There’s nothing quite like the buzz of excitement when word begins to spread about a talented young goalscorer emerging through the youth ranks.
Fans with their ear to their ground were well aware of the chatter surrounding the likes of Robbie Fowler, Michael Owen and Raheem Sterling long before they made their Liverpool breakthroughs and started to develop their sparkling promise at the top level.
There are of course no guarantees that an ability to cut a swathe through academy defences will automatically translate into the cold hard currency of goals in senior football and history is littered with sad tales of ‘wonderkids’ who were tipped to be the next big thing but struggled under the weight of expectation before fizzling out into obscurity.
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Almost as unfortunate are those who were able to initially make the jump and prove their ability to deliver in senior football only for circumstances and often injuries to hamper their progress, which was very much the case for one Anfield youngster who found himself compared at an early age to two of the game’s most iconic goalscorers and played an unsung but vital role in one of the Reds’ most famous triumphs before being let down by his body and seeing dreams of a career at the top level cut regrettably short.
Neil Mellor grew up dreaming of following in his father Ian’s footsteps and wearing the sky blue of Manchester City but, after being rejected by the Citizens’ academy despite being top scorer for six successive seasons in his age group, joined Liverpool’s youth set-up in 1999 and soon built up a growing reputation as a prolific goal-getter of rare ability. A strong, physical centre forward in the English tradition but with a real appreciation of space and the ability to bring team-mates into the game, the Sheffield-born youngster top scored with eight goals in just four games during the Reds’ run to the 2001 FA Youth Cup semi-finals before the following season doing the same for the club’s under-19 and reserve sides with a whopping total of 46.
With Owen and Fowler having followed similar paths in recent years, there was huge excitement amongst Liverpool supporters as news of Mellor’s unerring goalscoring exploits spread that the next young goal phenomenon on the conveyor belt would soon be rattling them in for the senior side, an enthusiasm shared by the youngster himself as he made the step-up from the Kirkby academy to training with the senior squad.
“I absolutely loved the Academy”, he recalled to LFCHistory. “It was a great experience, great coaches, Steve Heighway, Dave Shannon and Hughie McAuley down there. I was 16 when I went to the Academy and they signed me on a three year scholarship. I felt I progressed as well as a person as a footballer. The key is to improve your skills and try to become a good person. Even though you don’t make it as a footballer you want to become a decent person. They put as much emphasis on education as well as footballing skills.
“It was a big step from the Academy to Melwood because suddenly you’re training with players with international experience. It takes a while to adjust to, but you can learn a lot from them. There’s a lot more at stake in the first team than at the Academy. You certainly realise that when you’re training. Everything has got to be perfect. You learn different things from different players. When you train with people like Michael Owen you learn a lot.”
By October 2002, Liverpool manager Gerard Houllier felt Mellor’s learning curve warranted a place on the bench for the Reds’ Champions League group stage away to Spartak Moscow and six weeks later he was handed his full debut as the Frenchman’s side prepared to face Ipswich Town in a League Cup fourth round tie. Anfield was in need of a lift following defeat on home soil three days earlier to Manchester United when two shocking Jerzy Dudek errors highlighted how dreams of a genuine tilt at the Premier League title were unravelling rapidly only weeks after Liverpool had been unbeaten and top of the table.
For Mellor, it was the big chance he had craved and been working towards and he was handed a further confidence boost in the dressing room before kick off even if events on the pitch didn’t play out the way he would have hoped.
“It was a special night, and all my family were there”, he remembered. “I’d done well in the reserves, and I felt I’d earned my chance. I’ll always remember before the game Gerard Houllier, in the changing room, saying randomly ‘Who wants to take penalties tonight?’ I’d missed one in the Youth Cup semi-final, but I put my hand straight up. I enjoyed taking penalties. He looked me in the eye and said ‘You’re on pens.' That gave me a lift.
"I was poor in the first half and I was worried he was going to take me off at half time with us being a goal down. He didn’t, he kept me on, Liverpool signed obscure £1.5m midfielder to 'spy on the dressing room' and a few minutes into the second half, Kop End, I’m waiting for Mark Venus to make a challenge inside the box. I nudge the ball past him, he takes me out, bang! Penalty! I’m buzzing.
"I go to get the ball and El-Hadji Diouf, who’d been signed for big money that summer and was struggling to justify his price-tag with goals, has got the ball under his arm and is saying he’s taking it. I'm like 'What are you doing?' but he is having none of it. So, I’m a lad on debut arguing with a £10 million signing in front of the Kop! People probably thought ‘Who is this kid?’ I looked at Steven Gerrard, who was captain, and he said ‘Just let him take it.' Diouf scored.
"A few minutes later I’m one-on-one with Andy Marshall the goalkeeper, knock it past him and I swear to God it’s going in until it hits a bit of grass, and comes back off the inside of the post. To this day, I still think it’s going in!”
Mellor was substituted shortly afterwards and Liverpool eventually saw off the Tractor Boys after a penalty shoot-out to reach the quarter-finals where a 4-3 win at Aston Villa secured a two-legged semi final in January against second-tier Sheffield United. The Reds’ winter of discontent had continued over the festive period with Houllier’s side mired in a winless league run which would ultimately stretch to eleven league matches and leave their title hopes in tatters, an injury crisis adding to the Anfield woes with the unavailability of Michael Owen and Emile Heskey handing Mellor a Premier League debut from the bench at Newcastle on New Year’s Day as the Reds were beaten 1-0 to open up a 12-point gap to leaders Arsenal.
Liverpool had already crashed out of the Champions League in the group stages, giving progress in the domestic cups added importance in Houllier’s bid to breathe new life into a flagging campaign and, with the Frenchman’s first choice strike pairing unready yet for a first-team return, Mellor suddenly found himself leading the line as the Reds faced two key away games within three days.
The first was at his dad’s old Maine Road stomping ground - Liverpool’s last ever visit there before Manchester City moved to what was then known as the City of Manchester Stadium - where he played his part in a 1-0 win secured by Danny Murphy’s 47th minute penalty, and might have scored his first senior goal had it not again been for El-Hadji Diouf.
“Diouf has the ball, he cuts in from the right and he’s on the byline. All he’s got to do is square it to me and I’ve got a tap-in from three yards. What does he do? He tries to beat Peter Schmeichel on his near post and hits the side-netting! I always think back to those two moments, the penalty against Ipswich and that chance at City. I could have had two goals in my first two starts if it weren't for him!"
It would be third time lucky at Bramall Lane three days later however when the Reds travelled across the Pennines to take on Sheffield United in the first leg of their League Cup semi-final. Although Owen and Heskey were now fit enough to return to the substitute’s bench, Mellor kept his place in the side and scored the opening goal eleven minutes before half time with a poacher’s header from close range after Sami Hyypia had teed him up from a Danny Murphy free-kick. Two goals in the final quarter of an hour from Michael Tonge gave the Blades a lead to take to Anfield for the second leg but Mellor was exuberant afterwards after scoring his long-awaited first senior goal in the city of his birth, saying : "That was quite far out for me! It was in front of the Liverpool fans, in the semi-final of the cup, great moment. I was really pleased with it and when I'm in bed tonight, I'll be thinking that it was a screamer from 30 yards!"
He kept his place for the following weekend’s 1-1 draw at home to Aston Villa but, with Owen and Heskey nearing full fitness again, he only got six more minutes of first team action as a late substitute at Birmingham before the end of the season as Houllier’s faith in his young players’ ability to salvage Liverpool’s drifting season began to falter. Mellor's progress was rewarded with a new long-term contract which he signed in March 2003, the same month he was left out of the squad for the League Cup final victory over Manchester United even if the Reds manager did at least make sure his contribution in getting the Reds to Cardiff was acknowledged.
“At the end of the day, Houllier gave me my debut for Liverpool and I have to be grateful and respectful,” he told Simon Hughes in the book 'Ring of Fire'. “When we won the League Cup final by beating Manchester United, he included me in the match day squad of seventeen but only sixteen needed to be changed. I travelled with the squad and trained the night before, then he told me I’d only be needed on the bench if someone got ill. Nobody gets ill in the hours before a final, do they? Fair play to Houllier, though. He recognised my contribution in the semi and made sure I received a winners’ medal. It was a kind gesture.”
A Liverpool campaign which had begun which such high hopes on the back of two seasons of startling promise was to end in abject disappointment when Houllier’s men were beaten at Chelsea in a final-day showdown to decide who would get the final Champions League place with many supporters wondering why, in light of the Reds’ struggles in front of goal in the closing months of the campaign, the youngster - who had made such a bright if brief impression in January and had been nicknamed by internet wags ‘Gerd’ in tribute of German goalscoring legend Gerd Müller - had not been given further opportunities.
The Liverpool dressing room too were in no doubt over his goalscoring talent and self-belief, goalkeeper Chris Kirkland saying : "I think it's fair to say since Gregory Vignal left on loan, Neil Mellor has been the butt of a few jokes. The thing about Neil is, when he scores in training, he still celebrates as if it's a league game. He runs off off on his own to the corner flag with his hand in the air. The lads call him Shearer because of his celebrations and he's definitely one to watch. He's a brilliant finisher and one of my best mates at the club."
For Mellor, reassurance that the club believed in him enough to offer a new contract was offset by concerns that, even with record signing Diouf’s debut season having tailed off badly particular after he spat at Celtic fans during Liverpool’s UEFA Cup quarter-final exit, continued goals for the Reds’ second-string hadn’t been enough for Houllier to give the young forward a chance to rescue the campaign and these worries only deepened during the summer.
“There’s always that thing nagging at the back of my mind - did I get the best platform to show what I could do?” Mellor admitted. “I’ll always remember going to Thailand in the pre-season with the first-team squad the following summer. I was flying - doing really well. Then Houllier turns round and asks me whether I want to go to West Ham or Sunderland on loan. I knew I wasn’t at the level of Owen or Heskey; I didn’t expect to start games. But I always believed that if I felt out of my depth then I’d know. And in no way did I feel out of my depth.”
With Houllier having made clear he felt a loan move would be crucial to Mellor’s development, the 20-year-old opted for Upton Park but his hopes of helping the recently-relegated Hammers gain immediate promotion back to the Premier League suffered a blow when manager Glenn Roeder was sacked soon into the new campaign and further injury niggles meant the Liverpool loanee only appeared in 21 matches, scoring twice, before returning to Anfield before the end of his season-long loan. FA regulations prevented him playing for the Reds’ first team but he showed he hadn’t lost his goalscoring touch by banging in ten goals in just four games and by the time he was available again, there was a new man in the Anfield hot-seat to impress.
Liverpool had managed to salvage fourth place and Champions League qualification from another season of regression but the Frenchman’s six-year spell on Merseyside was brought to a sad conclusion soon afterwards and he was replaced by Spanish coach Rafa Benitez, whose Valencia side had in recent years challenged the traditional dominance of Real Madrid and Barcelona by winning two La Liga titles in three years as well as the UEFA Cup. Although the Reds had already been working under a continental influence for some time under Houllier, Benitez’s more hands-on approach at the training ground was an eye-opener for Mellor and a big influence on the success which followed according to the young forward.
“Things were changing in England at that time, there was a lot more continental managers and players coming over,” he told The Broken Metatarsal. “When I first went down to Melwood, after training we’d go to the canteen and there’d be cans of coke, chocolate bars…that all changed under Houllier and even more so under Rafa Benitez. For pre-match we’d have toast and we weren’t even allowed butter on it. That was the extent it had changed.
“Rafa was brilliant and tactically he did things we’d never experienced before. Houllier was only ever out on the training pitch on the Friday before a game, but Rafa was out there in his shorts every single day. He would go through where we needed to be, in and out of possession, for every warm-up so it became ingrained, a habit, we knew exactly what was expected. I think that went to be shown with how good our defensive record was. It was because of the hard work he did on the training ground.”
Mellor’s initial appearances under the Spaniard were limited to the League Cup where, after playing in a third-round victory at Millwall, he was handed another start in the following round at home to Middlesbrough and scored twice in the last 10 minutes at the Kop end to take Liverpool into the quarter-finals. With new £14m striker Djibril Cisse ruled out for months after breaking his leg at Blackburn and Milan Baros not always available through his own injury problems, Mellor’s third start of the season was in the Reds’ penultimate Champions League group game away at Monaco and, while he was unable to prevent Benitez’s men slipping to a 1-0 defeat which mean they would now have to win the final match at home to Olympiacos, he kept his place in the side for the following weekend’s visit of reigning champions Arsenal to Anfield. It would prove to be a day he would never forget and the start of a brief period which helped write him into Liverpool folklore even if it was laced with the sad irony that the serious injury problems which would ultimately cut his career short were beginning to reveal themselves just as it was threatening to take off.
“Arsenal were the best team around,” he recalled. “They had gone unbeaten the year season before, they were the Invincibles and won the Premier League title. They had finally been beaten a few weeks before at Old Trafford against Manchester United, losing that incredible 49-game unbeaten run.
“The first thing I did that day when I arrived at Anfield was head to the medical room to have an injection because physically I wasn’t fit enough to play. I had really bad knee trouble at the time, Milan Baros was out and I think Cisse was injured as well.
“It was my opportunity to play and obviously I wasn’t going to turn that down. I had a painkilling injection to numb the pain hoping that would help. I knew it was going to be tough playing against Kolo Toure and Sol Campbell, but the confidence I had was that I was at Anfield. I look around and I see Steven Gerrard in behind, I see Harry Kewell out on the left hand side, Xabi Alonso and Dietmar Hamann who were strong in midfield as well as Carragher and Hyypia. So I knew this was going to be a good game.”
The Reds had only won six of their 13 Premier League fixtures so far and already trailed runway leaders Chelsea by 13 points but performed above expectation against the second-placed Gunners and took a deserved lead four minutes before half-time with a goal which highlighted Mellor’s growing maturity and footballing intelligence. Steve Finnan’s switch of play found Harry Kewell on the left flank and when the Australian winger nodded the ball inside to Steven Gerrard, Mellor made a smart decoy run into the inside-left channel which opened up space for the Reds skipper to feed the onrushing Xabi Alonso who fired his first Anfield goal beyond Jens Lehmann.
The Gunners drew level twelve minutes after the interval when a slick move involving Lauren, Patrick Vieira and Thierry Henry played in the Arsenal skipper who lifted the ball over Chris Kirkland to equalise. Having already lost eight times in all competitions that season, many within Anfield felt the tide may have turned but Benitez’s men repelled the visitors’ attempts to grab a winner and, with the game going into stoppage time, seemed to have secured a respectable point before Mellor scored a dramatic late winner with the type of goal even those who had observed his prolific efforts for the Reds’ junior sides may not have been aware he was capable of.
“1-1 was a good result against that Arsenal side and I’m thinking, ‘why has the manager not brought me off?’” he recalled. “Chris Kirkland takes the free kick on the dead ball line, but before he takes the free-kick, I turned to Sol Campbell who was marking me and said, ‘Sol can I have your shirt after the game?’ I never really rated him as a player as I wasn’t fond of centre-halves, I don’t collect shirts but I bizarrely asked him for that in the lead up to the goal. I thought the referee was going to blow the whistle for full time as soon as the free-kick was taken.
“I go up for a header with Vieira, who’s about six foot five and I’m six foot, we both miss the ball. Sol Cambell and Kolo Toure go for the same ball and completely clean out Harry Kewell. It was a long way out and it was there to hit. I’ve struck it beautifully, the keeper was Jens Lehman, a German international. It goes in and the raw emotion is something that I’ll never forget. I shared the moment with the Kop and all the team came over and we were hugging everyone. My family were all in the crowd, it was against the best side around, the winning goal, in front of the Kop: it was something that I’d always dreamed about. It was an amazing experience and an incredible moment for me. I would have loved to have scored that goal in a cup final, but it also felt like a cup final for me because Arsenal were such a good side. It was nice to have my own moment because Liverpool fans still remember that goal today.
“After the game I’m thinking, ‘this is going to be a big night out’. I got the bottle of champagne, which was nice, which I’ve still got to this day as I was man of the match. All the boys were buzzing in the dressing room and wanted to go into town, but I was so tired and still living with my parents at that time. I’ve gone home in my little Renault Clio which I was driving at the time, I watched Match of the Day 2 and listened to Gordon Strachan speak about how Liverpool played on that day with a hot Vimto in my hand. That was as glamorous as it got.”
Mellor kept his place for the next two games, a League Cup quarter-final win at Tottenham and 1-1 draw at Aston Villa, before finding himself back on the bench for the Champions League group decider against Olympiacos at Anfield. The vagaries of qualification meant Liverpool had to win 1-0 or by two clear goals to reach the knock-out stages and the position was made clearer when Brazilian star Rivaldo’s free-kick gave the Greek visitors a half-time lead and left the Reds requiring three without reply after the break to progress. Substitute Florent Sinama-Pongolle provided one within a minute of the restart but, with only a quarter of an hour left, Mellor was thrown on for Baros and within two minutes poached one of the two goals Liverpool still needed by reacting quickest inside the six-yard box after goalkeeper Antonis Nikopolidis had kept out Antonio Nunez’s header before then providing the assist for Steven Gerrard’s iconic winner four minutes from time.
“I fancied myself to score because we were throwing everything forward and we needed to win by two goals,” Mellor told OTB Sports. “I was very confident that I’d get a chance to score and I did. For the winner, the ball came up to me and I don't know what Jamie Carragher was doing up on the left-wing, but that's where Carra was.
"He dinks it into me, I'm on the edge of the penalty area and I've got a few options in my head. Do I control it, maybe try and turn the defender, try get a shot away myself? Do I flick it on to somebody maybe running in behind or do I lay it off onto the edge of the penalty area? I can only see two players when I look. I see John Arne Riise who is the left full-back, and I'm thinking if I lay it into his path, that's going to be his right foot. About one in 500 to hit the target with his right foot. Not a good option.
"Steven Gerrard is the other one, a little bit deeper but I fancy the skipper hitting the target from there rather than Riise so I've just put it into an area and obviously Stevie has hit an unbelievable goal. When he scores and it's a great moment I stand there on the edge of the area thinking celebrate with me, please celebrate with me! He just barges past me, winds me as he pushes me out of the way and heads for the corner of the Kop. I was only about the eighth or ninth person there to celebrate, but it was a great moment and I was very grateful when I later heard the TV commentary which described my assist as a ‘lovely cushioned header’. I thought it was perfectly summed up. To me, football is about moments and memories, so it's nice to have one and be associated with Liverpool Football Club for that.”
A composed, slide-rule finish 11 days later in a win over Newcastle made it five goals in seven starts to foster hope Mellor would have a big part to play in the second half of the season but it would prove to be the last goal he ever scored for Liverpool. With knee problems causing more and more discomfort and ultimately retiring surgery on both, a substitute appearance in the FA Cup third round defeat at Burnley would be his final appearance of the season and his last in a red shirt.
Liverpool’s rollercoaster campaign saw them beaten by Chelsea after extra-time in the League Cup final in Cardiff and initially miss out on Champions League qualification after finishing fifth behind Everton in the Premier League before stunning the football world by winning a fifth European Cup after a miraculous fightback from three goals down at half time in Istanbul against AC Milan. Although Mellor and fellow supersub against Olymiacos Florent Sinama-Pongolle were not involved against the Italians, they were in Turkey to be part of the unforgettable night they played such a big part in helping Liverpool reach even if the experience was somewhat bittersweet.
“We felt very proud,” Mellor admitted. “We were European champions, and even though myself and Flo missed the later rounds through injury, we knew that we made a big contribution and without that contribution the club wouldn’t have qualified from the group stages. When we were on the pitch at the end in Turkey, we knew we’d contributed. But then so had other players, who played against the likes of Leverkusen and Juve but not in the final. It was a real squad effort.
“We watched the match from the directors box and got on the pitch afterwards by blagging a steward, Morientes blagged a steward – that’s another story. AC Milan got presented their medals and then it was time for the Liverpool players, so we’re just hovering by the podium. They all get their medals and go and stand on the podium by the cup, then Stevie does. And as Stevie is about to go on the podium, for whatever reason we could go and join them. Pellegrino led the way and said, ‘look, there are five AC Milan medals here, anyone want one? I was behind him and said ‘I’ll have one of them, no problem!’ So Maldini and Shevchenko had left their medals behind. We went on the podium and celebrated but it was a bit of a fiasco with the medals. UEFA only had 25 of them and that meant a few of us, including me, missed out on getting a winner’s one. I still don’t have one. The club gave me a small replica trophy.
“We were put on a different flight back from the players who were involved in the final and when the first-team plane landed, they were whisked off to Melwood straight from the tarmac of the runway. Nobody in our party knew what we were supposed to do. Salif Diao hailed a taxi and went straight back to Melwood and was able to join all of the other players in the celebrations. But nobody else followed him. We were told they’d wait for us but the police intervened and said they couldn’t hold the bus back at Melwood any longer because there were a million people on the streets of Liverpool. Apparently Rafa and Stevie were trying to get the bus to wait but it was impossible.
“I had family and friends in the crowd waiting to see me but they never got that opportunity because by the time I got back to Melwood, the bus had gone. David Raven and Darren Potter hung around a bit longer and Frank McParland drove them to the Arkles pub near Anfield, where they jumped on the bus. But I drove home to Altrincham in tears and watched everything on telly. I was still living with my mum and dad but they were back in Liverpool waiting to see me. It was a pretty sad way to finish what could have been an amazing couple of days, to be honest and it really upset me.”
By the time Mellor had completed his rehab and regained fitness the following autumn, Benitez had already bolstered his frontline by adding Peter Crouch to Fernando Morientes who had joined at the start of the year and in January 2006 he joined Wigan Athletic on loan but despite scoring a late winner on his debut against Middlesbrough, continued injury problems saw him only able to make a handful of appearances for the Latics. Liverpool sold him to Preston North End the following summer but the long-term damage to his knees prevented Mellor ever being able to stay fit to establish himself as a regular option for the Lancashire side and, after a season-long loan to League One Sheffield Wednesday in 2010/11 which saw him bag a respectable 20 goals in 43 appearances, he was forced to announce his retirement from playing in May 2012 at the age of only 29.
A successful career in the football media has followed where Mellor is a regular contributor for both LFC TV and Sky Sports and, despite the heartbreak that injuries prevented him from achieving everything on the pitch his early exploits hinted he was capable of, his love and passion for the game - as well as the club who gave him his big break - is never far from the surface.
He said: “I’m quite fortunate because there are players out there who have played say, four or five hundred matches and find it difficult to pinpoint a best moment. The last minute winner at the Kop end against Arsenal was a Roy-Of-The-Rovers moment for me, but I feel the match against Olympiakos meant so much more to the team and the history of the club, with what we then went on to achieve. The fans and atmosphere that night and how we turned it around was my best experience as a player.
“I had seven operations in total - six separate ones when I was at Liverpool - and the first surgeon said I had an 80 per cent chance of getting back to the Premier League. Then, I wake up from the surgery and he says ‘It’s more like 50-50’ because he didn’t realise how much damage there was to my knee. It was hard. It was the fact that I just couldn’t feel fully fit. There were times when I was in so much pain that I couldn't even run for the ball. Even when I scored against Arsenal, Olympiacos, I was taking injections to manage the pain in my knees. I always felt it me hampered throughout my career.
“I’m just grateful that I had a few moments, I’d love to sit here and say I played 400,500 games for Liverpool, I’ve won this, I’ve won that but I’ve had a couple of moments where the fans can say, ‘I still remember that’. A lot of players leave football clubs and burn their bridges, upset supporters, upset teammates, but for me when I left Liverpool, I had a great relationship with my team-mates, a great relationship with the supporters so I can come back and cheer the current team on.”
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