EX Tottenham and Liverpool defender Steven Caulker has opened up about his struggles during his playing career with gambling addiction and substance abuse.
The defender, who made one appearance for England and scored on his debut, revealed how he once blew £250,000 the day before playing a Premier League game against Arsenal.
Steven Caulker on the podcast Under The Cosh
Steven Caulker scored on his England debut
Caulker was Jurgen Klopp’s second signing as Liverpool manager
Caulker, 31, opened up about how his struggles with addiction led to him having a journeyman career.
The defender broke through at Tottenham aged 21 and made 29 appearances for the club.
From there he had stints at Cardiff, QPR and Southampton as well as becoming one of Klopp’s first signings when he joined Liverpool on loan.
His struggles with gambling and substance abuse meant he found himself unemployed aged 26 before joining Dundee after he called them to request a trial.
Since then he has gone on to play for several Turkish sides before joining Wigan in January.
He said in a podcast with Under The Cosh that while he was playing for QPR he became a regular at casinos.
On losing £250k the day before he was set to play Arsenal, Caulker said: “That night I’d done five casinos and did £250k.
“Then a day later we were playing Arsenal.
“Played Arsenal. Not sure what the score was. We either lost 2-1 or drew or something like that.
“They had Sanchez up front and everything like that.
“Anyway the next day Les Ferdinand, the sporting director calls me into his office and said ‘the casinos have called me.’
“He said I wanted to call you before the game but I thought ‘how the f*** can you go out there and play, that’s a quarter of a million pounds, just how?'”
Caulker then said: “I was just used to it. I was just numb to everything that was going on.”
The defender, who is now a free agent after being released by Wigan Athletic, also opened up about his time at Southampton under Ronald Koeman.
He said: “When I signed for Southampton, Koeman didn’t have a clue who I was.
“Went into his office and he did not know who I was. He did not know who he was signing that day.
“I walked in, shook his hand and he just kind of looked at me.”
Caulker soon found himself out of the Southampton team after being displaced by Virgil Van Dijk and Jose Fonte.
He said the spell on the sidelines saw him spiral into an alcohol addiction and that when his agent called to say Liverpool wanted to sign him he was drunk in a Dublin hotel room after a night out.
He said: “I was out the squad at Southampton so I went to Dublin for a piss up.
“I was there off my head, still in my clothes, had two missed calls from my agent and I was thinking f****** hell.
“Pick up the phone and my agent said you’ll never guess what, Liverpool want to sign you.”
Caulker became Klopp’s second signing after forgotten star Marko Grujic, and was mainly used as a striker in his four appearances for the club despite being a centre-back.
During his spell in Turkey Caulker spoke openly about his struggles with mental illness and addiction with The Guardian.
He has since been following a 12-step recovery program to help tackle his addiction issues.
