by ezzat amier
Gerrard spent 17 seasons at Anfield, making his Liverpool debut in 1998, cementing his
place in the first team in 2000, and succeeding Sami Hyypiä as team captain in 2003.
His honours include two FA Cups,
three League
Cups, one UEFA
Champions League, one UEFA
Cup, and one UEFA Super Cup.
Gerrard scored Liverpool's first goal and won the penalty kick for the third as
Liverpool came from 3–0 down to defeat Milan in the 2005
Champions League Final.[6] He joined Major
League Soccer club LA Galaxy in July 2015, spending
one-and-a-half seasons there before retiring on 24 November 2016.
Gerrard made his international debut for the England
national football team in
2000, and represented his country at the 2000, 2004 and 2012 UEFA
European Football Championships, as well as the 2006, 2010 and 2014 FIFA World Cups – captaining the team at
the latter two tournaments. He
was named as the permanent England captain shortly before UEFA Euro 2012, where he was named in the UEFA
Team of the Tournament. Gerrard became the sixth player to win 100 caps for
England in 2012, and is currently
fourth in the country's all-time
appearance list. He ended his international career in July
2014, having won 114 caps.
Liverpool
Beginnings,
Cup treble and club captaincy (1998–2004)
Gerrard made his Liverpool first-team debut
on 29 November 1998 in a Premier League match
against Blackburn
Rovers as a last-minute substitute for Vegard Heggem. He made thirteen appearances in his debut
season, filling in for injured captain Jamie Redknapp in
centre-midfield. He also occasionally played on the right wing, but he
scarcely contributed in the short on-pitch time he received, due to nervousness
affecting his play. Gerrard recalled in a November 2008 interview with The
Guardian, "I was out of position and out of my depth." The
Liverpool hierarchy nonetheless remained convinced that he would improve. Gerrard
saw himself as a defensive player primarily, looking to make key tackles rather
than push the team forward.
Gerrard began to regularly partner Redknapp
in central midfield for the 1999–2000
season. After starting the derby against Everton on
the bench, he replaced Robbie Fowler in
the second half but received his first career red
card for
a very late high challenge to the upper leg of Everton's Kevin
Campbell shortly afterwards in a game Liverpool lost 1-0. Later
that season, Gerrard scored his first senior goal in a 4–1 victory over Sheffield
Wednesday. However, he began to suffer from nagging back
problems, which sports consultant Hans-Wilhelm
Müller-Wohlfahrt later diagnosed as a result of
accelerated growth, coupled with excessive playing, during his teenage years. He
was then beset by groin injuries that required four separate operations.
He went on to recover from this, and in the 2000–01
season made fifty starts in all competitions and scored
ten goals as he won his first major honours with Liverpool – the FA Cup, Football
League Cup, and the UEFA
Cup.
He was named PFA
Young Player of the Year by his peers. In the following season,
he would go on to win both the FA
Charity Shield and UEFA Super Cup.
In March 2003, Gerrard scored the opening goal in the club's 2–0 win over Manchester
United in the Football
League Cup Final held at the Millennium
Stadium in Cardiff.
After a year as Liverpool vice-captain,
Gerrard replaced Sami Hyypiä as
Liverpool captain in October 2003, as manager Gérard
Houllier said that he recognised Gerrard had demonstrated
leadership qualities early on, but needed to mature. He chose to extend
his contract at the club, signing a new four-year deal.
Houllier resigned as Liverpool manager after
a trophyless 2003–04
campaign, and Gerrard was linked with a move to Chelsea during
the off-season. He admitted he was not "happy with the progress Liverpool
has made", and that "for the first time in my career I've thought
about the possibility of moving on." In the end, Gerrard turned down a
£20 million offer from Chelsea to stay with Liverpool and new coach Rafael Benítez.
Champions League and FA Cup success (2004–2007)
Liverpool had a number of injuries early in
the 2004–05
season, and a foot injury suffered in a September league match
against Manchester United shelved Gerrard until late November. He returned to
score in the last five minutes of a Champions League group stage match against Olympiacos to secure Liverpool's advancement to the
knockout round. He claimed that this was his most important, if not his
best, goal for Liverpool to date. However, Gerrard netted an own goal
during the 2005 League
Cup final on 27 February, which proved decisive in
Liverpool's 3–2 loss to Chelsea after extra time at the Millennium Stadium.]Gerrard
scored 23 goals in 53 appearances in 2005–06, and
in April became the first Liverpool player since John
Barnes in
1988 to be voted the PFA
Player of the Year. He scored twice in the 2006 FA Cup Final against West
Ham United, including a 35-yard equaliser that sent the match into
extra time, and Liverpool won their second consecutive major trophy on
penalties. The goals made him the only player to have scored in the FA Cup,
League Cup, UEFA Cup and Champions League finals. Liverpool eliminated Chelsea in the 2006–07
Champions League semi-finals
on penalties, to return to their second final in three seasons, which they lost
2–1 to Milan in Athens.
Gerrard suffered a toe fracture in an August
2007 Champions League qualifier against Toulouse but returned four days
later to play the entirety of a 1–1 league draw against Chelsea. On 28 October
2007, Gerrard played his 400th game for Liverpool in a league match against Arsenal, in
which he scored. He scored in all
but one of Liverpool's domestic and European matches during the month of
November, and after scoring the only goal in a Champions League away tie
against Olympique de Marseille on 11 December, he became the first
Liverpool player since John Aldridge in 1989 to score in
seven consecutive games in all competitions. In December 2007, Gerrard was
voted sixth (after Kaká, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Didier Drogba and Ronaldinho) for
the 2007
FIFA World Player of the Year.
During a six-minute stretch in the second
half of the 2005
Champions League final against A.C. Milan,
Liverpool came back from a three-goal deficit to tie the match at 3–3 after
extra time, with Gerrard scoring one of the goals, a header from a John Arne
Riise cross. Liverpool's third goal was gained as a penalty from a foul
awarded to Liverpool when Gennaro Gattuso was judged to have pulled down Gerrard in
Milan's penalty box. Xabi Alonso's penalty was saved by Dida but the rebound
was scored. Gerrard did not participate in the penalty shootout (he was
the designated fifth penalty taker) which Liverpool won 3–2 as they claimed
their first Champions League trophy in twenty years. Dubbed the Miracle
of Istanbul, the match is widely regarded as one of the greatest finals in
the competition's history, and Gerrard was lauded as the catalyst for the
second half comeback. Gerrard was named the Man of the Match, and later
received the UEFA
Club Footballer of the Year award.
In regards to his contract issues with
Liverpool, Gerrard told the press after the final, "How can I leave after
a night like this?" But negotiations soon stalled and on 5 July 2005,
after Liverpool turned down another lucrative offer from Chelsea, Gerrard
rejected a club-record £100,000-a-week offer. Liverpool chief executive Rick Parry conceded
the club had lost Gerrard, saying, "Now we have to move on. We have done
our best, but he has made it clear he wants to go and I think it looks pretty
final." The next day, Gerrard signed a new four-year deal as Parry
blamed the earlier breakdown of talks on miscommunication between the two
sides. Gerrard stated upon signing the contract that he would rather win one
premier league medal than win multiple titles at Chelsea as it would mean more
to him.
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