I was on cloud nine and I quite simply could not believe this was happening to me. When Ron Saunders had pointed at me just a few hours earlier, I was thinking that by now I would be somewhere like Notts County or Luton haggling over wages but, instead, I was in the company of a fantastic, up-and-coming, young manager poised to join one of the country’s biggest clubs.
Once we finished the meal, Mr Kendall briefly discussed terms with me and told me that the following day, when I passed the medical, I would be offered a three-year deal. The money on offer was good, probably double what I was on at Birmingham, and I was also offered £25,000 to sign. There were bonuses for winning games and for finishing at various places in the league – it was a fantastic deal.
Had Howard informed me that there was no signing-on fee and I was going to be on the same money as I was getting at St Andrew’s, I’d have still asked him for the pen and signed there and then. I felt at home in his company, he had won my trust and total respect over one meal, and he has that to this day.
When he left I got talking to the bar manager, ordered a few drinks and got on the phone to tell everyone my good news. My mother and father were really pleased for me although Susan was still in a state of shock with the speed of the move. I sat back, ordered a bottle of champagne and a few large brandies, then finished the night off with huge, big fat cigar, thinking, ‘Fuck me, I have won the jackpot!’ I ended up, not for the last time on Merseyside, having a few too many drinks and the restaurant manager eventually got me into a taxi and sent me off to the hotel.
The following day I had the medical and passed with ease, met a few local press reporters and was shown around the training facilities and introduced to Howard’s staff who were preparing for a game against Southampton.
I was then introduced to my new team-mates and every one of them seemed quite happy with my arrival – apart from a certain John Bailey, who had obviously noticed that I played in the same position as him. I went to shake his hand and he blanked me and later that night in the hotel I read in the local paper that when they had asked Bailey whether he thought that Pat Van Den Hauwe had been brought in to replace him, he said, ‘Pat who?’
After the blank at Bellfield and then a dig in the press, I thought, ‘Fuck you,’ and began to think I would have an enemy at the club. I could not have been any further off the mark as, within a few days, Bails had come round and right until his last day at the club he remained one of my closest friends at Everton.
Although Bails already had the hump with me, it had not actually been mentioned where Mr Kendall had intended playing me. I was just happy to sign the form and not cock anything up, so once that was all sorted and the formalities were over, I asked him bluntly where he saw me fitting into his side. I thought it could be as a central defender but he shook his head and said, ‘You’re my new left-back, although it may be a while before you’re my first-choice left-back!’ In one sentence, in seconds, he had taken me to the top of the mountain and rolled me back down to the bottom of it. He was a genius at that … the king of the one-liner!
That day I watched from the stands as my new team struggled to overcome a decent Southampton side and the game ended two each. I went to the players’ lounge and Mr Kendall asked me what I fancied to drink. I was obviously on my best behaviour so politely asked for an orange juice. He grinned and said, ‘An orange juice, Pat? Sure you don’t want some champagne … a brandy … or maybe a large Cuban cigar?’
If I could have dug a hole in the carpet of the players’ lounge and buried myself I’d have done it there and then. The bar manager had told my new boss every single drink I had ordered and even thrown in the cigar for good measure. Howard knew I was embarrassed but said no more, passed me my orange juice and told me not to be late for training on the Monday. What a man-manager he was! He could have bollocked me for getting pissed the night I met him as it was my medical the following day. He could have made a show of me in front of my new team-mates to teach me a lesson, but no, he quietly let me know that wherever I ventured in this huge city, he would no doubt hear about it, hence I learnt that I could not take the piss as I had done in Birmingham.
In training on the Monday, Mr Kendall went on to tell me that Terry Darracott, his chief scout, had watched me about ten times and had noticed I was naturally a right-footed player and had said to Howard that that could be a problem. Howard told me that he’d replied, ‘We’re having him … we can work on his left foot … I like him!’
By Christ, did they work on it! Every day after training, Terry, a tough, hard Scouser, took me out on the pitch and it was left foot this, left foot that and, within a few weeks, I began to find it so much more comfortable not only controlling the ball but crossing and passing with it as well.
Terry himself had been a left-back at Everton and was a bit of a cult hero, although he admitted to me his left foot was worse than mine and that he used to whack it over with the outside of his right at every opportunity. Terry and Howard had noted it as a weakness that we were to improve on and it was simple things like that – working on an obvious weakness – that showed I had moved to a bigger and better club. At Birmingham, nobody had ever said to me that my left foot was a weakness; it was as if it wasn’t the best but was good enough for Birmingham. Good enough for them, but nowhere near good enough for Everton. Maybe that attitude was the reason Birmingham were up and down like a whore’s knickers every season.
After realising that I had been signed by Mr Kendall to impress on the football pitch and not in the bar, I set about training hard to try and get into the first team, a task that was not going to be easy as Everton, after a shaky start, had strung a couple of wins together and were playing reasonably well.
Despite being fit and raring to go, I was sat in the stands for a few games next to Darracott, who just kept telling me, ‘Don’t watch the game – stay focussed on how our back four play!’ It was hard; if Everton were on the attack, I’d obviously follow the play but would get a dig from Terry and the same instructions: ‘Watch the fucking back four!’ It did my nut in but, after a couple of games, I began to notice how they went about their business and especially the way the full-backs were always just ahead of the two centre-backs. Things began to click in my head and, in training, it seemed easy to slot in thanks to Terry’s expert advice, even though it was blunt and to the point!
After one training session, I was chomping at the bit and I got brave and went over to the gaffer for a quiet word. I had it in my head what I was going to say, nice and calm, ‘Mr Kendall, I’m really training hard and I would love the opportunity to play in the first team. Do you think I will have to wait much longer to get my chance?’
Well, that’s what I had intended to say. As it was, I went over and just blurted out, ‘Boss … I want to fucking play Saturday!’ That was it, hours of building myself up and that was the best I could come out with! Howard just smiled and said, ‘Patience, son, patience …’ and walked off!
We had a couple of away games in a week and I roomed with Gary Stevens. I was very shy, not used to wearing a suit and going down to the restaurant with the players and the directors for tea, so I used to order my meal with Neville Southall and we’d eat in his room talking nonsense for hours before going to bed. It was superb.
I soon settled into life at Everton; it was one big, happy family and there were no cliques. Everybody trained hard, played hard and, apart from Neville, drank hard together. I was still in a hotel and, as soon as I landed there, I was introduced to a player who had also recently signed called Ian Atkins. Another bloke was hanging about and he came over and shook my hand but I had no idea who he was and, later that night, he phoned my room and asked me if I fancied a night on the town. I almost told him to piss off and then he mentioned that he was meeting a few of my team-mates and the bloke concerned turned out to be Terry Curran, who was also an Everton player. I felt a proper idiot for not knowing who he was, but soon was out and about with him and he was quality company.
Within weeks, we were getting birds back to the