JOE JUST BUZZING TO BE BACK
Gomez determined to cement England place after World Cup agony
HE can still feel the sting. Even now, as plaudits flood in for his superb start to the season, Joe Gomez will have a flashback to the day a dream died.
To be precise, it was April 28. Liverpool played Stoke City at home and Gomez, by his own admission, had not played to the standards he or his manager, Jurgen Klopp, had expected.
He played, though, with his left ankle so badly damaged there was only one possible outcome: surgery.
The ramifications were huge. There would be no place in Liverpool’s squad for the Champions League final, no opportunity to be a member of England’s World Cup party. He was left on the outside looking in, repeatedly tormented by two words: what if?
At times, it felt as if the question was on loop. The hardest point was the period at the start of June, when the nation started to get swept up in a wave of excitement. Gomez was in the gym, working relentlessly, trying to get ready for the start of pre- season but his mind kept drifting.
‘In the end it was made straightforward,’ Gomez explains. ‘I spoke to Gareth Southgate and saw the medical team here at St George’s Park. Once the decision was made to have surgery, my family tried to cheer me up as family do.
‘I tried to crack on in pre-season and give myself a chance of being ready to come in on the first day. That’s all you can do because at that point I accepted it had gone. I had to use (not going to Russia) as motivation. But it was tough. I won’t lie.’
Gomez would have been within his right to tell Klopp that he was not fit to face Stoke. He could even have come off at half-time. Five months on, he has found peace but the initial pain, both physical and mental, will not be forgotten.
‘I had a long period where I was beating myself up,’ said Gomez. ‘I was replaying it over in my mind. I kept thinking I should have done something to stop things going the way they did. I spoke with (Klopp) but I didn’t not want to face up to the challenge.
‘If you come off at half-time after not having the best of games, it doesn’t look good does it? I’m just not that type of person and I wouldn’t want it to look that way.
‘It worked against me a bit. But it’s done now. Hindsight is a beautiful thing.’ There is a smile as he delivers the last sentence. He would have given everything to be in Russia, rather than sitting at home watching it all unfold in front of his TV, but it is not glib to say there will be other opportunities.
Gomez has been superb in Liverpool’s opening four fixtures, his efforts epitomised by a tackle on Leicester’s James Maddison during last Saturday’s 2-1 win at he King Power Stadium that essentially guaranteed Klopp’s men would be top for the international break.
Such interventions are the reason why Gareth Southgate has recalled Gomez and if the head coach is to alter the back five that reached the World Cup semi-finals when Spain visit Wembley on Saturday, it will be to accommodate this elegant 21-year-old.
HEis England’s future and a measure of how far Gomez has progressed can be gauged by the fact it is almost 12 months to the day he was made captain of the Under 21s. That role has now been relinquished as it has been accepted at St George’s Park that he has graduated.
‘It’s expected for some of the lads here to be in the squad,’ says Gomez. ‘But I still feel that sense of excitement. Everyone buzzes to be in the squad but it still feels new. I have to keep growing and developing and I don’t feel established, not yet. I have got a way to go before I feel established.’
That point will arrive some time in a future he believes is bright for the national team. This is the first chance England have had to add to the credit they built up at the World Cup and, should they progress as Southgate feels they can, there is no reason why the summer of 2020 can’t be similar.
‘It was nice watching the team do so well and everyone wanting to them to do well,’ says Gomez. ‘Credit to the boys, the gaffer and the coaching staff for all they did for the country. I remember playing a pre- season game (at Chester) on the day of the quarter-final against Sweden.
‘England scored and everyone was cheering and I was thinking, “What’s going on?” That showed it was everyone’s focus at that point. Watching it from my perspective this time really showed me how much it means to everyone and how much of an effect it can have when the country does so well.
‘It would obviously be nice to be a part of that someday. Hopefully we can have the opportunity to do something like that again.’