Chelsea Tales of the Unexpected: John Terry was Dennis Wise’s toilet ‘fag’
Chelsea “legend” John Terry has been talking with the Chelsea website about his apprenticeship at Stamford Bridge.
After joining from West Ham United’s academy in 1995 at the age of 14, Terry turned to Dennis Wise, then Chelsea’s irritant-in-chief:
“I used to clean Dennis Wise’s boots. He wanted his boots perfect. I used to take really good care of them.” I used to Vaseline them and stuff like that. They were about size 2½! I learned a lot from Wisey. Every now and then he gave me a little bonus. Every time he scored I was on £25, which was half my wages at the time!”
Good old, Wisey.
“I’d do anything for them (the senior players). I’d make their teas and coffees.” Even silly things like sit on the toilet to make the seat warm for them in the cold winter days at the training ground. It’s bizarre when you think about it but that was part of growing up.”
Good to see the old public school fag system alive and well in the Premier League.
But how true is that bit about warming the potty for the ‘big’ boys?
In Boy: Tales of Childhood Roald Dahl recalls his fagging job of warming the toilet seat for the ‘Boazers’ (prefects) at Repton School in Derbyshire. He “wiped the frost off with my handkerchief then lowered by trousers and sat down”. He adds that he read entire works of Charles Dickens while working as a human toilet seat cosy.
Terry fails to shares how he occupied his mind whilst sat on Wise’s toilet. But given more lurid tales of his life, we’d wonder if Wise is now reviewing the wisdom of his mentoring…
Posted: 27th, March 2015 | In: Chelsea, Sports Comment (1) | TrackBack | Permalink
