“I once hit a six in very murky conditions to win a game which got us promoted.” Nigel Martyn is lost in a reverie. The former England, Leeds, Everton and Crystal Palace player was English football’s first £1m goalkeeper, chalked up 846 club appearances in a career that spanned three decades, went to two World Cups and played in an FA Cup final. But it is a smear over long-on in the Yorkshire gloaming that has him misty-eyed.
“Wow. I remember that feeling was … yeah. That was as good as any feeling that I had on a football field.”
Picking up on a whiff of incredulity Martyn begins to explain himself. “It was right down to the wire, I think we had one wicket left and it was almost pitch black.”
The game was in Cookridge a few years ago. Martyn, now 59, was playing for Leeds Modernians in the Airedale & Wharfedale senior cricket league. “The ball before I had not seen at all. I decided to just swing at the next one and somehow I really middled it! If I close my eyes I can almost feel it now. Then it was pandemonium.”
I gently remind Martyn that he was in goal for one of English football’s most visceral moments in modern memory – when David Beckham boomeranged a 93rd-minute free-kick into the top corner of Greece’s goal at Old Trafford to secure England’s place at the 2002 World Cup. Losing 2-1, England were staring down the barrel of an embarrassing non-qualification. It was Martyn’s long ball forward that led to the foul on Teddy Sheringham and resulted in the free-kick being given.
“That was a horrible final few minutes,” Martyn says, chuckling. “The lads in defence kept passing the ball back to me, inviting all this pressure on. I kept thinking: ‘Rio, don’t give it back to me, get it up there!’”
Martyn was unaware, even in the minute or so after Beckham’s free-kick had hit the back of the net, that it was enough to see England through. “That moment of euphoria was in a way taken away from me. We had to match Germany’s result and I just assumed they had won their match against Finland. Steve McClaren [then assistant manager to Sven-Göran Eriksson] only managed to get a message to me seconds before the whole ground knew.”
A serious ankle injury forced Martyn to end his football career in 2006. He soon found himself donning a different pair of gloves, those of a wicketkeeper. Martyn was a promising young cricketer growing up in St Austell and remained a keen follower of the game despite not being allowed to play once he turned professional with Bristol Rovers in 1987. Not many of his former teammates shared his love of leather on willow. “I’m racking my brains, I can only really think of Phil Neville having a passing interest when we were at Everton together.
A few years after retiring he decided to get back into cricket. “I didn’t take it seriously enough at first and ended up tearing one of my hamstrings pretty badly.” Fortunately for Martyn, his daughter is a physio for Harlequins and she encouraged him to start training again.
“I’ve never been much of a runner, but I always loved diving around and catching balls, I was a natural goalkeeper and wicketkeeper. I’m still really competitive though so when I set my mind to something I really go for it.”
Martyn now has an almost Goochian appetite for setting examples with his fitness, inspiring much younger players at Knaresborough to get in shape and have a more professional outlook. Having secured three promotions and with a couple of young keepers coming through the ranks whose development he did not want to block, Martyn was persuaded by a friend to make the move to Scarcroft, north of Leeds, for a fresh challenge. He also plays midweek for Cornwall’s over-50s and in summer completes an 800-mile round trip on a weekly basis. “My wife is a huge cricket fan and is very understanding. She does find the whole thing slightly bonkers though.”
This passion and commitment for cricket has paid off. Last week Martyn was given another chance to represent his country, having been selected for England’s over-60s cricketers. He will play his first match for the Lions, in effect the second XI to the first team, on Friday at Seaton Carew in County Durham. “He’ll be presented with a red cap on Friday for the match versus Scotland,” says Paul Bradley, England over-60s manager. “If he makes it into the first team, which I’m sure he will at some point, then he’ll get the blue cap and be able to call himself a dual international.”
“It’s a real honour to be selected,” says Martyn. “I was really impressed at the trial at Loughborough a few weeks ago. These guys are super fit and really strong cricketers, there’s no doddery old men or anything like that. These older gents could give blokes decades younger than them a run for their money.”
Martyn turns 60 in August and as such was never really in contention for a World Cup due to take place in Canada the same month. “I’d like to play a World Cup or a ‘Grey Ashes’ one day, but right now I’m taking it all as it comes. Fitness is never guaranteed when you get to my age so anything could happen.”
Does he ever get sledged playing club cricket? “Not really, I had one annoying bloke last season just listing famous goalkeepers while I was batting, that was a bit odd.” Martyn says he doesn’t really get recognised when he is in his whites, but does recall a time when a Knaresborough local and fellow former Leeds and England keeper, Paul Robinson, turned out for a game when they were left short.
“There were a few quizzical faces that day, a couple of wide-eyed Leeds fans in the opposition. I think they half expected Harry Kewell or Lucas Radebe to be opening the bowling for us. Robbo used to be my boot boy at Leeds. After the match I flung him my spikes for old times’ sake. Luckily, he saw the funny side.”
Martyn is keen for the interest in his selection to shine a light on the thriving world of seniors cricket, which does not receive any funding from the England and Wales Cricket Board and relies on sponsorship as well as players paying their own way. “We’ve got 135 teams from 36 counties competing in 60s and 70s age groups,” says Bradley proudly. “When it comes to the England squads we select on talent alone, not on favouritism.”
Bradley then confides that Martyn drove up to Seaton Carew a couple of day ago to have a look at the pitch where he will make his Lions debut. “He wasn’t there just to have a Mr Whippy on the seafront, was he?” Once a pro, always a pro.