As a footballer, Peter Crouch didn’t always get the appreciation he deserved. And yet the 6ft 7in striker scored more than 100 Premier League goals, made 42 appearances for England (averaging a goal every other game) and created a memorable goal celebration: the robot. But in his second career he is getting all the plaudits. His 2018 book, How to Be a Footballer, was a bestseller, and his podcast, That Peter Crouch Podcast, is one of the most popular on the BBC. Now 38, and recently retired, he’s back with more tall tales in I, Robot: How to Be a Footballer 2. He has four children with the model and Strictly star Abbey Clancy.
You retired this summer. How’s life after football?
I feel good. I’ve trained every day of my life since I left school at 16, so that’s 20-odd years of being told where to be and what to do and what to wear. So I’ve had a bit of a break and just thrown myself into other things. Yeah, I’m still on a big holiday really.
Your podcast and books have been phenomenally successful. Why do you think that is?
I don’t know. I had the best job in the world and I like to think that I made the most of that and enjoyed it. But I look at players these days and I think sometimes they take themselves a bit too seriously and they don’t look like they’re enjoying it. So maybe I don’t take myself too seriously in a world that does take itself too seriously and that’s what people enjoy.
There are some amazing stories in your new book about how mollycoddled footballers are. When you go on away trips, you hand your passports in days before, so you don’t forget them. You’re not expected to pack phone chargers or even a pair of underpants…
Everything’s taken care of as a footballer, so that’s probably the difference now. But I’m not stupid; I can bring my own passport to the airport!
You write about how any footballer who took a book on trips would be looked at suspiciously. Is it changing at all?
Er, no. I don’t see many books. When I was at Liverpool, Jamie Carragher used to read an autobiography on every away trip, but he just loves football that much: it was Cruyff, Pelé, Maradona, Keane, Ferguson… But there’s not too many into novels.
How about you – do you read many books?
The last I read was Ant Middleton’s book. Only because I met him and me and him were competing for top spot [on the bestsellers chart]. So I read all the competition. I read [Yuval Noah] Harari – he wrote Sapiens and all that. And I read Michelle Obama. Well, we blew her out of the water, Michelle Obama.
Must admit, I was surprised to learn that when you were at Stoke City you spent much of your downtime with your teammates playing Trivial Pursuit…
I loved it, honestly couldn’t get enough of it. We played it on the coach on the way to matches and then in the hotel every moment… One game could take a while! But God, what Charlie Adam doesn’t know about animals. Unbelievable. My forte was sport or geography. A bit of history. But if you got the arts and literature segment, you’d won.
There’s a memorable story in the book about meeting Mickey Rourke in Miami in 2006, when you went on holiday with friends after the World Cup…
We were out and I was like: “Oh, there’s Mickey Rourke.” And he was like: “Oh, you’re robot boy!” I’ve got a picture somewhere of me and him doing the robot together in Miami. I’ll find it one day. It was great, we had two amazing nights [with him]. But I was on a lads’ holiday – he lived out there, that was his life! So the third one he knocked on our bedroom door and I peeked through [the peephole] and went: “Lads, it’s Mickey Rourke.” And they went: “Ah, fucking bin him. Get rid.” So I pretended I wasn’t in and went back to bed. He slipped a letter under the door and it was like: “Let’s meet here for dinner.” And I literally left it in the hotel room. I didn’t even bring the letter home to show anyone. Nuts. I wish I had it now, obviously.
On the subject of weird exchanges, you recall how Prince Harry came over to you in the England dressing room and asked: “How did you bag Abbey?”
That shocked me. It did shock me, that one, took me by surprise. I didn’t have a comeback.
You have four kids now – do you feel outnumbered?
Yeah, I often say that you have to go from man-to-man to zonal marking. It’s carnage, but it’s great. We’ve got two girls and two boys and I feel blessed. I’m knackered now, I’ll be honest, because I was up at four in the morning feeding the little one. But the girls are great, they help out.
You’ve hinted that you would like to go into management. Why would you do that when everything’s going so well?
Yeah, I am tempted. I did the book and then the podcast and everything took off, but football doesn’t leave you. Like I say, I’ve been doing it every day since I was 16. It’s all I’ve ever known, so there’s got to be some part of me missing. So one day maybe, but I’m looking forward to having Christmas for the first time this year. I literally haven’t had a Christmas since I was a kid. And if I was managing, I wouldn’t have that.
• I, Robot: How to be a Footballer 2 by Peter Crouch is published by Ebury (£20). To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com or call 020-3176 3837. Free UK p&p over £15, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99
