Big_Nothing
Well-known member
I subscribe to The Athletic and this article was on there. Behind a pay wall which is an effin pain so thought I'd copy over for anyone interested.
Grant Leadbitter's Grief:
Scene one: mid-1990s Wearside, on the tight streets near Roker Park. A young boy, Grant Leadbitter, is with his father Brian outside the bungalow where they always park when Sunderland are at home. “The old lady kept us the space,” Grant says, smiling. Next stop will be the sweet shop — “Sarsaparilla tablets, can you remember them?” he asks. “Kola cubes, stuff like that.” Then father and son will go together to the Fulwell End to see Peter Reid’s latest team do their bit.
Brian Leadbitter was a home-and-away man, “a fanatic”, says his son. Grant was in Sunderland’s school of excellence by the time he turned seven and at 14, he was selected for England’s under-16s. Brian was a proud dad as well as a proud fan.
It was all before them. Who’s having that last kola cube?
Scene two: New Year’s Eve 2019, Blackpool. Grant Leadbitter is almost 34. Half a lifetime on from his Sunderland debut, Leadbitter is back at the club of his heart via a decade away at Ipswich Town and Middlesbrough. It has been no sweet homecoming, though, and in the Blackpool hotel bed the night before a League One game at Fleetwood Town, he can’t sleep. Past midnight, he gets up, leaves and starts pacing the streets.
Blackpool is illuminated, welcoming 2020, but Leadbitter’s glow has dimmed. Insomnia has crept up on him lately. There are hours, days, when he feels slow, like he is lost in a fog. All the while, his mind is racing with grief. The comfort of Brian is long gone and 2019 has taken Grant’s mother, Susan. Brian’s dying wish was to have his ashes buried beneath the pitch at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light; Susan’s was to join her husband there. Those wishes have been met but this is where their son plays and now he is roaming around strange streets in unfamiliar towns at all hours.
Scene three: last Monday, Park View School, Chester-le-Street. Leadbitter is on a low stage, socially distanced from three lines of County Durham 12- and 13-year-olds. He was once one of them. He is being quizzed on the best player he faced (“Paul Scholes”); his favourite grounds (“Old Trafford, Anfield, Goodison Park, I like the old-school stadiums”); and if he is verified on Instagram (“is that a thing?”).
Leadbitter speaks of determination and resilience and when asked if he has ever cried after a match, he replies that he has lost three Wembley finals. At the end, headmaster Andy Finley thanks Grant and reminds his pupils that in an age of instant judgment they should remember, famous or not, “Beneath everybody, there is a human being”. Signed photographs are handed out. The picture is of Leadbitter scoring against Peterborough United a fortnight ago. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter running to his parents’ ashes after he scored to touch the turf. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter sitting in his car after the match, crying.
“How was it?” Leadbitter asks when the school session is over. Despite spending 17 years in a very public profession, he has always tried to remain private. In the workplace — a club’s training ground — colleagues will know Leadbitter as boisterous and opinionated, and one of them. But publicly, he has, to use a phrase he employed on Monday, “shied away”. He is anxious about this interview, how it might be interpreted or misinterpreted. He wants to explain the past; he is positive about the future.
In front of the children, his ease grew. His tone remained understated, like his advice — “less is more at times” — and when a boy asked what Leadbitter considers his most significant success, his answer was: “Being here today, still playing, not taking anything for granted.”
There were times as 2019 became 2020 when, mentally and physically, Leadbitter had been unsure about that. He refers to himself then as “a hindrance” and 30 days after sloping around Blackpool, he took leave from Sunderland, from football. The club announced their captain was stepping away, saying it was a personal decision. That was correct. Leadbitter had been engulfed by grief and guilt to the point of standstill. He had reached the stage where he was, “Hoping to wake up one day and feel normal”.
He had sought help. For around a year, Leadbitter has been speaking to someone outside the game. And it has helped. So, unintentionally, did COVID-19 — “It bought me time” — and when he returned for pre-season in July, he felt sharp again. Leadbitter’s figures proved it. He has started and finished Sunderland’s last three league games — seven points, no goals conceded. He feels part of things again.
“I want to show people that you can come through it,” he says. “I get letters — from older people as well as younger ones — and I understand. I know what it’s like.”
The “it” is grief. In mid-February, a fortnight into his break, on Leadbitter’s verified Instagram account he posted the quotation: “Grief is like an earthquake.” It spoke of “aftershocks”. Unfortunately for Leadbitter, it is a subject he now knows intimately.
Grant Leadbitter's Grief:
Scene one: mid-1990s Wearside, on the tight streets near Roker Park. A young boy, Grant Leadbitter, is with his father Brian outside the bungalow where they always park when Sunderland are at home. “The old lady kept us the space,” Grant says, smiling. Next stop will be the sweet shop — “Sarsaparilla tablets, can you remember them?” he asks. “Kola cubes, stuff like that.” Then father and son will go together to the Fulwell End to see Peter Reid’s latest team do their bit.
Brian Leadbitter was a home-and-away man, “a fanatic”, says his son. Grant was in Sunderland’s school of excellence by the time he turned seven and at 14, he was selected for England’s under-16s. Brian was a proud dad as well as a proud fan.
It was all before them. Who’s having that last kola cube?
Scene two: New Year’s Eve 2019, Blackpool. Grant Leadbitter is almost 34. Half a lifetime on from his Sunderland debut, Leadbitter is back at the club of his heart via a decade away at Ipswich Town and Middlesbrough. It has been no sweet homecoming, though, and in the Blackpool hotel bed the night before a League One game at Fleetwood Town, he can’t sleep. Past midnight, he gets up, leaves and starts pacing the streets.
Blackpool is illuminated, welcoming 2020, but Leadbitter’s glow has dimmed. Insomnia has crept up on him lately. There are hours, days, when he feels slow, like he is lost in a fog. All the while, his mind is racing with grief. The comfort of Brian is long gone and 2019 has taken Grant’s mother, Susan. Brian’s dying wish was to have his ashes buried beneath the pitch at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light; Susan’s was to join her husband there. Those wishes have been met but this is where their son plays and now he is roaming around strange streets in unfamiliar towns at all hours.
Scene three: last Monday, Park View School, Chester-le-Street. Leadbitter is on a low stage, socially distanced from three lines of County Durham 12- and 13-year-olds. He was once one of them. He is being quizzed on the best player he faced (“Paul Scholes”); his favourite grounds (“Old Trafford, Anfield, Goodison Park, I like the old-school stadiums”); and if he is verified on Instagram (“is that a thing?”).
Leadbitter speaks of determination and resilience and when asked if he has ever cried after a match, he replies that he has lost three Wembley finals. At the end, headmaster Andy Finley thanks Grant and reminds his pupils that in an age of instant judgment they should remember, famous or not, “Beneath everybody, there is a human being”. Signed photographs are handed out. The picture is of Leadbitter scoring against Peterborough United a fortnight ago. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter running to his parents’ ashes after he scored to touch the turf. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter sitting in his car after the match, crying.
“How was it?” Leadbitter asks when the school session is over. Despite spending 17 years in a very public profession, he has always tried to remain private. In the workplace — a club’s training ground — colleagues will know Leadbitter as boisterous and opinionated, and one of them. But publicly, he has, to use a phrase he employed on Monday, “shied away”. He is anxious about this interview, how it might be interpreted or misinterpreted. He wants to explain the past; he is positive about the future.
In front of the children, his ease grew. His tone remained understated, like his advice — “less is more at times” — and when a boy asked what Leadbitter considers his most significant success, his answer was: “Being here today, still playing, not taking anything for granted.”
There were times as 2019 became 2020 when, mentally and physically, Leadbitter had been unsure about that. He refers to himself then as “a hindrance” and 30 days after sloping around Blackpool, he took leave from Sunderland, from football. The club announced their captain was stepping away, saying it was a personal decision. That was correct. Leadbitter had been engulfed by grief and guilt to the point of standstill. He had reached the stage where he was, “Hoping to wake up one day and feel normal”.
He had sought help. For around a year, Leadbitter has been speaking to someone outside the game. And it has helped. So, unintentionally, did COVID-19 — “It bought me time” — and when he returned for pre-season in July, he felt sharp again. Leadbitter’s figures proved it. He has started and finished Sunderland’s last three league games — seven points, no goals conceded. He feels part of things again.
“I want to show people that you can come through it,” he says. “I get letters — from older people as well as younger ones — and I understand. I know what it’s like.”
The “it” is grief. In mid-February, a fortnight into his break, on Leadbitter’s verified Instagram account he posted the quotation: “Grief is like an earthquake.” It spoke of “aftershocks”. Unfortunately for Leadbitter, it is a subject he now knows intimately.