‘Portsmouth were going to release me as a kid - then I got lucky’: Ex-Spurs, Wolves, Bournemouth and England man Darren Anderton on the game which saved his career

The right winger went on to amass 30 England caps, while spent eight years in the Premier League with Spurs and also turned out for Wolves, Birmingham, Bournemouth and, of course, the Blues.

However, his fine career almost ended before it began at the age of 16 when in Pompey’s youth set-up.

Anderton admitted in Played Up Pompey Three that, ahead of the final match before apprenticeship decisions were made, he was heading out the Fratton Park door.

Then an under-16 fixture against the Royal Navy at Eastney Barracks would change his footballing destiny.

‘You need a bit of good fortune in football. There are kids with mega-talents who everyone wants, but who plays well in a trial game? It’s not nice, it’s not normal,’ he told Played Up Pompey Three.

‘My luck arrived in the form of Dave Hurst, Pompey’s youth development officer. I was representing Southampton Schools under-14s against Eastleigh at their Crestwood Community School ground one Saturday morning. My dad wasn’t even at the match, he was instead watching one of my other brothers that morning, but my mum was present.

‘I came out of the changing room afterwards and a guy came up to me and said: “Are you Darren Anderton? I’m Dave Hurst from Pompey, I thought you did all right and would like you to come and play for us. Can I come around to your house this week?”.

‘I was buzzing. I remember sitting down and talking football with my dad every night, when he would emphasise how I just needed a chance. He knew how much I loved the game and how I would give everything to succeed. Now I’d signed associate schoolboy forms with Pompey.

“As an associate schoolboy aged 14, I arrived for my first Pompey session on a Thursday night at Alexandra Park and we had the first-team manager taking us for training - Alan Ball. You don’t get that now, and didn’t get it then, but he cared and loved coaching the kids, intent on making players better.

‘However, I didn’t play many games, occupying the bench most of the time in a very talented young group.

‘The final match before apprenticeship decisions were made was an under-16 fixture against the Royal Navy at Eastney Barracks, when it just so happened first-team manager Ball was watching.

‘Darryl Powell was right-back, with me in front on the right of midfield, and, whenever he had the ball, it would result in a pass to me. Pass, pass, pass, never giving the ball away.

‘Bally, who knew my dad as his son, Jimmy, played in the same Sunday side as my brother, turned to him and said “He’s got a chance, your boy looks decent. He does everything right and never gives it away”.

‘Off the back of that, I went into training on the Thursday and Peter Osgood, taking us at the time, was all “Brilliant, Daz, brilliant this, brilliant that”. Suddenly people knew who I was.

‘At the end of that week, I was informed I would be getting an apprenticeship. They were scheduled to take 10 lads, but extended it to 12 - with me one of the additional two.

‘I was so close to not being taken on as an apprentice, so close. If it wasn’t for that game there was absolutely no chance I would have been kept on.’

An eye-catching 1991-92 campaign, in which the Blues reached the semi-finals of the FA Cup against Liverpool, brought him to the attention of the Premier League.

And Anderton, who netted in the first semi-final at Highbury against the Anfield giants, would sign for Spurs in a £2m deal in May 1992.

He added: ‘Jim Smith told me: “You go and speak to them. Look, I know Terry Venables, he will make you the player you should be. He will be a different class, you will love it”.

‘It was mind-boggling, I was so nervous when my dad accompanied me to the Royal Garden Hotel in Kensington. Terry had an aura about him – and I signed there and then.

‘I believe it was the right time to leave Pompey. I wanted to be part of the team which took Pompey into the Premier League, but Spurs came calling and you can’t ask them to wait.

‘It was my old Spurs boss Terry Venables who subsequently handed me full international honours, in a Wembley friendly against Denmark, with David Platt netting in a 1-0 victory.

‘It hadn’t even been two years since I departed Fratton Park – and represented the first of 30 caps for my country.

‘I’m very appreciative of what Pompey did for me. Quite simply, that Fratton Park grounding made me the player I was.’

Anderton made 77 appearances and scored 13 times for Pompey from July 1988 until May 1992.

Played Up Pompey Three is available from Waterstone’s (Portsmouth and Fareham), Pompey’s club shop and Amazon.

Played Up Pompey (paperback) and Pompey: The Island City With A Football Club For A Heart are also on sale from the above.

Alternatively, contact [email protected] for copies autographed by Guy Whittingham, Alan Knight and Barry Harris.