It turns out the death of street football has been greatly exaggerated.
Joe Gelhardt, now of Leeds United, played on a patch of grass amid terraces in Liverpool’s Netherton district where a sign states ‘No Ball Games’ when he was a lad.
He and his mates set up a goal there anyway and the crossbar is in the same state of dilapidation, held on by gaffer tape, that it was before he left for a shot at the big time.
That shot has been riddled with jeopardy. It was all going so well for him at Wigan Athletic — where he had been playing first-team football since the age of 16 — before the club was mismanaged to the brink of oblivion and all the best players sold.