SPORTING PASSIONSWHEN I WAS 11 I started playing soccer with Waterford Bohs. I played Kennedy Cup for Waterford when I was 14, which would be like an All-Ireland competition for soccer, and we played before the Cork-Derry FAI Cup final in 1989 in Dalymount.

The following season I got trials at under-15 level for Ireland and it started from there.

I would have been playing both hurling and soccer, as any 14-year-old does. There was probably no indication that I'd turn out to be a hurler, though.

I didn't make the Tony Forrestal team in Waterford at under-14 because I was too small, which is funny because I was playing in goal in soccer - small and all as I was.

I played a couple of games for the Ireland under-15s, but I was more of a reserve keeper to a lad called Chris Farrelly, who was one of the triplets that QPR famously signed back in 1990.

Most of the lads would have been based in England, but there were a few of us travelling up from provincial towns to training in Lucan.

We got a nice bit of travelling done around Europe, but I only got in for a couple of games because Chris was a very good goalkeeper.

The current Waterford United manager, Gareth Cronin, was on that team, as well as Alan Moore, who went on to play for Middlesbrough, and Willie Boland, who played for Coventry.

There were also a couple of superstars from the Dublin league who were bound to make it, but never quite did.

I was over and back to Aston Villa then from September, 1990. Jozef Venglos was the manager, but then Ron Atkinson took over. Villa had a good team then.

They had Dalian Atkinson and they had all the Irish lads around that time - Townsend, Houghton, Cascarino, McGrath and Staunton.

I went over and back about 10 or 12 times and then I stayed there between July and October of 1991. I was only 15 and a half so it was interesting.

But we were based a few miles outside Birmingham and there was no bus service into town. So it was literally training, get back to the digs at two and wait to get collected the following morning at nine.

It was hard to kill time because I was in the house on my own. Dwight Yorke was in the house in a different room, but of course he had all the trappings of being a professional soccer player. He had just turned maybe 19 or 20 and he was starting to make money.

A 15-year-old player is so far removed from life at the top I'd say you have no idea about it unless you're actually doing it - the money and the lifestyle and everything that comes with it.

It's tough as well - a lot of people crack under the pressure - but you'd have no idea whatsoever as a 15-year-old what it's like.

I remember we travelled to the Cliff training ground in Manchester one day and played what went on to become Ferguson's Babes. The Nevilles, Paul Scholes. There was a lad called Steven Robinson who was supposed to be the next big thing.

Robbie Savage played that day too, although he didn't end up staying with them. They were all playing and we got beaten 4-2.

In the end, I came home in October for a week and never went back. I could have stayed, but if you were in a house with a couple of other lads it would be easier I'm sure. I was with Luton and West Ham before Aston Villa, but when I went to Villa those clubs lost interest.

I played half a season for Waterford United when I came home, but I gave it up then.

I absolutely loved the soccer and, to be honest, I miss it a bit. I like playing it, but I don't like watching it, which is kind of weird. But it's gone so bad on the TV, hasn't it?

I went back into school when I came back. I'd more or less given up the hurling at that stage and I didn't make the Waterford minor panel.

I made the minor team the following year, but I didn't make the Irish under-18 soccer squad because they were all more or less full-time and they could bring in the English-born players then.

I was only playing local soccer in Waterford so I gave up on it. I played minor in 92 and senior in 93 and never really played soccer after that.