https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crCXR8GDXUg
His life has not been a bed of roses and his football career hardly a bowl of apples.
Born in Nottingham it would be fair to say that he didn't have a very secure or supportive childhood and like many he could have gone totally off the rails, but football offered him a flag of hope.
His father was a semi-professional football (but ended up in jail following drug crimes) so Jermaine avoiding the temptations of his home district joined Notts County, where during his YTS he was living in a club hostel, a safe haven. He eventually made around 300 appearances for the following clubs:
County, signed a contract with Arsenal,Watford, Leeds,Birmingham, Liverpool, Portsmouth, Real Zaragoza, Stoke, Wolves, Pune City (India), Wigan, Tampines Rovers (Singapore), Bury and lately Billericay Town and earned 21 caps at U21, but was sent off for punching Niko Kranjcar in an U21 game.
He is of course now "retired" to take up a career on television, possibly?
His last game was on 28th December 2017 and following his appearance on "Celebrity Big Brother" he has written an autobiography "Mental-Bad Behaviour, Ugly Truths and the Beautiful Game".
He has had drink-driving punishments, drove while disqualified, was involved in a road crash, been tagged even during a match, chosen infidelity, had £200,000 worth of designer clothes and personals destroyed by an angry girlfriend, had his home gates rammed in a potential raid, been arrested after a domestic, was drunk when he scored a hat trick in his first game for Arsenal, found during his various trials to be illiterate. He did score in a Champions League Final!
By coincidence I have just be bought a football book "The Beautiful Game- Searching for the Soul of Football" by David Conn.
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