Dwight Yorke - Sydney's over
By Cameron Bell
The Sunday Telegraph
Not one to hold a grudge ... Dwight Yorke on the golf course this week. Photograph: Rohan Kelly / The Sunday Telegraph DWIGHT Yorke is running an hour late. Roaring down the M5 in a little blue Audi hatchback, he's missed the turnoff to the Macquarie Links golf course and ended up in Campbelltown.
Then he's missed it again on the way back and almost ended up in Liverpool.
Due on course at 9.30am, he arrives at 10.35am, drags his set of Callaways out of the boot and saunters towards the first tee to be special guest at a corporate golf day.
But he's not flustered. His face has that trademark grin.
His only worry is a slight stomach muscle strain, which makes him nervous about how he's going to swing a club.
Other than that, he's the happiest he's been in months. And why wouldn't he be.
Two weeks earlier he had helped Sunderland win promotion to the English Premiership. He joined Sunderland after Sydney FC effectively booted him out when they accepted more than $500,000 for his transfer last September.
It remains the lowest period of Yorke's career.
But he has moved on.
Sydney will always be a part of him, as evidenced by his return to the Harbour City for a holiday as soon as his Coca-Cola Championship commitments had finished. He can't get enough of the Sydney nightlife, the Sydney women and Sydney's golf courses.
But holidays are where it ends.
Yorke has effectively ruled out returning to Sydney to play.
In fact, he's all but ruled out a return to the A-League, saying it would take something extraordinary for him to play in the competition he helped to ignite in its inaugural season.
"You know, I don't hold any grudges,'' he said of his treatment by Sydney FC. "You can't go through life like that.
"Everything is sorted for me now and, as it's worked out, I've got an opportunity to play in the Premier League again next year, this time with Sunderland. In my life, I've always learned to never say never when it comes to anything in football.
"But I'm back in the Premier League now and I feel like a little kid again. I never thought that at the age of 35 I'd get another chance in the Premier League, but I have. You never know what could happen in football and I never rule anything out.
"I can't answer the question of whether I'll be back in the A-League with 100 per cent certainty, but it would take something quite extraordinary for it to happen.''
And not just because he has a sour taste in his mouth from the way things ended with Sydney.
The big move When Yorke joined his former Manchester United team-mate and now Sunderland coach Roy Keane last season, the northern England club was 23rd in the 24-team Championship.
"I thought 'what the hell am I doing here. I must be crazy','' he said. "I had a great set-up in Sydney, I was really enjoying my time there and then, all of a sudden, everything changed.
"It took me an initial seven, even eight weeks, to really get into my game. It took me that long to get over leaving Sydney because I loved it that much.
"But here I was, with a two-year deal at Sunderland, and I just told myself I had to make the most of it. I had to do the best I could for myself and my team.''
Yorke finished the season with seven goals to be Sunderland's second top-scorer. Keane even made him captain for a large chunk of the season.
Sydney FC Yorke has kept in touch with plenty of people at Sydney FC. In many respects, he was looking forward to the second year of his contract with the club more than the first. He was looking forward to the challenge of defending the title.
"I've been intrigued with how Sydney went,'' Yorke said. "I always said that the first year was going to be easier than the second. It's a difficult challenge defending the title in any league.
"They had a few hiccups this year and didn't do as well as they would have liked, or could have, but that's football. I would have loved to have been there and contributing to defending the title.''
Import hunt It's strange that Sydney got rid of a guy who was so passionate aboutthe club and the city, only to offer more money to secure another marquee signing.
On Sydney's hit list have been 41-year-old Teddy Sheringham, Dutch star Phillip Cocu, Turkey's Hakan Sukur and Nigerian Jay Jay Okocha.
The club was said to be prepared to pay $1.2million a season to sign one of them - more than Yorke was earning.
"It seems like a lot but compared to what these guys can earn on the world stage, it's really a pittance,'' Yorke said. "No offence to the A-League but you could never get a 23-year-old from another country on that sort of money because it's just not much.
"For me, it was never about the money I was earning because I've always said I could have gone to Qatar and played for a lot more. It was more about lifestyle and that's the thing I miss most of all.''
Yorke leaves Sydney on Friday to be home in London in time for his son's birthday on the 27th.
Until then he will be living the lifestyle he loves before returning to the pressure world of the English Premiership.
A world he had long thought he had left behind.
