Vinnie Jones is sent off. Paul Gascoigne: "I remember Vinnie Jones' handshake." Rough in three seconds

Paul Gascoigne - 10 wildest stories

Paul Gascoigne is the biggest hooligan and alcoholic in the history of football. Throughout his career he drank and went crazy. The other day, the former England midfielder told another fiery tale. Well, this is a great reason to remember his other wild stories.

Fresh. About Les Ferdinand's genitals

“I was in the dressing room,” says Gascoigne. And then Ferdinand came out, completely naked. You should have seen his trunk! I felt insignificant. I walked up to Les and said, “Man, please let me touch him.” The forest didn’t mind.”

I took the field and played very well, even scoring.

The next game was at Wembley. I sat down next to Les again.

Well, I say, get it.

“That’s the tradition,” Gascoigne continues. We played together for the national team for five good years.”

Ferdinand's reaction was not long in coming:

“This is all nonsense,” Les laughs. Gascoigne has gone completely crazy.”

Nine thousand pound burp

In 1993, Lazio fined the striker nine thousand pounds. The reason for this was a short interview with Gascoigne. Which, as they say, was discussed even in the Italian parliament.

The essence of the incident is simple. Gazza was not included in the squad for the match with Juventus. And he gave the reporters this comment.

Blatter and Santa Claus

Sepp Blatter arrived in Rome. The FIFA Secretary General was going to visit the Lazio base. For this occasion, the team coach, Dino Zoff, asked the players to dress up.

Gazza came dressed as Santa Claus, sat next to Blatter and said:

“Hi, I'm Santa. Ho, ho, ho!

The reward for the masquerade was a portion of training twice a day for the whole week. Seven days a week.

Bus driver

History of the Middlesbrough times.

Gascoigne was wandering around the training ground when he saw the driver of the club bus, who went for a cup of tea. Gazza walked into the dining room. And, five minutes later, he returned with the keys in his hands.

The football player got behind the wheel and went for a ride. Nearby, at the bus stop, two girls stood.

Hello! Sit down, where are you going? - the newly minted driver slowed down.

The ladies went up to the salon. A couple of moments later the bus crashed into the wall.

Vinnie Jones and Easter

Paul Gascoigne met with a gang as part of Newcastle Vinnie Jones from Wimbledon.

Gazza pestered Jones throughout the match. At one point Vinnie couldn’t stand it. He grabbed his opponent by something that came to hand. Namely - for the genitals. Football history replenished with a famous shot.

“Everything is fine,” Jones recalls. - After all, it was Easter.

After the game, as a sign of reconciliation, Gazza sent Jones a red rose. Vinny responded with a package, which was a toilet brush. They say the players are still friends.

Sausage rap

After the 1990 World Cup, Gazza was on a roll. And launched a musical career. The first single was a remake of one of the old British songs.

There is nothing surprising in Gascoigne's choice. The first lines of the hit talk about “sweet sausages sliding across the tongue.”

Dumb as a mop

This was the description given to Gascoigne by Sir Bobby Robson, coach of the England national team in the 80s. In response, Gazza showed up to training with mop brushes inserted into his socks.

A little more Italy

At a press conference on the occasion of his move to Lazio, Gascoigne demanded silence from journalists. And then he euphoniously spoiled the air.

Vinnie Jones, a good actor and former footballer, and one of his most famous photographs:

Some people know Vinnie Jones for his roles in the films Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Bonebreaker, Gone in 60 Seconds and others. But before he got into films, Jones was a professional football player. I’m ready to assume that anyone with the slightest interest in English football knows how Vinnie “looked after” the rising Newcastle star Paul Gascoigne. This episode of the match between Newcastle and Wimbledon in February 1988 became famous thanks to photojournalists, whose photographs were remembered much better than the outcome of the meeting. Gascoigne himself, who was also never a good boy, devoted several pages to a description of what happened in his autobiography.

We had to play away against Wimbledon, which at that time was an extremely difficult opponent. Mainly thanks to three players - John Fachan, Dennis Wise and Vinnie Jones. The press described upcoming match like a duel between Jones - a tough guy who takes no prisoners - and me, a young talent with a lot of cunning tricks up his sleeve.

During the pre-match warm-up, the camera lenses were turned on me, and I, in turn, could not bring myself not to look at Vinnie, who was warming up on the opposite half of the field. Even from a distance it seemed huge to me! I always get nervous before a game, but this time I felt exhausted even before the starting whistle. Shortly after the match started, he came up and croaked in my ear:

My name is Vinnie Jones and I'll damn sure be around the whole game. Do you understand me, fat man? Today there is only you and me!

I knew that experienced players often resort to such methods, especially if they have a young player like me as their opponent. But then Jones' threat had the most serious effect on me. When I first touched the ball, it attacked me so hard that I must have been thrown five feet into the air. Until the very final whistle, he did not leave me alone for a second, with the exception of one moment when he had to throw the ball in from touch.
“I need to leave for a couple of seconds, but I’ll damn it be back,” Vinnie growled, heading to the sidelines.

Our team received the right to a “standard”, and Vinny and I stood in the penalty area, waiting for the serve. He was in front of me, suddenly pulled his hand back and, like a vice, squeezed my balls. I roared from pain and surprise. I think at that moment no one understood what really happened, especially since the ball flew to another place. But thanks to the photographers, the whole of England knew about it the very next day.

Even for very good actors, the best roles are considered to be those where they don’t have to play anything and just be themselves. The director's talent partly lies here - in matching the characters with those who most closely match them in life.

It was on this principle that Vinnie Jones, a former English football player, flashed in the movies, who unexpectedly became one of the textbook characters in the black crime comedies filmed in Britain 15-20 years ago.

Childhood

Vincent Peter Jones was born in 1965 in Watford in Hertfordshire (East England). Like any ordinary British boy, he loved to play football. Already at the age of 9, Jones played for the school team - no one has yet broken this age record in his country.

Soon Vinnie began playing for the county team, and then led it. At the same time, he played for the children's team of the local club Watford, which is now in the English Premier League. For a talented teenager, the logical step would be to join the senior team. In the case of Vinny, the club management decided differently. Due to his short stature and puny physique, he was considered unpromising and was excluded from the team.

How long have you been in football?

Jones actually gave up football for a while, but returned in 1984 as part of the Weldstone amateur club. With him he won the FA Championship and Cup (in amateur league), after which he left to play in Sweden. In the Scandinavian kingdom, he and the Holmsund team won the third division of the local championship in 1986.

Comparing English and Swedish football is pointless. Against the background of the British favorite game, their colleagues from cold Sweden cannot be seen even under a microscope. Therefore, in the same 1986, Jones returned to his homeland and moved to Wimbledon. In 1988, Vinny, together with this team, won the now professional FA Cup. For Wimbledon, which has existed since 1889, this victory still remains the highest achievement.

Everyone has it English club There is an unofficial nickname, many have several of them. It is noteworthy that Wimbledon players, in addition to the Dons, are also called the “Gang of Psychos”. For the stubborn, extremely capricious and undoubtedly talented Jones best place it was impossible to find then.

After Wimbledon's victory, players from its roster began to be lured away by higher-ranking clubs. Over the course of several years, Jones played successively at Leeds United, Sheffield United and Chelsea, after which he returned to the Dons, becoming their captain. He played more than 250 matches for Wimbledon. In 1998, Vinnie briefly spent time as a player-coach of another British club, Queens Park Rangers, and at the age of 33 completed his career. football career.

In total, Jones played 384 official matches, with 33 goals scored. He usually didn’t need to make his way to the opposing team’s goal - he was always a defender or midfielder.

Dirty game

On the football field, Vinnie Jones gained the image of a “tough guy”. For this he was often criticized and called one of those who discredit football. Journalists weren't particularly fond of Jones either. They constantly accused him of clumsiness and inappropriate rudeness.

When it came to Wimbledon winning the FA Cup, one newspaper wrote that a team containing the likes of Vinnie Jones winning the trophy would be a “mockery of football”, since the country had so many great players who had never received such a title.

Vinny’s nickname was appropriate – ‘Axe’, that is, “Axe” or “Axe”. During his football career he was sent off 12 times. Once he received a yellow card just three seconds after entering the lawn for a tackle on an opposing attacker.

The most striking illustration of rudeness, perhaps, will be the case when Jones angrily clenched his fist, so to speak, the crotch of another star English football, Paul Gascoigne. The photograph of this episode was probably seen by many who were interested in Vinnie’s football past.

In another match, Jones inflicted a very serious injury on Gary Stevens, then an England player, which ended Stevens' career. However, Vinny was so tough only as part of Wimbledon. At Leeds he received only 3 during the season. yellow cards, and during the game for Sheffield and Chelsea he was never sent off the field.

Like any footballer, Jones dreamed of playing for the England national team, but due to his scandalous reputation, he had no chance of getting there. However, he was able to play for the Welsh national team. Vinnie was born in English city, but he managed to prove the presence of Welsh roots on his mother’s side. Jones played 9 matches for Wales and even served as captain of the national team. He was also invited to the Irish national team. However, the search for Irish roots was less successful.

Sudden Guy Ritchie

In 1998, Guy Ritchie released Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. The low-budget film immediately began to be criticized for allegedly shamelessly copying Tarantino. But when the film was revealed to the mass audience, it became clear that Ritchie had directed one of the iconic British films of the 1990s.

Vinnie Jones had no acting experience before. Richie invited him to make his directorial debut after seeing him on one of the TV shows where he participated as a football player. On the first day of filming, Jones arrived on set straight from the police station - the day before he had been arrested for a fight with a neighbor.

“Cards” did so well that Guy Ritchie immediately conceived the next film on a similar theme – “Snatch.” Naturally, there was a place in it for Vinny. It was he who was supposed to play the gypsy Mickey. However, a big fan of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Brad Pitt asked Richie for a role in the new film.

Richie simply could not refuse a star of such magnitude. When it turned out that Pitt could not be included in the panopticon of London bandits due to their inability to reliably imitate the local accent, it was decided to give him the role of a slurring gypsy. Yes, yes, Mickey’s speech in “Snatch” is largely like that precisely in order to disguise his not at all British origin.

Vinnie Jones ended up playing the hired thug Tony "Bullet in the Mouth", and he did a great job. Acting former football player received several awards and positive reviews critics. Dustin Hoffman even called him “the new Bruce Willis.”

Through the Hollywood Hills

An incredible debut helped Jones build a rapid acting career out of nothing. In the image of a sarcastic thug, he appeared in several large projects at once - “Gone in 60 Seconds” (2000), “Password “Swordfish”” (2001), “Eurotrip” (2004).

Vinny played a football player only once in the film “Bonebreaker” (2001), which was produced by Guy Ritchie. However, the film did not receive much success, and even comparing it with “Cards” and “Snatch” is somehow awkward. But later, Hollywood made a kind of remake of the film - “All or Nothing” with Adam Sandler and a whole set of famous wrestlers.

In 2006, Vinnie Jones played in his highest-budget film, the third part of the X-Men. Naturally, he got the role of a giant mutant with enormous strength. After the premiere, Vinny announced that he had signed a contract for the next two parts of the X-Men. However, he never appeared in them.

Hostage of the image

The viewer, alas, soon became bored with the permanent role of Vinnie Jones. After 2006, no matter how hard you try, you cannot find a single major or successful project in which the actor played. He continues to actively act. For example, in 2012, several films with his participation were released at once: “Pretend to be my husband”, “Stolen”, “Freelancers”, “Magic Boys”. Can you remember any of this?

These days, Jones seems to take whatever job is offered. He goes to Alma-Ata to star in the thriller “Liquidator” (2010) from Kazakh director Akhan Sataev. In 2014, Vinnie played in the failed Russian science fiction film The Calculator. He performs in musical theater, appears in second-rate TV series and does not refuse to star in documentary and entertainment shows.

In general, the current Vinnie Jones can only be seen on screen by accident. It’s unlikely that anyone is intentionally following his career. However, this does not deprive Jones of his past acting credits. "Big Chris" and "Bullet in the Mouth" Tony will always be with us as one of the most memorable archetypes of London's gangland underworld. And any episode with his participation from Guy Ritchie’s first two films will invariably lift your spirits.

Over its rather long sports career Vincent (or simply Vinnie) Jones won only one serious trophy. In 1988, the "Band of Loonies", as Wimbledon was called at the time, unexpectedly for many - and perhaps even for itself - won the FA Cup, defeating the mighty Liverpool in the final. Neither before nor after this modest London club with more than a century of history has conquered such heights. And certainly never in its ranks was there a more scandalous personality than Mr. Jones.

AN AX TO YOUR CAREER

His nickname, Axe, speaks volumes about Vinnie Jones's playing style. Defender Jones never stood on ceremony with his opponents, and the most suspicious of them preferred to bypass the bully from Watford the tenth way. Not everyone succeeded. In his first season at Wimbledon, the young defender effectively ended the playing career of Tottenham colleague Gary Stevens. The poor guy never managed to recover from severe injury, received from Jones' leg, and was forced to stop performing at the age of 30.

GAZZA SECTOR

In 1988, perhaps the most famous incident involving defenseman Jones occurred. After the match between Wimbledon and Newcastle, English newspapers circulated piquant footage of Vinnie squeezing his hand... the genital organ of Paul Gascoigne, at that time a rising star of the England national team. The “victim” recalled later: “I was never indignant about the harsh guarding from my opponent, but there was natural aggression there. I constantly felt his breath behind my back. In one episode he approached me and said: “My name is Vinnie Jones. I'm a gypsy and I earn a lot of money. I'll bite your ear off and spit it out on the grass. You’re mine, fat man!” Fortunately, there was no self-harm. But this incident established Jones at the top of the ranking of the most inveterate hooligans in British football.

LOAD IN THREE SECONDS

No wonder that for a long time It was Jones who held the national record for the most red cards in a career. Furious Vinny was ejected from the field 12 times by the referees. Over time, the long-time leader of Manchester United, Roy Keane, “improved” this result, collecting a collection of 13 deletions. Another “achievement” of our hero remained unsurpassed - a warning in the 3rd second (!) of the game. Jones managed to snag him in a Chelsea T-shirt in 1992. The unwitting co-author of this record was Sheffield United midfielder Dan Whitehouse.

HARD GUY

In the same 1992, the Football Association fined Jones 20 thousand pounds sterling “for discrediting football.” It cost a pretty penny for the player to participate in the acclaimed film “Tough Guys of Football.” In it, Vinny and several of the same “specific boys” openly shared the secrets of “skill” - how to make an opponent hurt more, or even turn him off from the game altogether.

UNKIND NEIGHBOR

It is easy to guess that in Everyday life Vinnie was not distinguished by exemplary behavior. The footballer was repeatedly brought to administrative responsibility for driving while intoxicated and various drunken brawls - sometimes alone, and sometimes in the company of his Wimbledon drinking buddies. For the time being, Jones got away with these “petty pranks,” but at the end of his playing career, he really almost ended up in jail. In 1997, Vinnie was arrested for beating a neighbor, with whom he had quarreled over disagreements regarding land boundaries. Vinny is lucky that the court sentenced him only to a fine of £1,150 and 100 hours of community service. Jones made up for his guilt by painting walls in a nursing home and doing other good deeds in institutions for the poor and orphans.

VICTIM

In December 2008, already a famous film actor, Vinnie again got into an ugly story. While on vacation in the United States, he started a brawl in a bar in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Jones was infuriated when a local guy asked him in a bar if he was the same guy from the X-Men. Vinnie tried to explain young man and his friends that the list of his film heroes is not limited to the role of a “stupid mutant”. Word for word... Jones spent the rest of the evening in a local hospital with injuries to his head and nose. The dull “Yankee” and his companions, however, also got it.

In November 2013, the 48-year-old footballer and actor announced that he had cancer and underwent three operations to remove tumors: two on his face and one on the back of his head. It seems that even the victims of defender Jones wish him luck in this fight.