanted the players who I supported to feel exactly the same way.
If, then, I’d seen Neville Southall put an arm around Ian Rush’s shoulder after he’d scored a goal, I’d have been devastated. I took that approach when I ended up playing against Everton. Put it this way — I couldn’t have shared a joke with Tim Cahill if he’d scored 30 seconds before half-time like Defoe.
I appreciate some people reading this will feel it was extreme but that’s how I operated. Gary Neville has told me regularly that if I ever want to go into coaching or management, I will have to lower my tolerance levels since modern players are different and it isn’t worth falling out with them over certain things.
I’m not saying my way is right or wrong but to be at my best I needed to be tense and wound up. If I thought to myself I needed to say ‘Well done’ to someone I was in direct competition with, I wouldn’t have been thinking about winning the game in which I was involved. That wasn’t me.
Gerard Houllier was a manager who held similar views. He once saw one of our foreign players hugging an opponent in the tunnel before a game at Anfield and went berserk afterwards.
‘I never want to see that again from any of you — you are going to war with them,’ he said. ‘Save the hugging for in the bar afterwards.’
Houllier even told us before the FA Cup final in 2001 that he didn’t want us looking into the stand to see our families; given that I grew up watching players make the long walk at Wembley while waving to the crowd, that was quite a statement.
BUT
do you know something? I loved that. There is a time and a place for showing mutual respect and it is after the final whistle has gone and you are in the bar afterwards.
Before that, you have business to take care of and that should be the priority — that’s why I felt so strongly about Krul.
Others, of course, will take a different view and say I have been too harsh. I respect that. It doesn’t mean to say, though, that I can understand it.
Carragher blasts Krul after Toon keeper salutes Defoe for wonder derby winner