Gazza and the mystery of the secret sniper

Hi,

Del spent four years as a schoolboy and youth team player at Tottenham Hotspur between 1988 to 1992.

During his time there he starred in the same team as Nicky Barmby, played next to Sol Campbell in the former England star's debut as a centre back and has many insider stories about life at White Hart Lane.

It was the era of Paul Gascoigne, Gary Lineker and Terry Venables. Gazza and his antics fill an entire chapter in Del's Story. Below is one story out of many that Del shares about Gazza.

"No matter what’s been written and said about Gazza I will always remember him as being one of the kindest, funniest and most generous people I have met in football. Especially when you consider what a legend of the game he is and what a huge star he was during his playing career.

His shooting skills extended further than the playing pitch as many of us apprentices found out to our discomfort.

One day one of the apprentices complained of being stung by something during a run at the training ground. At first we thought nothing of it then more and more players in our squad were getting ‘stung’ on the legs and body.

The secret stinger turned out to be Gazza. Somehow he got hold of an air rifle and wreaked chaos with it for a few days. He’d be hanging out of a changing room window sniping at us, taking pop shots whenever we got within range.

None of us apprentices would dare tell our coach Keith Waldren. Gazza was Gazza and even though he was using us for target practice everyone loved him.

Keith Waldren must have been scratching his head when we all turned out for training wearing full tracksuits with the collars turned up even though it was summer. The tracksuits provided protection against Gazza’s pellets. Whenever we were running near the changing room window where Gazza lay in wait we’d burst into sprints and zig zag.

Waldren must have thought his young team were losing their minds.

Somehow he found out about Gazza’s sharp shooting and confronted him. From what I heard Gazza took no notice and I think he even began including Waldren in the target practice.

It stopped when Terry Venables had a word with Gazza and pointed out to him it was dangerous.

Gazza wasn’t doing it to be spiteful he was just, in his own crazy way, having a laugh."

This is just one of a number of great stories in Del's book about Gazza. Others involve Gary Lineker, Pat Van Den Hauwe and Sol Campbell.

Thanks for reading and remember to tell your friends about this blog and the Del's Story Facebook page.

Make the most of right now.

cheers,

Del and Jerry