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John Terry: Public Enemy number one – but why?

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John Terry has an uncanny ability to hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons, on and off the pitch. In the 2004/05 season he won the Premier League in the first season of his long-standing captaincy of Chelsea and the following season, Chelsea won it again thus achieving back-to-back titles. Then on May 21st 2008 John Terry slipped, much like he did on Saturday against Arsenal, and played his part in costing Chelsea their biggest match in their 106 year history.

It was The Champions League final, and as he ran up to take the fifth, and if scored, final penalty his standing leg gave way and Terry went crashing to the ground and the shot was awry and ended up far wide of Van Der Sar’s goal.

He cried that night, in front of millions, the thousands in the ground and the millions at home in front of their brightly lit television screens; there stood a broken man with Chelsea in his veins, described at the time with the compliment of, “they don’t come more popular than Terry.”

At the time they didn’t, John Terry was the face of everything; Pro Evolution Soccer, Umbro, recently named in FIFPro World XI for the fourth consecutive season and the captain of his beloved country. “Five years ago anyone could have played alongside Terry,” said Match of the Day pundit Alan Hansen.”

But it did seem to the ultimate breaking rather than making of the man. Although the father of twins with his wife Toni Poole, Terry had a four-month affair with Wayne Bridge’s then girlfriend Vanessa Peroncel. Even more ironically, and saddening, was that Bridge was Terry’s England and Chelsea team mate and less than a year ago, in 2009, Terry had been voted “Dad of the Year.”

It seemed that the once roaring Lion who could lead his pride through the harshest of deserts had become the has-been feline that remained at the top of the hierarchy out of a lack of challenge rather than ultimate prowess.

The happenings had taken a seemingly detrimental effect on Terry and Bridge’s career. Bridge had already been sold to Manchester City in 2009 for £10m but the revelations of the affair that happened when the two Englishmen were Chelsea team-mates took its toll on the left-back. His on-the-pitch performances suffered and after playing 1,897 minutes for Manchester City without delivering a single cross accurately to his team mates he was loaned to West Ham where he was at fault for all three goals in a 3-0 defeat to Arsenal on his debut for The Hammers.

He now lives a non-footballing life whilst earning £4.7m a year at Manchester City, a figure he will continue to earn until his contract runs out in 2013, unless he decides to leave, an option he had and rejected this summer. However, the media attention that didn’t leave his side after the Terry scandal, which had seemingly contributed to his downfall, is now supplementing his meaningless footballer existence. Bridge’s only activity of note is his relationship with Frankie Sandford, the recent benefactor of a £40k engagement ring.

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Budding Football journalist who blogs at www.maycauseoffence.com/ daily as well as writing here for ThisisFutbol and on www.onehellofabeating.com/ the England fan's page. Outside of writing is more football. I work at Southampton F.C and I manage a men's football team on Saturdays.

0 comments

  • cb says:

    You missed out about him abusing Americans on 9/11, his tun ins with bouncers etc

    top player, pond life as a person though

  • cb says:

    here’s a few other reason he’s not exactly Mr Popular

    9/11
    John Terry was fined two weeks wages by Chelsea after a drinking session with team mates Jody Morris, Frank Lampard and Eidur Gudjohnsen at a Heathrow hotel which culminated in the harassment of American tourists at a Heathrow hotel in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks on New York. The players embarked on their binge after their game against Levski Sofia had been called off out of respect to the victims of the terrorist attack.

    Assault and Affray
    In January 2002 Terry was arrested for affray while out celebrating the birth of team mate Jody Morris’ first child. The pair were held overnight at Belgravia police station and questioned over an alleged attack on a male receptionist, before eventually being cleared of all charges – and all this just thirty-six hours before an away game at Norwich City!

    Paparazzi Attacks
    No good celebrity should go without a good paparazzi attack, and the same is allegedly true of John Terry and some Chelsea teammates who clashed with a photographer outside a restaurant on Fulham Road in October 2007. The photographer called the police claiming the Chelsea players had prevented him from taking photographs and damaged his scooter before disappearing before the police arrived.

  • Thanks cb; I was well aware of the other misdemeanors of the man, just didn’t want to create too lengthy an article so kept to the more recent and prevalent.

    Thank you for the reply nonetheless.

  • cb says:

    just thought they’d give a better idea of why everyone that doesn’t support chelsea in England thinks he’s a scum bag

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