Well, I was a bit reckless in them days, I must admit. But, I never came up from the ranks properly. I held jobs working on building sites. I was also a gardener and a window cleaner. Then I came into the spotlight and was a bit crazy, without a doubt. I’d get into fi ghts and I’d go into some full-on challenges. And, you know, the press at the time in England, the papers loved writing about that kind of stuff and that’s where we got the name Crazy Gang. [Fans] used to always yell from the terraces “Psycho” and then the lads used to call me The Butcher and things like that, but it was all a long time ago.
How did the soccer spotlight turn into the film spotlight?
After grabbing Gazza [footballer Paul Gasciogne] in the balls, I kept getting invited onto chat shows, like the equivalent of your David Letterman or Jay Leno. At the same time, Guy Ritchie had written Lock, Stock. He and the producer saw me on TV and thought it would be a good idea to give me a small part. I only had three scenes I was supposed to do, but when Guy saw what I did he loved it. So, he basically wrote more as we went along.