Sheldon Xavier
Sheldon
has never played professional footy as no clubs could agree nor afford his asking
wage even at the time of writing. However his love for the game in over 30 years
has taken him to footy stadia worldwide (well, in Europe mainly!), where Sheldon
has touched, sniffed and scoused back plenty of sacred pitch tufts for his home
collection. This, whenever the groundsmen weren't looking. And what a collection
indeed where Sheldon can proudly boast of having to his collection pitch tufts from
the grounds of Anfield, Wembley, El Do Dragao in Porto, Millenium stadium in
Cardiff, Craven cottage, Goodison Park, Old Trafford as well as the Nissan stadium
in Yokohama and the national stadium of Tokyo when he went venturing with Liverpool
at the FIFA World Club championships.
Now at the tender age of just below the half century mark, Sheldon has decided
to call his playing aspirations quits as apparently, he was never gonna make
the professional grade! After a caffeine session with Bojan Hodak on one fine
sunny Monday amidst discussing if bald footballers can do a better job off the
pitch instead of when being on it, the offer was made for Sheldon to take up
the part-time coaching role of assisting and teaching kids the right techniques
and ways of playing football (sah-cer, if you come from the land of stripes and
hope)
The experience has been tremendous thus far and enjoyable.
Sheldon, apart from his coaching role, runs and operates his own sports media
company aptly called Soccergurusasia Sdn Bhd, where he lives and breathes football
in presenting the game via radio and tv. Details at www.soccergurusasia.com (parental
guidance is advised!)