Thrown some advice on the Delap delivery
Over a firm handshake, I ask him to teach me how to throw like he does on the telly.
As he looks, curious, from one member of his entourage, to me, and slowly back again – I think of a celebrated article about a famous weightlifter, by Paul Solotaroff, that I once read.
“One day a kid walks up to him between sets and said: ‘I want to be like you, Steve Michalik. I want to be Mr America and Mr Universe.’
“‘Yeah?’ said Michalik in thick contempt. ‘How bad do you want it?’
“‘Worse than anything,’ said the kid, a scrawny 17-year-old, more balls than biceps.”
Right, says Delap. Let’s go.
The Stoke City man, of course, is renowned for his laser-accurate, long-distance throw-ins which he darts in from sidelines in Premier League stadia. A weapon, but not so secret.
Hurled in at around 40mph, and averaging distances of 100ft(!), with an unusually and dangerously flat trajectory, the Ireland man is largely responsible for plenty of the Potters’ goals and their subsequent success in the English top flight over the past two seasons.
So, is this technique something I can bring to the Tuesday night five-a-side?
We’re standing outside Harry Crosbie’s impressive new Grand Canal Theatre in Dublin city centre on a wet midweek morning. Perfect laboratory conditions for our experiment, I discover.
“It’s very important, on a day like this, to dry the ball,” Delap explains as he drags the new Jabulani around in his arms, as is his familiar trademark while teammates flood the box and goalkeepers, essentially, freak out.
“When we’re at home, the ball-boys have towels and they can quickly throw them to me and I give the ball a good drying. It’s one of the most important bits.”
Away from home, however, when conditions aren’t perfectly conducive to his distinctive set-piece, he admits to wearing “an old, raggy vest” that envelops the wet ball while he steps backwards over the line as if he’s tip-toeing out of the cold sea.
That is, of course, if he’s allowed to take his customary few paces, bounce three or four steps forward onto the line, before bending like a sapling and whipping the ball goalwards. No, the opposition often make it harder than that.
“I was walking out the tunnel at Upton Park last season, and Zola looks up and says: ‘have you seen the pitch?’
“I said, ‘no – why?’
“‘It wasn’t my idea,’ he says.”
Delap smiles at the memory of the then West Ham boss’s embarrassment. He took the field to see the advertising hoardings almost scuffed by chalk, as they hugged the sideline.
But you don’t bring a knife to a gun fight. Delap, typically unfazed, just stepped out over them.
Perhaps, though, the key to understanding the throw-in is found in Delap’s sporting DNA.
His trademark set-piece sometimes overshadows what a good footballer he is – he’s played in FA Cup finals, won promotion, scored some corkers and should certainly have more than the 11 Ireland caps on his dresser. But it’s also the case that his teenage years were spent – kicking a ball, sure – but throwing a javelin too. The young Carlisle-raised lad – to Irish parents – was a schools champion.
After he dries the ball carefully, he places it carefully in his palms, the tips of his thumbs touching each other and his fingers spread to form a butterfly-type grip. “This is important. As you can see, I don’t have big hands or anything, so I catch it like this and...” he takes his left hand away from the ball with a flourish, like a magician waving his glove in front of a handkerchief. “You need to be able to grip the ball with one hand and not drop it.” He turns the ball to hold it only from the top half, like a Harlem Globetrotter, and it stays where it is.
So now it’s showtime. There’s no verbal missiles raining down on us this morning, no din from the stands and no opposing full back is hopping on his heels in our path. But let’s imagine there is.
“I don’t really have a routine now,” shrugs the 33-year-old. There’s no Ronan O’Gara schedule, no Jonathan Edwards-like hop, skip and jump. I tell him – after a particularly sad evening spent watching his throws on YouTube – I’ve noticed he usually takes four strides, including one longer pace. “I just do whatever’s easiest. I don’t know. I wouldn’t be able to deal with the hoardings, would I, if I had a set routine?”
He steps back, then jumps onto the imaginary line and releases the ball from over his head, licking on some backspin to keep it flat and fast. It flashes to the other end of the square. “Now your turn.”
My first effort isn’t too bad – but the footballer insists my run-up was a bit dandyish. I give it a go, this time determined to send the new ball into the canal. My approach is less Strictly and I plant my feet firmly on the line, draw the ball over my head and – pop – it skips into the air before coming down on my crown.
“That’s why you need a towel,” says Delap dryly. Good advice.
* adrian.russell@gmail.com Twitter: @adrianrussell
