Jamie Carragher and Robbie Fowler tell Melwood stories as vision for former Liverpool training ground revealed
EXCLUSIVE: The ECHO sits down with Jamie Carragher and Robbie Fowler as they team up to use Melwood as the base for their new joint-academy
Jamie Carragher says both he and Robbie Fowler take immense pride from having their new venture associated with the iconic Melwood.
The Liverpool legends have teamed up to create an academy that will be housed at the famous site in West Derby alongside swimming and gymnastic clubs from Merseyside Olympians Steve Parry and Beth Tweddle.
The Fowler-Carragher Academy will take on operational responsibility for the existing building with Melwood set to become the home for a college that will provide opportunities for young people across the Liverpool City Region.
After partnering with affordable housing company, Torus, Carragher and Fowler were present at a press conference at Melwood on Friday to officially welcome in the new venture.
Carragher said: "We were coming together as an academy and then the situation with Melwood obviously popped up.
"It just gets the juices flowing, doesn't it?
"It's not playing at Anfield but we both probably came here from eight or nine years of age, really. Robbie spent such a long time here and I spent my whole career here.
"This was the place that we come to every day and this gives us an opportunity to do that as often now.
"But hopefully younger people coming into the academy now can have those same memories that we had.
"There will be some houses and it won't be exactly the same, but it's Melwood, it's iconic, you say that word and everyone knows what it means around the world really.
"For us to be a part of the future of Melwood rather than just the past, with the memories and stories we can tell...it goes back a lot further than us, we know that.
"It started with Bill Shankly, so for us to be involved with it is something that I think we should be really proud of.
"It's not just football, Melwood will always be synonymous with Liverpool Football Club."
The ECHO sat down with Fowler and Carragher after the press conference to talk through their memories of the famous Melwood site.
How special is it to have your names attached to the iconic Melwood, helping the next generation of young people in the region?
Carragher : "It's very special, it really is.
"And for us, as players, I wouldn't say we took Melwood for granted, but it was a workplace. It's only when you leave and you go that you realise there's a history here and you've been a part of that yourself.
"It is special and whenever you come back you do get those feelings back again. Now that we're sort of back and just popping in to see how things are going, you can't help but just think back to the past and your time through to obviously Bill Shankly's days.
"That is something that can keep Melwood going, but going forward this enterprise can too and it will also keep a lot of the fabric here of Melwood and what it was about and also that it will never be forgotten."
Can you remember your early days here?
Fowler : "We used to play at the Vernon Sangster and we'd obviously come down to Melwood to play a few times a season and you just remember it being open and green. You trained in whatever kit you had on these pitches, because it wasn't all in the same kit then.
"What I remember most about it was, you look at academies now and there are load of staff on the books to look after the kids, we only had like three staff members. We had Dave Shannon, Steve Heighway and Hughie McAuley who were looking after every single kid.
"They must have been absolutely shattered!
"That's the way it was years ago, so just coming in and training with them and load of other kids, doing lots of skills and we very rarely played games to be honest with you, but it was the more technical aspects of learning to be a footballer.
So who were you trying to impress when you used to come down from the Vernon Sangster?
Fowler : "I think you wanted to impress the other players to be honest and that was always the case for me. You didn't play many games and I don't really remember playing many games until I was about 13 or 14.
"It was just a case of wanting to be as good as the lads you trained with and you wanted to impress your team-mates.
Carragher : "It was the same for me. Don't forget you come to Liverpool and you're obviously the best in the school or Liverpool Boys or Bootle Boys, but when you go to a football club, it's another level up.
"So it's OK thinking you're the best in your school team or whatever but there are different levels and you are not sure of every kid in the city. So that is a good barometer of where you are as a player, really.
"And then once you get there, of course you want to impress the coaches. Steve Heighway was a big figure, the figurehead of the youth teams really and you always wanted to impress him basically, an ex-Liverpool player with an authority about him that made you jump as a young kid.
"That was the best way to be for a young kid at that age, so I would agree with Robbie, you work out where you are in the group and then obviously there was Steve Heighway.
From progressing through from youngsters to being established stars...when other players signed for the club, was their first day at Melwood always looked at intensely to see who was going to cut it and who wasn't?
Fowler: "I think that's a normal, thing in football, so regardless of how good you are or how good you think you are, clubs and teams are always bringing in new players, so you are always comparing yourself to them and you are always hoping that you are better than them.
"I think you've always got to have that self-confidence that you are but it's not until you get into training at Melwood that you would see what they were all about.
"Then it is a case of transforming your career where you have gone from trying to impress your team-mates and all of a sudden you are impressing the coaches that little bit more than the players and I think that's a normal thing, isn't it?
Carragher : "Yeah, I think when the club brings a new player in, if he's not in your position, you hope he's brilliant. If he's in your position, you hope he's f****** s****!
"No, I'm joking, but you can't deny that. Thankfully there were some s**** full-backs who come in!
The name Melwood is known throughout football and there's not too many training grounds that are as famous, it's a name that reverberates across football.
Fowler: "I think that's just because of the success of the football club. Look at the great players that have been here and the trophies that have been won. Everyone knows the history and the tradition.
"The elements of tactics and the technical elements to winning games, it all started here.
"I think that is probably what is was with Liverpool and Melwood, the fact that the club has been unbelievably successful, you always think that these players have been here and this is where it all started.
Carragher : "I think it's special as well in that there's not many, certainly now, training grounds that are in an area like this with terraced houses around. It did feel a big part of the community and it still is, so hopefully we can provide that.
"I think a training ground has always got that mystique because supporters don't always see what goes on inside of it.
"They see what happens when you play at Anfield but they don't see what happens when Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan and Ronnie Moran were doing on a day-to-day basis here. As I said, it has got a mystique to its name and hopefully we can keep that name going.
Going forward now, on top of being a place of sporting excellence, it's going to be a place for education and potentially jobs for the future generations and it's a very special venture that you're undertaking...
Carragher : "It is and I think we might be the 'big names' of it, but there is a lot more to it than that. Beth Tweddle, Steve Parry, there are other sides of it as well, the education aspect is a huge element of that.
"Of course there is the sporting side of it but you also want people to come out with their education boosted, BTecs, A Levels, whatever it may be. I think Brian McGorry (FEFA college principal) mentioned how many people had gone to university and scholarships as well.
"So it is an all-round thing and maybe we are the names of it, if you like, but there is a lot more to it, so that is why I think it could have a long lasting legacy.
Fowler : "I think this is a goosebumps moment. We're obviously here and part of the fabric that has been Melwood with some of the great players that have played here.
"We are part of that, we have a history here, now we can keep this history and keep the tradition going. I just mentioned goosebumps but every kid who comes through here now, whether it is just to have a look around or whether it is to be involved in the educational side of it, it's a goosebump moment for them too because they will know and understand what has been here before them."
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