Tony Cascarino

Anthony Guy Cascarino (born 1 September 1962) is a former professional footballer who played as a forward for various British and French clubs and internationally for the Republic of Ireland national team, with whom he competed in UEFA Euro 1988 and two World Cups in 1990 and 1994.

Tony Cascarino
Cascarino in 1986
Personal information
Full name Anthony Guy Cascarino
Date of birth (1962-09-01) 1 September 1962
Place of birth St Paul's Cray, Kent, England
Position(s) Striker
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1980–1981 Crockenhill
1981–1987 Gillingham 219 (78)
1987–1990 Millwall 105 (42)
1990–1991 Aston Villa 43 (11)
1991–1992 Celtic 18 (4)
1992–1994 Chelsea 40 (8)
1994–1997 Marseille 84 (61)
1997–2000 Nancy 109 (44)
2000 Red Star 93 2 (0)
Total 620 (248)
National team
1985–1999[1] Republic of Ireland 88 (19)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only

Since retirement, he has presented on TalkSPORT radio and written for both The Times and Ireland's Hot Press magazine. He has worked for both Sky Sports in England and TV3 and Today FM in Ireland. He was a winning participant in the fourth season of the Celebrity Bainisteoir reality television series.

Football

Club career
In their three seasons together at Millwall, Cascarino and Teddy Sheringham scored 99 goals between them.[2]

Cascarino joined Gillingham in 1982 from Crockenhill, and according to Cascarino Gillingham donated tracksuits and training equipment to Crockenhill in lieu of a transfer fee.[3] He went on to play for Millwall - the club he supported as a boy. Millwall had missed an opportunity to sign Cascarino as a youngster and subsequently paid The Gills £225,000 to secure his services.[4]

Cascarino holds the Ligue 1 record for oldest player to score a hat-trick, which he did while playing for Nancy at age 37 years and 31 days.[5]

International career

Cascarino, who was born in England, represented the Republic of Ireland—qualifying through his adopted Irish grandfather, Michael O'Malley, who was from Westport, County Mayo. He was also eligible to play for both Scotland and Italy because of his Scottish and Italian descent.[6][7][8]

He made his international debut against Switzerland in September 1985, during Ireland's ill-fated qualification campaign for the 1986 World Cup.[9] Cascarino would go on to feature for Ireland in three major tournaments: Euro 1988, the 1990 World Cup and the 1994 World Cup.[10]

His last international game came against Turkey in late 1999, as Ireland failed to reach UEFA Euro 2000. He got into a brawl with a Turkish defender and left the pitch showing the scars of battle. This marked the end of an international career which had spanned 14 years at the highest level.[11]

Irish citizenship controversy

In October 2000, Cascarino was the subject of national newspaper headlines when extracts from his upcoming autobiography were published in the Sunday Mirror.[12] In it, he revealed that his mother told him in 1996 that she was adopted and therefore no blood relative to his Irish grandfather. Cascarino said in his autobiography: "I didn't qualify for Ireland. I was a fraud. A fake Irishman". The FAI's Chief Executive Bernard O'Byrne stated that he was shocked by the announcement and Cascarino's former international manager Jack Charlton questioned why he came forward with the information. Cascarino revealed that Republic of Ireland teammate Andy Townsend had advised him to keep quiet about the situation.[12]

Four days after the newspaper exclusive, in November 2000, the Football Association of Ireland issued a short statement: "The FAI are satisfied that Tony Cascarino was always eligible to become a citizen of the Republic of Ireland and was, therefore, always eligible to play for Ireland."[13] The Irish Independent reported that Cascarino was given a 'passport of restricted validity' in 1985 and that his mother's name, Theresa O'Malley, was in fact entered in the Foreign Births Register in the Department of Foreign Affairs prior to Cascarino's international debut for the Republic of Ireland.[14][15]

Retirement

Since retiring from football, Cascarino has become a semi-professional poker player, having appeared in the television series Celebrity Poker Club and commentating on the PartyPoker Poker Den. He has become something of a cult figure and was referenced in the song "All Your Kayfabe Friends" by Welsh band Los Campesinos! where the singer tells that "You asked if I'd be anyone from history / Fact or fiction, dead or alive / I said I'd be Tony Cascarino, circa 1995."[16]

Cascarino joined talkSPORT as a pundit in 2002 and from 2004 he presented the afternoon Drive Time show with Patrick Kinghorn. He was involved in an on-air bust-up with Kinghorn after the latter remarked that the married Cascarino had been "chasing that 21-year-old around the office", which prompted Cascarino to lunge at Kinghorn and punch him. They pair had to be pulled apart by production staff.[17] Cascarino left the station in 2005 although still sometimes returns as a guest pundit.[18]

In 2011, he was a winning participant in the Celebrity Bainisteoir reality series. Managing Killeshin GAA Club of County Laois, Cascarino's club won the season 4 competition,[19] beating Paul Gogarty's Oughterard team after extra-time in the final.[20][21]

Cascarino entered into a relationship with his third wife, Jo, in 2009 and their son, Rocco, was born in 2015; they married in Mauritius in November 2019.[22]

Autobiography

Cascarino produced an autobiography in 2000, Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino,[23] which received great critical acclaim.[24]

The book detailed his love of gambling, particularly playing all forms of poker, and revealed that his career had been blighted by crippling self-doubt, which he summarised as the "little voice".[25] The book also candidly refers to his shame over his infidelities[26] and of leaving his wife, Sarah and two sons, Michael and Teddy (who was named after Cascarino's former Millwall teammate Teddy Sheringham) and muses: "...maybe, just maybe, I was so wrapped up in my newfound celebrity that I'd become immune to the suffering I was causing".

He also revealed that during his time at Marseille, he and many other of the club's players were injected by club president Bernard Tapie's personal physician with an unknown substance. The physiotherapist at the time insisted the substance was legal and would provide an "adrenaline boost". Cascarino claimed that most players accepted the injections[27] and that "it definitely made a difference: I felt sharper, more energetic, hungrier for the ball". He also later admitted suffering from depression.

Honours

Millwall

Marseille

Nancy

See also

References
  1. "Anthony Guy "Tony" Cascarino - Goals in International Matches". The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation.
  2. "Top Goal Scorers". Millwall History. Retrieved 28 August 2010.
  3. Bandini, Paolo (11 May 2007). "Small Talk: Tony Cascarino". London: Guardian. Retrieved 8 June 2008.
  4. "Lions Roaring into the Big Time".
  5. BBC. "Real Betis 3-2 Athletic Bilbao: Joaquin hits hat-trick aged 38 - BBC Sport". BBC Sport. BBC. Retrieved 9 December 2019.
  6. Thomas, Greig (20 March 2008). "Tony Cascarino: I Should Have Played For Scotland, Not Ireland". dailyrecord. Retrieved 2 April 2018.
  7. "Tony Cascarino's life story shows us football players can be human - Unusual Efforts". Unusual Efforts. 8 February 2017. Retrieved 1 April 2018.
  8. "La Rivelazione di un Perdente: La Vita Segreta di Tony Cascarino" (in Italian). lastanzabianca.net. 6 May 2014. Retrieved 11 January 2019.
  9. "WORLD CUP 1986". www.allworldcup.narod.ru. Retrieved 27 June 2020.
  10. "Tony CASCARINO". Sporting Heroes. Retrieved 27 June 2020.
  11. Leahy, Ed (10 November 2011). "Ireland's chequered play-off history". RTÉ Sport. Archived from the original on 11 November 2011. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
  12. "TONY'S OWN GOAL; I Did Not Qualify for Ireland. I Was Just a Fraud, a Fake Irishman". Sunday Mirror. 30 October 2000. Retrieved 17 March 2014.
  13. "FAI: OUR TONY IS NOT A FRAUD; Cas always eligible". The Mirror  – via Highbeam (subscription required) . 3 November 2000. Archived from the original on 11 June 2014. Retrieved 17 March 2014.
  14. Corcoran, Jody (24 November 2000). "Revealed: New twist in Cascarino row". Independent.ie. Retrieved 17 March 2014.
  15. "Cas mother was Irish but didn't realise.(News)". The Mirror. 6 November 2000. Archived from the original on 11 June 2014. Retrieved 17 March 2014.
  16. "All Your Kayfabe Friends lyrics - Los Campesinos!". sing365.com. Retrieved 3 August 2013.
  17. Cascarino's on-air punch-up, Brazil's off-air p*ss-ups and Rodney Marsh's depression: 10 true Talksport tales Archived 14 June 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  18. "Talksport1089.com". Archived from the original on 23 September 2012.
  19. "RTÉ's Celebrity Bainisteoirs announced" Archived 17 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine. RTÉ Ten. 15 July 2011.
  20. "Cascarino wins Celebrity Bainisteoir". RTÉ Ten. 7 November 2011.
  21. Butler, Laura. "Soccer star Tony wins Celeb Bainisteoir title". Evening Herald. 7 November 2011.
  22. Cascarino, A. "Weekend Talking Points", The Times, Monday 25 November 2019
  23. Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino. Simon & Schuster/TownHouse. 2000.
  24. "Books of the Year: The reading list". The Guardian. London. 18 December 2000. Retrieved 6 November 2007.
  25. Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino. p. 22.
  26. Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino. Destiny (Part 2): The territory of Lies. p. 165.
  27. Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino. Destiny (Part 1). p. 152.
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