It’s me in stilettos and the lads all in Lionel Richie wigs!
But after his stag do, Southampton striker Jay Rodriguez wants to forget his injury nightmare
My stats show I’m faster than ever since my comeback
JAY RODRIGUEZ had to take the stilettos off after five minutes, for fear of another injury following a year already spent on the sidelines. High heels are not often a cause for concern among footballers during rehabilitation but when the Southampton striker was told during his Ibiza stag do this summer that he was to dress as his mother, Carol, while all his friends dressed like his father, Kiko, they were the first to go.
‘I got rid of the shoes pretty early,’ he says. ‘I didn’t want to have another injury. They were too risky. It was literally five minutes, then they were ditched.
‘When my dad was younger he had the Lionel Richie hair and ’tache so they had wigs and fake moustaches on. They all had to wear different football kits and I dressed as my mum. I don’t think she was too happy!’
The 26-year- old’s stag do and subsequent wedding to Simone — his partner of four-and-a-half years — at the picturesque Eaves Hall back home near Burnley, were the high point of a painfully low year as he recovered from rupturing the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee. Rodriguez was expected back by Christmas but during minor surgery last November the wound became infected and he was unable to play all season.
‘With an infection you think the worst could happen,’ he says, grimacing at the memory. ‘In the extreme you could have your leg amputated. That was the darkest moment, around that time. It was hard to take, the setback.
‘I was doing everything right, it was just something small and the doctors said I need this surgery to get rid of something that was in the knee. Then it got infected, which took over.
‘It was painful. As soon as you get rid of it you’ve got to start rebuilding your muscles all over again.’
The 15 months between landing awkwardly against Manchester City in April 2014 and playing his first real football in a friendly against Red Bull Leipzig early last month — where he netted with his first touch and added a second coming on at the interval — were lonely at times.
That is why after donning a flamboyant green dress, blonde wig, black tights and posing for a photograph laid out on a picnic bench with his now bushy-haired and mustachioed friends, no risks could be taken and those dreaded stilettos were replaced by flip-flops.
In his absence, Southampton secured a Europa League spot and their highest-placed finish of seventh. Rodriguez’s joy at his teammates’ success is tempered slightly by his frustration at not being involved. The doctors and physiotherapists became, he says, his new team. At first he could not put any weight on the knee and he simply had to pass time to recover — he watched the entire Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad box-sets. Then the muscles had to be fired back up in the gym, light jogging could begin and heavier weights added before he could get out running and then finally rejoin training.
Warning to defenders: out of the Rodriguez of old has stepped Rodriguez Mk II. ‘ We got all the stats back and measured my sprint speeds that I clocked when I was fit before to when I came back and I’ve improved. I ran 9.1 metres per second before and it’s now up to 9.3.’
That, according to one sports scientist at a Premier League club, will be up there with the fastest in the league. ‘It was something I wanted to do,’ Rodriguez adds. ‘I thought, “Right, this is my opportunity to get faster and stronger”. I told the club I’d work every hour I can. We got my nutrition sorted. It made me realise how much you can improve without playing.’ He spent two months without kicking a ball, but then could not resistst juggling one if it was lyingng around the changing room or having a knockabout with his is dog, Vera, in the back garden.
‘I had to be careful, Simone ne would tell me to calm down n a bit and take it easy a few w times,’ he says. After all, Vera is a huge grey Weimaraner and looks like she would not t pull out of a challenge.
‘Every time you see a balll you have to mess with it,’ he e adds. ‘It’s something you u miss when you’re being told you can’t do it.’
Rodriguez was in the form of his life before the injury. He had scored five in five games and was on the verge of a place in Roy Hodgson’s World Cup squad after earning a first cap. Yet since then a clutch of English strikers have come to the fore.
In the Premier League last season, Harry Kane scored 21 goals, Charlie Austin 18, Saido Berahino 14 and Danny Ings 11. Jamie Vardy also earned an England call-up.
‘It’s good that players are gettingetting opportunities when they’re in form,’ he says, targeting an improved return on the 15 league goals he netted in his last season and hoping a place at Euro 2016 in France will follow.
‘For me it’s a positive. If I get back to playing and improve my form hopefully there’s a chance for me. The main thing is to concentrate on how I play and everything else will take care of itself. I play each game as if it’s my last.’
Manchester City, Liverpool and Tottenham were all following Rodriguez’s situation as he headed into the final year of his contract. But while all of those clubs would have helped his standing with the England team, the player opted to sign a four-year deal on the south coast.
‘It was a case of staying loyal,’ explains Rodriguez, whwho scored a 25- yard screamer in Southampton’s 1- 1 friendly draw with Espanyol yesterday. ‘Having been out for a year I thought it was the best time to get out playing football and that was the decision I made. It felt right to do that.’
Loyalty is a rarity in football nowadays, but it is a concept which Rodriguez, whose Saints side start their Premier League season at Newcastle on Sunday, clearly embraces after marrying Simone in June. ‘The last year has been really testing but she’s never once broken, she’s always been the stronger one,’ he says. ‘She keeps me grounded. It felt right to get married.
‘It feels a bit grown up for us, being husband and wife. We’re the first out of our friends to get married. We’ll look to build a family of our own now. That’s the plan, hopefully we can start as soon as possible. We feel like we’re ready for it.’
So we will soon see a few little Jay Rodriguez running around. ‘That would be nice, I’d love that. We’ll see how the first one goes, see how hard that is. We’ve got a mad dog, and probably a kid will be even madder.’