Jesse Lingard’s birthday. He is now 31 years old and, at this stage of his life, he must realize that it will not be easy to change some of the perceptions that come from being a non-footballing footballer. For now, at least.
Talk to Lingard’s former team-mates and they’ll talk about a man who has been popular at all his clubs and played at a level, including a World Cup semi-final, that automatically commands respect his fellow pros.
But it’s also a harsh reality that many others will wonder how a player with Lingard’s record of success has spent so long without a club and seems less troubled by that situation than you might think.
Lingard last played competitive football in April, a two-minute substitute appearance for Nottingham Forest against his old club Manchester United. His last 90-minute Premier League appearances came with Forest in August 2022 and, before that, you have to go back another 15 months to find the previous one, on loan at West Ham from United.
Since then, it has been more of a period of drift for a player who previously won 32 England caps and contributed to some of United’s happier moments since Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement, including scoring winning goal in the 2016 FA Cup final. There have been some nagging injuries, some personal issues and only sporadic glimpses of his undoubted talent.
Jesse Lingard celebrates his win in the 2016 FA Cup final (Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)
And, more than two years since his last appearance in England, ‘JLingz’s’ life involves an entirely different routine these days: picking up a ball and going out, alone, except for a personal trainer, to do his fitness.
Something similar happened to Michael Owen when he left United at the end of the 2011-12 season and it quickly became apparent that a player who was once football royalty, with all the riches and accessories of a superstar, might need to reassess his position within the sport.
Owen, like Lingard, is in his early thirties. His highlights reel is wider, as a former Ballon d’Or winner, but age has also started to become his biggest enemy. And, even if no one ends up on Skid Row, it’s not easy trying to adjust when the boundaries shift and the sport, as a whole, stops looking at you so well.
In Owen’s case, he was too old, too expensive and too vulnerable for elite clubs and there were times in a long and challenging summer when he considered giving up football to devote himself to his horse racing business.
“I received several inquiries from overseas – one from the Vancouver Whitecaps, an MLS side based in Canada, and one from an Australian side, the Newcastle Jets,” Owen wrote in his 2019 autobiography. “When I considered those two possibilities, neither appealed.
Apart from that, Stoke City were the only Premier League side to show any real interest and, if you remember their tactics under Tony Pulis, it always seemed strange to think of a player of his size and ability. Owen in their forward line. Owen has doubts about himself. But he signed for them anyway because the alternative meant he would be out of football for more than six months – which is exactly what is happening to Lingard now.
Michael Owen and Stoke City, managed by Tony Pulis, were an unhappy partnership (Clive Rose/Getty Images)
“My God, the whole episode was empty,” Owen added. “When I first signed for Liverpool, I literally couldn’t write my name fast enough. The same applied to Real Madrid and, for that matter, Manchester United. I must admit that when I signed (for Stoke), I did it without joy. It was just a job and I just signed because I thought it was the right thing to do at the time. What else can I do?”
That seems to be a question Lingard has probably asked himself many times since he started building a sports center in Newton Heath — the area of north Manchester where United was founded — to go through his training sessions, sweat and then upload photos. on his social-media channels with fun phrases like “keep pushing” or “positivity and progress”.
“Even the hardest days will pass,” read one recent post. “We only do positive things.”
The intention, presumably, is to show potential employers how hard he works, how loyal he is to the sport, regardless of what anyone might say, and how he’s ready for a new challenge. His ambition, it seems, is to find a team in the US “Motivation, hunger and love for the game,” read another recent post.
Unfortunately for Lingard, the new MLS season doesn’t start until February. Nothing has been fixed and, for the past six months, the football industry has been hard-faced and cynical enough for many people to question its priorities. Why, they want to know, is a capable person out of a job? Does he not care? Doesn’t this hurt his professional pride? Because nobody wants to be a non-footballing footballer, surely?
The questions are understandable because, however well-dressed it is, there is nothing orthodox about a footballer who has spent half a year, or possibly longer, out of the game.
But there’s some context here and, if anything, the nature of modern-day football means we’ll probably see more of that happening in the future.
Here we have a man of extraordinary wealth who is in a position where he doesn’t have to rush into what he’s going to do next.
It is not about a lack of offers, according to people with knowledge of the situation who will remain anonymous to protect their positions, or that Lingard holds any arrogant assumptions about the level he should be playing at. It’s more about waiting for the deal that suits him best, rather than being forced or forced to accept whatever comes his way.
Jesse Lingard starts the 2018 World Cup semi-final for England against Croatia (Clive Rose/Getty Images)
That, after all, is exactly what Owen did at Stoke and look how that turned out. To the surprise of absolutely no one, Owen didn’t fit into Pulis’ big-man-at-the-far-post scheme, sitting on the bench while Peter Crouch and Jonathan Walters went into attack.
In a moment of tragedy, a training session ended with one of the senior pros holding court in the dressing room and asking with a mixture of humor and seriousness: “What is Michael Owen doing here?”
Owen, asking himself the same question, retired at the end of the season after no league starts, but offered to hand in his notice at least once in the previous months.
Against that kind of backdrop, perhaps Lingard has every right to be selective. It will be more difficult, perhaps, if interest dries up. But the phone still rings and, as long as that is the case, the attitude seems to be: why rush?
Lingard has been training for weeks with Al Ettifaq, the Saudi Pro League club where Steven Gerrard is manager and whose players include Jordan Henderson, Moussa Dembele and Georginio Wijnaldum.
Before that, Lingard had a similar arrangement at West Ham and turned out for David Moyes’ side in a behind-closed-doors game against Ipswich. Many people wonder if this could lead to something bigger and Lingard has a chance to mend his relationship with the club’s supporters, who were aggrieved by his decision to choose Forest ahead of them a year ago. . But nothing came here and all the talk about Saudi Arabia also disappeared
The wolves toyed with the idea of moving for him. Other Premier League clubs have discussed his availability, including one from Italy. However, nothing happened and it is worth remembering that Lingard, despite everything, will not be cheap. Forest pays a basic weekly salary of £115,000 ($147,000), along with some lucrative bonuses, which has led to some issues between the player’s camp and the club’s owners.
Jesse Lingard has had a disappointing spell at Nottingham Forest (Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)
Lingard can’t be blamed and you have to wonder if, on reflection, he recognizes it was a mistake not to rejoin West Ham last season, especially as it meant he wasn’t part of their Europa Conference League success, the the club’s first major trophy for 43 years.
Other offers have been suggested by Newcastle United and Fulham, with a four-year deal being discussed. Instead, Lingard signed a one-year contract with Forest, where he started just 14 games, rather than accept the club’s offer of a two-year deal.
Maybe that was a mistake, too, but he and his advisors thought he would be in a stronger position if he played well for a year, which he didn’t, and became available on a free transfer.
With that in mind, it becomes easier to understand why Lingard wants to make sure his next choice is the right one.
DEEP
Jesse Lingard and Manchester United’s sad farewell
His penance came in the form of 24/7 reminders, through the cesspit of social media, that he was a shirker and a waster, that he threw away his career and various attractive- attract responses to go to all the hostile headlines and regular unpleasantness. that a person in his position has to face.
Some people can get very angry when they think that a very rich football player is not making the most of his talent. It is an everyday part of Lingard’s life and that is, perhaps, the saddest thing given that he has tried to open up in the past about some of his more difficult times at Old Trafford and his occasional sometimes struggle with mental health.
So, yes, MLS will probably be the best place for Lingard to rediscover himself and, on his birthday, we might not judge him too much until we see what happens next.
Did he make some questionable choices? Yes. Does he need to find his way back soon? Absolutely, unless he wants to be one of football’s forgotten men. But he can play another five or six years, if he really wants to.
The next few weeks will tell us more. It all depends on Lingard’s priorities and that is the biggest question when, ultimately, 31 is too young for any player to talk about in the past.
(Top photo: Clive Mason/Getty Images)
