Monday, September 9, 2013

Soccer Special: Louis Tomlinson

Louis Tomlinson played soccer for charity and went down in a tackle. You don't get that as a headline in normal soccer. But this tackle sent Twitter ablaze with tweets. Louis Tomlinson hurt his knee and left the content of his stomach on the turf. These things happen, usually when amateurs play soccer. Headlines don't come easy, and Louis Tomlinson really did his part to get them noticed in a field they don't normally dominate.



Aston Villa striker Gabriel Agbonlahor brought Louis Tomlinson down with a harmless tackle during a friendly for the Stiliyan Petrov Cancer Foundation. Professional soccer players hardly notice these tackles, as they are trained and physically fit. For an amateur player it was too much, and Louis Tomlinson wasn't very good at dealing with the pain either. He spewed his tea all over the field.

Gabriel Agbonlahor is to apologize for the tackle on Louis Tomlinson that left the One Direction singer sick on the touchline. "It was one of those things," said Agbonlahor. "I'll apologize to Louis when we meet up." It can be taken as a given that Louis Tomlinson didn't take the tackle as a personal thing. "I know he enjoyed playing in the game and it's fantastic that he took time out to be here."

Gabriel Agbonlahor was a team-mate of Stiliyan Petrov's at Aston Villa. He received abuse from some of the more childish One Direction fans on Twitter after the game for the tackle. There were also tweets from One Direction haters congratulating him, equally childish and in severe need to grow up to the age of 10. Maybe that's pushing it, let's say eight.

This season, Louis Tomlinson had signed for his local club Doncaster Rovers on a non-contract basis to play reserve games after impressing in another charity match. As a fan of the Rovers and a local lad, he was overjoyed with the honor.

Boy band One Direction last year became the first British group to debut on top of the Billboard 200 list when their Up All Night album sold more than 175,000 copies during the first week of release in the United States. They have recently been promoting their own movie This Is Us and fragrance Our Moment. Their third album is due out in late November. The singer's soccer injury should not affect tour plans as their next concert is not scheduled until May 2014 in Dublin.

Louis Tomlinson's participation, along with Westlife's singer Nicky Byrne and many other celebrities, helped boost the attendance at the charity bash (sorry for the pun) to a capacity 60,000 in Glasgow for a game of soccer organized to raise money for the Stiliyan Petrov Cancer Foundation. It was set up by the former Bulgaria international soccer player after he retired in May having been diagnosed with leukemia in 2012.

The 21-year-old's appearance, with the number 1D on the back of his Celtic shirt, ended prematurely when he was left hobbling from a tackle and was sick on the sidelines as he was substituted. Martin O'Neill, the former Aston Villa and Celtic manager who was his boss for the day, said: "Agbonlahor smashed into him and he picked himself up and then was ill in the dressing-room area, but he's not too bad now I think."

Actor Martin Compston also took part in the game as a player and said he was glad he was not on the receiving end of any heavy tackles. "I was feeling a bit rough before the game, but everyone put an arm round me and I think I fared a wee bit better than the guy from One Direction by the look of it," said the Celtic fan. "I've never seen Agbonlahor tackle anyone in my life, but he went fair through the wee boy because, when he walked off, he looked in a bit of a state."

Nicky Byrne scored for the Stiliyan Petrov XI, who won 5-3 thanks to a hat-trick from Fulham striker Dimitar Berbatov and another from former Bolton Wanderers and Manchester City midfielder Martin Petrov. Actor Warren Brown scored for Louis Tomlinson's Celtic XI along with former Hoops strikers Henrik Larsson and Pierre van Hooijdonk.

Further reading







No comments:

Post a Comment