Former Liverpool attacker Craig Bellamy has issued a warning to footballers, young and experienced, not to make the same mistake he did after being declared bankrupt.
The 78-time Wales international played 54 times for the Reds over two spells, winning the League Cup and Community Shield during his time at Anfield. During his career, he enjoyed noted spells at Norwich City, Newcastle United, Manchester City and Cardiff City.
Now the 43-year-old is with table-topping Burnley in the Championship as Vincent Kompany's assistant manager and with the Clarets looking to immediately return to the Premier League. However, off the pitch, Bellamy owes almost £1.4m in taxes to HMRC and has been declared as bankrupt.
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He has described the last half-a-decade as "death row" after failed business ventures and trusting the wrong people led to financial difficulty.
"I have been living the last five or six years on Death Row just waiting for someone to put me out," said Bellamy speaking to the Daily Mail.
"I have been waiting for the cell door to open and someone to say: 'Today’s the day'. It’s like the feeling of not being able to look forward to anything. All the money I’ve earned, I can’t get a mortgage. Financially, I have no future. The hurt of that. I can’t own anything. Everything’s gone.
"My life has been on hold. I’m not a tax dodger but I have been very naive and the HMRC have been pursuing me for unpaid tax for some time. Everything I have had has been taken from me. If you get the wrong people advising you, it all haemorrhages, it all dwindles. It has got to the point where bankruptcy is a relief. It means I can just live again.
"I know some people will probably think I have squandered all my money on drinking or gambling or drugs. I haven’t. I can go quiet where you won’t hear from me but I won’t be down the pub. I have never touched drugs since I was a young kid. I don’t gamble. I have never gambled. It doesn’t make any sense to me. But I have gambled on people unfortunately."
He added: "I want this to be a warning to other players. Check everything, make sure the people advising you are regulated. If they are not regulated, it’s the Wild West. Get your stuff audited by independent people, the equivalent of getting a second opinion. I was brought up in a generation of footballers where everything was done for you. Every bill. Wherever I was, the club did everything for me. I think that’s wrong.
"It makes you too vulnerable. It’s good for players to have their own responsibilities because one day the club will not be there. You will finish your career and you will still be a young man and when you finish who’s going to pay your stuff then? You are going to have to learn to survive. You are going to have live in the real world."
With his position at Turf Moor, he lives in a Manchester flat - which has been rented and paid for by Burnley. He had been at Anderlecht's U21s until 2021 until the iconic Belgian defender took charge of the Lancashire club in the summer.
He spoke of the fortune of the Premier League winning captain offering him the role and the reward he feels from coaching. With the closing stages of the second-tier of English football, Burnley sit 11 points clear of nearest challengers Sheffield United.
He added: "I entertained a lot of dark thoughts. But I realised the anger had to go because I was making myself ill. I am grateful I never turned to drink and I had close friends who have been incredible for me.
"And then Vincent comes up, completely out of the blue. I hadn’t been ready to take anything else on because my health was still not great — the dark thoughts and the dark moments can turn you bad. I wasn’t ready to manage because I had to learn to manage myself first.
"I knew I had to get up and I had to keep working. Keep going, keep working and it will be OK. I knew if I kept working and I stayed with it, something amazing would happen. I have believed in that so much that I have brainwashed myself.
"And now I know how lucky I am to be at Burnley, to be doing something I love and something I’m good at. And now we are top of the league and I love what I do. And now, after everything, something amazing is happening."
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