FourFourTwo UK – September 2019

SHAMROCK

ROVERS

“GREnADES WERE COnSTAnTLY THROWn

AT US BY PAUL HART AnD EDDIE GRAY”

Above Stephen Bradley
patrols the touchline
during Shamrock Rovers’
recent top-of-the-table
clash against Dundalk

FourFourTwo September 2019 93

All of this gave the Republic of Ireland international a certain

outlook on the fragile nature of success, and what he expects from 

a Shamrock Rovers player if this team is going to end its trophy

drought. “So many things have to fall into place at the one time,”

he says, “and you have to be ready to take your chance.”   

To illustrate his point, McPhail fondly tells a story from his early days

at Leeds in the mid-90s, not long before he was an 18-year-old in

a team challenging for the Premier League title and a 21-year-old

in the squad for a Champions League semi-final against Valencia.  

The club’s youth prospects – including Paul Robinson, Jonathan

Woodgate, Harry Kewell and Alan Smith – lived together in dorms as

part of the newly-built Thorp Arch training complex. “It was in the

middle of nowhere and there was a prison across the road,” explains

McPhail. “Sometimes we would watch some of the prisoners be led in

with their handcuffs to play.”  

The gates of Thorp Arch shut at 10pm and the squad’s curfew was

strict, but in the week leading up the 1997 FA Youth Cup Final, players

snuck out of the training ground. “Well, we jumped the big fence and

we were caught on camera,” laughs McPhail. 

“Paul Hart was in charge and he was raging. He didn’t take training

with us for the week. Harry Kewell was in a suit jacket, trackie bottoms

andflip-flops,butwealllied for each other. We didn’t give anyone up.

Wewerelikea mob.

“Thepointisyoucanhave all the skill in the world, but you have

p tobeing tested. We were constantly having

d;having grenades thrown at us by Hart and

Eddie Gray. Can you cope? Do you lie down

criticised, or do you say, ‘Fuck you, I’m going

?

change, and you have to respect that, but you

keep the hunger; that desire to want to fight

ng.You aren’t given one first-team appearance

tional cap. You have to earn it, and it’s the same

h Rovers.  

eds,we thought we’d win the Premier League

e were 19 or 20 years of age. Every day we had

e best. That’s what we’re looking at here.”  

thetable, Bradley is nodding his head intently,

ninghis excitement. “I love hearing that – the

c’svoice and the feeling he has,” Rovers’ head

sistently. “We need to be properly educating

the top of the FAI Premier League, sparking hopes that a run of seven

seasons without a major trophy would finally come to an end.  

But if life has taught McPhail anything, it’s that you should take

nothing for granted.  

His playing career started at Home Farm FC, just a few miles north

of Dublin’s city centre. It’s the club where many of Ireland’s greatest

footballers kicked off their careers, including Busby Babe and Leeds

legend Johnny Giles, Liverpool captain Ronnie Whelan and Arsenal’s

consummate playmaker, Liam Brady. 

Indeed, former Leeds and Arsenal manager George Graham said

McPhail had “the best left foot since Brady” – the Mesut Ozil of his

day, only more consistent and less infuriating – following McPhail’s

first-team debut as a 17-year-old in 1998. 

Two Achilles injuries sustained in 2001 and2002,rightatthepoint

when McPhail’s career should have been onanupwardtrajectory

coincided with Leeds going into freefall.   

He left Elland Road for Barnsley on a freetran

followed by a move to Cardiff City in 2006,whe

the team that reached the 2008 FA Cup Finalw

Aaron Ramsey alongside him in midfield.But,l

McPhail was diagnosed with lymphoma, acanc

required 25 sessions of radiotherapy.  

“When I first went in for treatment, I wasspe

time on a ward with kids,” recalls McPhail (righ

“That’s when you see how lucky you reallyare.

I was still able to play football the week before

Cardiff in the Championship, and now I wasbe

a kid who was properly fighting for their life.Th

real perspective. My family were all tellingme,

not going to die, you’re not going to die’ –allI w

was to be playing football, because footballgav

discipline to focus on something.” 

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