Jamie Carragher reveals ruthless way he’d try to win Liverpool players awards after controversial Messi gong
JAMIE CARRAGHER has revealed the underhand tactics he used to try and ensure his Liverpool team-mates would win an award.
While appearing on the latest episode of the Stick to Football podcast, brought to you by Sky Bet, Carragher was joined by Gary Neville, Roy Keane, Ian Wright and Jill Scott.
During the podcast, the topic of Lionel Messi‘s controversial win at Fifa‘s The Best Awards and Ballon d’Or over Erling Haaland came to light.
There were also discussions about the PFA Player of the Year award and BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
And former Liverpool defender Carragher has now revealed how he tried to elevate two club icons to try and get them to win awards.
He said: “I’d get the [PFA] forms [at Liverpool] and if I thought someone had a decent chance of winning something – Stevie [Gerrard], or Fernando Torres for player of the year – it would be like [in the changing room], ‘Well no one can vote for his rival’.
“I’d make sure of that! I’d tell players ‘You can’t vote for him’!”
Carra spent his entire career with the Reds but often saw these efforts be in vain.
Indeed, Carragher saw just one Liverpool star crowned PFA Player of the Year during his time at the club – that being Gerrard in 2006.
Meanwhile, Torres was named in the PFA Team of the Year on two occasions but never got his hands on the individual prize.
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Although, one year after his retirement from football, the squad seemed to remember Carragher’s teachings with former Reds ace Luis Suarez handed the gong in 2014.
In the years since, Kop favourite Mohamed Salah has gone on to win the award twice – in 2018 and 2022 – while in 2019 Virgil van Dijk also became the first defender to win the award since John Terry in 2005.
Manchester United icon Neville expressed his distaste for the current award set-up.
He said: “The honours system in this country is a joke.
“You grow up with the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, the Ballon d’Or – it meant a lot, it was quite regal.
“The idea of [Lionel] Messi winning the best player in the world this year – to be fair he’s been the best player in the world for the last 15 years along with [Cristiano] Ronaldo – but he scored a few goals for PSG [and] obviously got injured mainly in Miami.”
In the opinion of Arsenal icon Wright, Haaland should have won this year’s award over Messi.
He added: “Erling Haaland deserves something [an award] for what he’s done. [Lionel] Messi, and the joy he brings, it’s like when there’s a goal of the season, goal of the week.
“People love him but if you really look into what Haaland’s done, he easily should have won that [Fifa’s Best Men’s award].
“That’s just the way it is and that’s something they [the award bodies] must look at because he [Haaland] should not have to go through that, thinking, ‘I should have won that’.
“Look at [Robert] Lewandowski, when he should have won it, they’ve got to put the vote in people’s hands where people can say, ‘No, he should have won it’.
“If I’m Haaland, I’m finding out, ‘Did I win?’, and if they say, ‘No’, I’m saying, ‘Well I’m not coming’.”
Wright also expressed his disappointment that Gary Lineker won the PFA Player of the Year award over him in 1986.
He said: “I thought [I should have won the PFA Award in] my first year at Arsenal when I came from [Crystal] Palace and I scored my 29 in the league and five league cup goals!
“I think Gary Lineker won it that year, he announced he was retiring as well.
“He won the writers, and he won that one. I thought I was in for a chance with that one, I was devasted.
“I used to always [vote for] the players I played against, and if they were impressive on that day.”
Given the illustrious nature of the award many players would be proud to win the gong, unless your name is Keane.
In quite typical fashion, the former midfielder, who won the award in 2000, declared he was not proud to have won the award and insisted he should have won it in each of the three years prior.
He said: “I swear to God I’m not [proud to win the PFA award]! What did you want me to do?
“I had to go and pick it up – it was a lovely touch [Sir Alex being there!].
“It was a shocking speech [at the time], but if I hadn’t won it, I wouldn’t have been upset and gone, ‘I should have won it’.
“I would have rolled with it. I probably should have won it the three previous years!”
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