Matt Le Tissier - Taking le Tiss

Jimmy was a formidable character when he had been drinking, as I found out when I ended up playing cards with him until 5am on another trip. We were staying at the Atalaya Park Hotel on the Costa del Sol and he owed me £80, which was a fortune to me back then. We had no cash on us so we were just writing the stakes on bits of paper. Jimmy was getting more and more drunk and wouldn’t let me go to bed while he was losing. Eventually he staggered away to the toilet so I legged it out the door and back to my room. I was sharing with Francis Benali who, incidentally, never got up to anything on these foreign trips. So he was well chuffed to be woken by me shouting that Jimmy had kept me prisoner for five hours and now owed me £80. Suddenly there was a loud bang on the door and I hissed ‘Don’t answer it.’

Next thing there was a loud bang on every door as Jimmy went down the corridor, trying to find someone who wasn’t asleep. I conked out but was woken by a rap on the patio doors. Jimmy had climbed over his balcony and was standing outside trying to get in. We just hid and eventually he calmed down and went off. Next morning, when we left the room, we were greeted by the sight of Ray and Rod Wallace’s door hanging off its hinges. It wasn’t the normal flimsy door but a big, thick wooden one and Jim had just demolished it. Apparently he wanted someone to lend him some batteries for his personal stereo. It proved mighty expensive because the cost of the door got added to his bill. And no, I never did get that £80—and I’m still not brave enough to ask for it.

The only time Jim had a drink ahead of a match was the night before the final game of the 1986-87 season. I was injured so I was back home in Guernsey but I heard all about it from Glenn Cockerill who was rooming with him, and who also liked the occasional drink. We were away to Coventry and both teams were safe and, with no prize money in those days, there was nothing riding on the match. So the lads had a few quiet drinks the night before, but Jim kept going all night. His breath was still reeking of alcohol when the game kicked off and he’d hardly had any sleep.

After five minutes we won a corner and Jim went up to take it. Coventry cleared it, broke and won a corner of their own. It was Peter Shilton’s job to set up the defence and tell everyone who to mark, and he noticed that Jim was missing. Everyone looked round and eventually spotted him still at the other end of the pitch, where we’d had our corner, sat on a wall talking to a spectator. He was quickly subbed after that.

After games, the lads would usually end up at Jeeves nightclub, but as I’ve said, at 17 and 18 I didn’t really drink. However I do remember being talked into going out one night for a few rounds. I was living in digs and didn’t want to wake everyone at 2am so Jim said I could stay at his place. We got back there at 2.30am and Jim started cooking bacon sandwiches while I sat in the lounge. I honestly just wanted to see his medal collection because he had won just about everything in the game, except an England cap, which is unforgivable when you think of his talent. On international weeks at Liverpool he’d be training all on his own. Everyone else would be with England and Scotland, etc. He was different class and I just wanted to see his championship medal because I had never seen one. I was stood looking at his trophy cabinet when his wife Lana came downstairs to see who’d woken her up.

JIM KEPT GOINGALL NIGHT. HISBREATH WASSTILL REEKING OFALCOHOL WHENTHE GAMEKICKED OFF ANDHE’D HARDLYHAD ANY SLEEP.

She had a bit of a go at Jim and I thought I was going to be in the middle of a domestic when she started having a go at me. She said, ‘What do you think you are doing?’ I stammered, ‘Jim said I could stay here…’ She hit back, ‘No, I mean what d’you think you are doing trying to keep up with Jim? You’ve got no chance.’ She packed me off to bed and warned me never to try that again. I was woken by the sound and smell of Jim cooking a full fry-up including eggs from the geese he kept in his garden.

For such a hard-tackling, harddrinking player Jimmy was very domesticated. On away trips he’d look after the whole team on the coach, making cups of tea and plates of toast. He was really happy doing it. Here was this senior pro, a real big name in the game who was happy to be the waiter. He also looked after his training kit. Most of the lads just chucked it on the floor to be cleared up by the apprentices but Jim always folded his up neatly. He was brilliant like that but very different when he’d had a few.

It was quite an eye-opener for a naïve young lad who had grown up on Guernsey with something of a sheltered upbringing. I don’t think the wives were particularly pleased about these trips but it did us good to relax in a different country, and that togetherness played a huge part in keeping Saints in the top flight. We weren’t the most talented team but we had a real bond and spirit which got us through a lot of matches. You certainly couldn’t have a conversation without one of the lads taking the mickey. If you said something stupid, you instantly panicked wondering if anyone else would pick up on it, and invariably they did. Equally, there was a time and a place for it—which took me time to learn. I was always ready with a cheeky quip but it wasn’t always appreciated. These trips were brilliant for banter and team spirit. And of course we went right OTT.

I remember when we almost got chucked out of the prestigious five-star Dona Filipa hotel on the Algarve. Why we went to a luxurious hotel during the season I’ll never know. It was full of really posh people dressed smartly for dinner while we were in shorts and T-shirts, larking around and getting drunk. There were several complaints about us so the hotel manager summoned Dennis Rofe who called a team meeting for 8.30am, which we thought was a bit unreasonable as we’d only just got in. We had no idea what was going on.

Dennis read the riot act and said the hotel manager was on the verge of throwing us out but he’d managed to talk him into giving us one last chance, and we had to be on our best behaviour or we were out. There was suddenly quite a sombre mood but I didn’t pick up on it because I hadn’t sobered up and piped up, ‘I thought if you were calling a meeting at 8.30 in the morning, it must be for something serious.’ Dennis had a face like thunder.

Generally Rofey was good value on tour, mucking in with the lads. As first-team coach he was a kind of bridge between the players and manager, someone for us to moan to or laugh with. He was popular with the fans too because he had Saints running through him, despite the fact that the club sacked him three times. The first time was when Chris Nicholl got sacked in 1991. The board assumed that the new manager would arrive with a ready-made coaching team, but that wasn’t the case. Ian Branfoot came solo so there was absolutely no reason for Rofey to go. Dave Merrington brought him back as youth team coach in July 1995, but he was sacked again a year later when Graeme Souness came in as manager and brought in his own team of coaches, most of whom weren’t a patch on Dennis, who returned for a third spell in April 1998. He was appointed as Academy coach but worked his way up through the Reserves to regain his position as first-team coach in March 2001. But he was sacked again in December 2005 following the appointment of George Burley who discarded most of the coaching staff. It was Rofe justice (OK, OK) because all the players and fans liked him, especially because he wore his trademark T-shirt on the touchline even when it was freezing in midwinter. He’d even had a stint at the club as a half-time pitch announcer, winding up the crowd to get behind the team, cracking jokes and even singing.