Birchall bound for the game's biggest stage
By Henry Winter (The Telegraph)
Six months ago, Chris Birchall was hanging out with friends in Stone, Staffordshire, trying to become a regular at League One Port Vale, and now he's eating chicken feet with Dwight Yorke and heading to the World Cup finals with Trinidad & Tobago.
"It's mad!" laughed the Englishman who has become a Caribbean darling after helping the Soca Warriors defeat Bahrain in a play-off for Germany. "People in Hollywood would probably think it was too far-fetched to make into a film! The last World Cup I watched in my local in Stone, supporting England. Now I am going to the World Cup playing for Trini! I was watching Barcelona against Real Madrid the other night, thinking, 'Jesus, we could get drawn against some of these players'." Next summer, the eyes of the world will be on Ronaldinho, Beckham and Birchall.
"If we get drawn against England or Brazil, it would be a dream," continued the engaging Birchall. "The biggest player I have played against was Chris Powell for Charlton Athletic in the League Cup. Some of the best players in the world, like Ryan Giggs, have never played in the World Cup, and I am privileged to be there at 21.
"When loan players come to Vale and hear I play internationally, they can't believe it and say, 'Who do you play for?' 'Trinidad & Tobago.' They start laughing. 'No really, who do you play for?' There's a bit of banter, jokingly calling me the white boy playing in a black team. It's all in good humour." Vale's players are planning to commandeer the team bus and follow Birchall around Germany.
The midfielder himself is getting used to travelling. "My passport's full of stamps now: Costa Rica, Panama, unbelievable experiences. Costa Rica away was the most hostile fans, worse than Bahrain. It's an amazing story. My grandparents emigrated to Trinidad from England to work and my mum was born there. She came back at 18, met my dad in Liverpool, and they moved to Stafford, which is how I got into Vale's School of Excellence. I used to mess around with my mates, saying, 'I could play for Trini', and they'd say: 'Yeah'! "
Scepticism slowly turned into reality. Prompted by his agent, word went around football that Birchall was eligible for the Soca Warriors. On April 26 this year, a game took place at Vale Park that opened up the World Cup for Birchall. "We were playing Wrexham and one of their defenders, Dennis Lawrence, who plays for Trini, came up to me during the game. He's 6ft 7in and I thought he was going to mouth off at me. But he asked: 'Have you got any Trini blood in you?' 'My mum was born there,' I said. He said: 'I need to speak to you after the game'."
Lawrence passed Birchall's number on to the Trini footballing authorities, the Fifa vice-president Jack Warner helped cut the red tape and Birchall was invited to a training camp for the two World Cup games against Panama and Mexico. "A few fans and Vale players were coming up and saying, 'Why are you going over, you are not going to qualify for the World Cup'. No one thought we had a chance. We were bottom of the group. But I wanted the experience of playing with Dwight, Shaka Hislop and Stern John."
His father, Phil, voiced brief concerns that an English-born player representing Trini "will get some stick somewhere down the line", but these were swamped under waves of joy from mother Jenny. "Mum was the proudest person alive that I was representing her country. She thought the Trinidad chapter in her life had been shut. It's emotional for her."
Particularly when Jenny sat in the Port-of-Spain crowd as her son screamed one into the top corner in the home leg of the Bahrain play-off. "My mum loved going back," Birchall said, "she didn't really want to come home again.
"She told me how friendly the people would be and they are. A lad at our club, George Abbey, who plays for Nigeria, said, 'Maybe you wouldn't have been accepted so easily if it was a country like Nigeria who are a bit more hostile'.
"But in Trinidad, there are loads of different cultures, whites, Chinese. For them, it is not a big deal, because there are a lot of white people over there, but the whites don't get involved with the football. I am the first white to play for Trini in 60 years. I was getting a bit of stick for not singing the national anthem for the first few games. So I got someone to write it down, and learnt it. It is about the island. It's nice."
Yorke has taken Birchall under his wing. "I have been to the local nightclubs and met a lot of the local people. I have been around a bit of the island; everyone is wearing Liverpool or Man United tops but I've not seen any Port Vale ones!" He has even been sampled local delicacies, such as chicken-feet soup. "You do eat the feet, but spit out the bones. I have had it once. I don't think I would have it again." For a man who admitted his musical tastes six months ago were Phil Collins, Birchall is now into Destra's It's Carnival. He smiled: "They are always playing Soca, which is their local music - steel drums, upbeat music. We have it in the dressing-room and it gets everyone up for the game.
"In the dressing-room in Bahrain, Russell Latapy and Dwight were crying with delight. Dwight and Russell are so old, they knew it was their last chance. Dwight has achieved everything now, apart from winning the World Cup, which I don't think he is going to do, but...
"Dwight is really friendly with me. I wouldn't have been surprised if he had been all big-time when I arrived. But he's a good captain. Him and [Brian] Lara are the two legends on the island, worldwide too." As a Liverpool fan, Birchall has wound up the former United striker. "I do! I was in the Kop when he scored a header off Beckham's cross. Dwight just laughs about it.
"He's playing up front in Sydney now, but for Trinidad, the coach, Leo Beenhakker, wants him in central midfield, because his pace has gone a bit but he still has the skill to get out of trouble and pick passes out. Dwight has played at the highest level, won the Champions League, so for me to be playing alongside him is unbelievable.
"Without this experience, I wouldn't get the notice that might get me a move to the Premiership. I'm 21, having a good season with Port Vale and going to the World Cup. There are about four or five teams who have never been there before, like Angola, Ivory Coast, Trinidad and Togo. I wouldn't be surprised if one of us did well. We'll struggle to get there again because the best players are retiring after this World Cup. So I'm going to seize the moment."
