Any hopes Steven Gerrard had of grabbing a quiet cup of coffee were quickly dashed when his whereabouts became online knowledge.
The Aston Villa boss was back in Merseyside, in a Costa Coffee shop in the Central Square Shopping Centre, in Maghull, when he was noticed by another customer. That individual decided to share Gerrard's location on Facebook which sparked a mass onslaught to the popular hot drink chain.
According to the Liverpool Echo, eye witnesses state that more and more people began descending on the shop desperate to get a glimpse of the Liverpool legend. Things even became a tad raucous with some banging on the shop windows.
One fan even turned up with a shirt to be signed, in the hope Gerrard would meet and greet his sudden audience. It is understood Costa Coffee staff were able to serve Gerrard and help him leave the establishment safely.
But it seems there was no hostility between the 42-year-old and his onlookers with Gerrard stopping to pose for photos and even signing a jersey. One witness said: "My nephew was made up, it was nice to let him have a photo. He made someone very happy by signing a brand new Liverpool shirt and putting person's name on it. My nephew's face was pure joy that he got to meet him. People will always look and complain."
However not everyone was happy with the situation, with one woman exclaiming: "He is just a normal person trying to have a coffee, it’s embarrassing."
Another added "It’s nice until people are told on social media so start to turn up banging on windows and staff can’t go home because there’s that many people waiting outside. Just let a person enjoy their coffee in peace. "
Gerrard is no doubt enjoying the last of some downtime before Aston Villa's pre-season kicks in. The squad will return in full on July 4 for testing and fitness drills before jetting out to Australia a week later. Villa will take on Leeds, Brisbane Roar and Manchester United down under in a bid to prepare for the upcoming season.
Although it is not yet clear whether former Manchester City midfielder Douglas Luiz will be joining his teammates. The Brazilian has 12 months left on his contract and has been linked with a move away.
Discussing his future in April, Gerrard said: "He's got 12 months left (in the summer). That’s where we’re at. We haven’t analysed that individual’s situation in isolation, if you like. He’s a very good player who’s been playing the majority of the games. He’s a player we rate very much.
"All of the individuals, we’ll speak about from now until the end of the season and we’ll deal with each case when needs be but that’s certainly not right now." Gerrard continued: "We want to keep all of our good players at the club. For us, to take this where we want to take it, where the ambitions are, we want all of our remaining players to stay.
"But, at the same time, we’ve got to respect that everyone’s different, i.e. Phil’s on loan, i.e. Dougie’s got a year left, i.e. one or two might be close to signing new deals. We’ll just analyse each case as and when needs be. That’s not the case now with nine games to go with Dougie."
