Gone fishing. One man and his rod, a pitiful shell of the exuberant clown who courted the limelight and never escaped it, shuffles towards the camera.
Then the credits roll – and the glorious nostalgia of those twinkling feet, garden sprinkler tears and insatiable daftness gives way to sadness at the betrayal of a superstar on the altar of celebrity. Paul Gascoigne brought much of his misfortune upon himself, from necking booze on the 7.30am train from Stevenage to Darlington every Monday, on the way to a new week's training at Middlesbrough, to the untethered recklessness of his tackles in the 1991 FA Cup final.
And a new, two-part authorised documentary does not gloss over the demons of a confessed wife-beater. But there is a also sense that, for all the authenticity of his genius on the pitch, Gascoigne was deserted by most of the 'friends' – famous or otherwise – when the music stopped.
