How to be a footballer (Ebury Publishing)

You become a soccer player because you love soccer. And then you are a soccer player, and you’re suddenly in the strangest, most baffling world of all. A world where one teammate comes to training in a bright red suit with matching top-hat, cane, and glasses, without any actual glass in them, and another has so many sports cars they forget they have left a Porsche at the train station.

Even when their surname is incorporated in the registration plate. So walk with me into the dressing-room, to find out which players refuse to touch a soccer ball before a game, to discover why a load of millionaires never have any shower gel, and to hear what Cristiano Ronaldo says when he looks at himself in the mirror.

We will go into post-match interviews, make fools of ourselves on social media, and try to ensure that we never again pay far too much for a haircut that should have cost ten bucks. We’ll be coached and cajoled żeby Harry Redknapp, upset Rafa Benitez, and be soothed żeby the sound of an accordion played aby Sven-Goran Eriksson’s assistant Tord Grip.

There will be some very bad music and some very bad decisions. I am Peter Crouch. This is How To Be A Footballer. Shall we?