A planned 30 minutes with John Carver concludes at just short of three hours. Given the subject matters range from Paul Gascoigne to Steve Clarke and so much in between, this is hardly a shock.
Take, for example, the case of Hatem Ben Arfa one half-time at Newcastle. “He was having a rough game and Alan Pardew had a right go at him,” Carver recalls. “Suddenly Hatem turns to a fridge that would have taken 10 men to pick up. He tried to lift it and throw it at Pards but he couldn’t. He storms out of the dressing room, into the coaches’ office. Five minutes later he reappears eating a sandwich, ready to play the second half.”
