The Andy Carroll story Part One

It is around 4.40pm on January 10 2009, and Newcastle United are in desperate trouble.

With the team having won just five league games all season, and with off-field issues strangling the club from within, the Toon Army are running out of patience as West Ham United recover from a goal down to take a 2-1 lead at St James' Park.

More in hope than expectation, Damien Duff sends a cross into the penalty area from the left as he has done, without reward, for the majority of the match.

Only this time, he hits the jackpot. This time, the ball lands on a young, hungry, tightly-braided head, and bullets beyond Robert Green in the West Ham goal.

Welcome to the Premier League, Andrew Thomas Carroll.   The gangly centre-forward had turned 20 only four days earlier, and had been jeered mercilessly by his team-mates as he arrived at training sporting his unconventional 'cornrow' hairstyle.

The West Ham game was his first league start at St James', and his 78th minute strike was his first for Newcastle. Having sat in the Jackie Milburn Stand and imagined following in the footsteps of his idol, Alan Shearer, Carroll had finally realised his boyhood dream.

"It was the best feeling in the world," he said afterwards, "Something I will cherish all my life and something I have dreamt of since I was a little boy.

"I didn't really know what to do. I just jumped up, stuck my hand in the air and kept my emotions all in. But it really meant a lot to me."

Ultimately, Carroll's late intervention against West Ham would do little to arrest Newcastle's slide. They would be relegated from the Premier League four months later, having won just two of their remaining 17 games.

For Carroll, though, the dark clouds that gathered over Tyneside during that period would be lined with silver. He had made 16 appearances for the Magpies by the time the season was out, scoring three times. He might have been heading for the Championship, but he had arrived.

Born in Gateshead on January 6 1989, Carroll, along with his mother, father and two brothers - who attend every game he plays - was always Newcastle-mad.   A ball-boy at St James' Park for three years, the gangly teen was discovered by the club whilst playing for local side Low Fell Juniors.

Alan Jarvis, a coach at the famous Wallsend Boys club - which spawned the likes of Peter Beardsley, Michael Carrick and Shearer - was the man who recommended Carroll to Newcastle recruitment officer Peter Kirkley.

Jarvis remembers seeing the youngster tear his side apart for Low Fell, and says it was clear that Carroll possessed that special quality.

"He was a small, skilful left-sided midfielder with great talent and ability," says Jarvis, "I never expected him to turn into a big 6ft 4in centre-forward, that's for sure.

"I knew that I'd seen something special. He had something that other players did not have."

Sunderland, naturally, were interested, but there was only one club Carroll was ever interested in.

He joined Newcastle at 11, but was drifting at the club's academy after being utilised as an auxiliary left-back.   Only the intervention of the-then academy director John Carver - now the Toon's assistant manager - and a growth spurt at the age of 15 enabled Carroll to develop into the all-action, powerhouse striker he is today.

"It often happens," says Carver. "Left-footed players are asked to do a job for the team. Andy had joined us as a forward but was moved into the back four due to the shortage of left-backs.

"At the end of that season, a decision had to be made on his future and a couple of the coaches didn't think he was good enough.

"Others pushed his claims and, in the end, it was up to me to decide whether he got a two-year scholarship.

"You can't judge someone when they're playing out of position. Fortunately, I'd seen him play up front, so it was a no-brainer."

 A no-brainer, and a decision which paid handsome dividends. Like Malcolm MacDonald, the Geordie No. 9 of the 1970s, Carroll was transformed from an awkward left-back into an aggressive, goalscoring centre-forward, very much in the Shearer mould.

Carver, though, believes there are more obvious comparisons to be made with another ex-Newcastle striker.

"Sir Bobby Robson always said the best way to judge a player was to imagine yourself up against him," says Carver.

"If you enjoyed playing against a certain opponent, then he couldn't be the greatest footballer.

"Andy's big hero was always Alan Shearer, but, to me, he was much more a Duncan Ferguson clone.

"No defender relishes the prospect of coming up against Andy. He ruffles up defenders, bullies them, doesn't give them any peace. He certainly passes Sir Bobby's test."

It wasn't the only test he would pass at Newcastle. Always an aerial target, Carroll worked extensively on improving his ground skills, attending extra training sessions to focus on his technical attributes.

Former Liverpool and Newcastle star Terry McDermott encountered the raw teenager whilst working alongside Lee Clark - to whom he is now assistant at Huddersfield Town - with the Magpies' reserve team, and says Carroll was by no means a certainty to make the grade.

"We all knew he had something about him, due to his size alone," McDermott told the ECHO. "But I would defy anybody to say he was a certainty at Newcastle, and to become the player he has become.

"We all had an inkling that he had a chance to become a player, but nobody was 100 per cent sure. That's why he went out on loan to Preston.

"I used to take him to do some shooting and some volleys and things like that, and he had the ability to fire one into the top corner from 30 yards one minute, and then miss the ball completely the next.

"Myself and Lee would talk to him about working on his technique. We knew he had the abilities to be a really good player, it was a question of applying himself and working hard to improve."

Improve he did. In November 2006, he became the youngest European debutant in Newcastle's history when he appeared as a substitute away to Palermo in the UEFA Cup, aged 17 years 300 days.

His league debut would arrive against Wigan Athletic the following February, and he would spearhead the club's charge to the semi-finals of the FA Youth Cup in 2007 and was beginning to become something of a talisman for the reserve team.

"I remember one game against Middlesbrough at the Riverside," says McDermott. "And he was absolutely unplayable. He scored a hat-trick, against good experienced players too, and he was just fantastic. You could see him getting better and better."

International recognition soon arrived. Carroll made a goalscoring debut for England's Under-19s side in September 2007 in a 4-0 win over Belarus. He was, by this time, at Preston, having joined on a six-month loan deal.

Lillywhites boss Paul Simpson described his capture as "a good target man with bags of potential", but he would depart the club in November, with the side struggling.

Simpson's replacement, Alan Irvine, set about stamping his authority at Deepdale and a raw, untried striker was not part of his plans, and he was sent back to the north east having scored just one goal - a header, naturally.   "Before he left, I had a conversation with him," says Irvine. "And told him he could be as good as he wanted to be but that he needed to be 100 per cent professional."

Fortunately for Carroll, Irvine wasn't the only man who held this view. His stint at Preston may not have been the success story he had envisaged, but his fledgling career would go from strength to strength on his return to St James' Park.

Source: Liverpool Echo

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