inexperienced and eager, but there was also some pretty rotten luck.
Sometimes it was down to my self-discipline as well, because when
I was injured, I wasn’t trying to keep fit and was feeling very sorry for
myself – I didn’t look after my body and stuff like that. Mentally, it’s
tough to deal with when you’re watching the lads play every week.
You have to trust the medical staff, but I was having some sleepless
nights thinking about when it was all going to end – whether I could
still have a good career. Football is a short life and big injuries can end
everything. Looking back, I think I could have retired from the age of
20 – I can’t remember the last time I played a game when I wasn’t in
pain. You start to think, ‘This isn’t me, this isn’t how I play – I’m better
than this’, but then each new injury is a setback.
I wanted to come home after the first six months, although I was
warming to it after my first year. I’d signed a three-year contract and
did two, then Bayern were reluctant to let me go. Pep Guardiola was
coming in and they said, ‘Let’s see what the new manager thinks’,BETWEEn
THE LInES“I WAS HAVInG SLEEPLESS nIGHTS
WOnDERInG WHEn IT WAS ALL GOInG
TO EnD – IF I COULD HAVE A CAREER”
FourFourTwo March 2021 65but I had tunnel vision and wanted to come back to England. I never
spoke to Pep because I was gone before he arrived for the new year,
so we didn’t cross paths. It’s definitely a regret. Fresh eyes and a new
perspective under a different coach could have made a difference,
especially as he brought some young players through.
But there’s a lot of regret in football – when you get an opportunity,
you can’t turn it down. I got one of those at Barnsley. I wanted to go
there and push on. So it wasn’t ideal when I got sent off five minutes
into my debut, after coming on as a substitute against Wigan. It was
a bit of a rash challenge, but I was so eager to impress. I got a three-
game ban and it took a couple more weeks to earn some trust back
from the manager [David Flitcroft], which wasn’t a great start. Then
as I went on, I fell out of favour and had a mixture of injuries. I joined
MK Dons on loan and did really well there for a month – they wanted
me to stay for longer, but Barnsley called me back. I finished off the
campaign strongly, winning young player of the year and goal of the
month. I was doing well.
But during the off-season, I wasn’t looking after myself. I didn’t do
any running so I came back quite unfit and overweight, and the new
manager [Micky Mellon] wasn’t happy. It was just a mixture of my life
outside of football and wanting to do things that I shouldn’t: going
out, drinking, eating what I wanted. Eventually, after another spell
at MK Dons, I took some time out in 2016 to deal with family issues.
My daughter was diagnosed with leukaemia, and two months after
getting the all-clear they found a tumour on her kidney. Football was
nowhere in my brain. At that point, I thought if I never kicked a ball
again, so be it – it was the last thing I was thinking about.
But I started playing again with Runcorn in 2018, simply to go out
and enjoy myself; to get back in a changing room with the lads and
take my mind off things. Sky Sports turned up for my first game and
did a big thing, coming into the changing room and watching the
game. I have to admit, it felt good to get back out there with people
talking about me. I’m surprised that lots of people still recognise me,
though, because I don’t particularly like speaking about my past. It
pops up almost every day, because one of the dads of the kids I coach
might say, ‘Didn’t you used to play for Bayern Munich?’ I left Germany
almost 10 years ago!
I’m currently at Prescot Cables [in the eighth tier], but haven’t really
got going there because I’ve been carrying another injury. It’s strange:
I feel like there’s more pressure on me at this level than when I was
at Bayern, because everyone knows where I’ve been and expect that
I should be tearing things up. But sometimes you can’t.
Sitting here at 29, I’ll never be the same Dale Jennings I was at 18
or 19, and I’ll be lucky to have another three or four years left playing.
I’m not aiming to climb the leagues again, but anything is possible in
football – I went from Tranmere to Bayern Munich, after all...