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Jon Parkin is one of Cardiff City’s more unlikely cult figures.

He only played 11 times, scoring just one goal, yet still found his way into the affection of Bluebirds fans.

Standing at 6ft 4in, he was known as ‘The Beast’ and Cardiff supporters loved the way he took no prisoners on the field of play.

But in a searingly honest autobiography, Parkin reveals he hated his time with the Bluebirds and fell into a spiral of depression.

He details how the club doctor helped him through the tough time and lifts the lid on tales of team gambling, blowing promotion to the Premier League under Dave Jones and an extraordinary fallout with Malky Mackay.

Being dubbed one of the most colourful, entertaining football books of the year, this is the story of ‘Feed The Beast’, by Jon Parkin...

THE WRONG MOVE, DRINKING AND CHOPRA GAMBLING

Yorkshireman Parkin joined Cardiff from Preston on new year’s day 2011, but his marriage to wife Clare was breaking down and he was gambling heavily. He placed a £4,500 bet on Roger Federer to win the US Open, who lost to Juan Martin del Potro.

“A couple of clubs were interested in me and they turned out to be Sheffield Wednesday and Cardiff City,” writes Parkin. “Wednesday were in League One, going well and, geographically, it would have been perfect. But Cardiff were second in the Championship and paying £100,000 a year more in wages so, financially, that made more sense.

I didn’t want to leave Oliver (his youngster) behind so I said to Clare that I’d only go to Cardiff if she came with me. It was probably too early to make a commitment like that but football sometimes forces your hand and when she said she would come, I agreed to sign for Cardiff. It was the chance of a new start somewhere else and everything seemed right – but it would turn out to be one of the worst decisions of my career.

Cardiff were in a good position and I knew that if they went up, my money would double. In honesty that’s the only reason I signed and while Cardiff fans may not thank me for that, it’s the truth.

First, we had to get promoted but I knew if we did, I could go on loan to a club in the north of England for the season because I was under no illusions that I was (not) good enough to play in the Premier League.

Things started well when I scored an incredible volley away to Norwich after just seven minutes of my debut. We flew back to Cardiff and the captain Mark Hudson said the lads were going for a night out and asked if I was up for it. Too right I was. I got absolutely trollied and remember being sick in the taxi, but as the training session the following day was at the hotel I was staying at, I only had to roll out of bed, jog around a bit and that was that. My sort of session.

There were some good lads at the club. One of them, Michael Chopra, had gambling problems that were a couple of notches up on me and his addiction is widely known in football. The thing with Chops is that he’s a nice bloke, but he’s like a 14-year-old trapped in a man’s body. The things that he did weren’t the sort of things he should have been doing as a promising young footballer – like playing PlayStation until 4am in the morning the day before a game.

I didn’t really get involved in the card school but before one game there must have been about £800 in the middle and Jlloyd Samuel (who is sadly with us no more), Paul Quinn and Chops were in the hand. Jlloyd got to a point where he just said: “That’s me done” and came out of it, but Chops must have already owed Quinny two grand from previous games.

In the end it was just those two playing for the pot. Quinny looked as if he was about to fold then said: “Okay, I will see you.”

Chops must have thought he was bluffing and said: “I tell you what – I will spin you for that two grand I owe you.”

(Image: Huw Evans Picture Agency)

So Chops would either clear his debt completely, or end up losing about £4,000 in total. It turned out Quinny had three of a kind and Chops had a run, so Quinny won. And that was just on the way to a game! Chops was letting it ruin his career."

PROMOTION BLOWN

A star-studded Cardiff team was expected to soar into the Premier League in 2010-11, but they faltered badly in the closing weeks. Parkin thinks he knows why.

"The club had found a house for Clare, Oliver and me a few weeks after I’d signed and after sorting a nursery out, they moved in. We were at least going to give it a go for his sake. As far as my place in the pecking order at Cardiff was concerned, I soon realised I’d been signed as a squad player more than anything else.

Jay Bothroyd returned to fitness. It seemed clear I’d been signed as his back-up and I don’t think I started another game that season. I was coming off the bench here and there, but I went 12 games without a goal because I couldn’t get the run of games I needed to really get into my stride.

Dave Jones had brought in a few young lads throughout the season and some came on loan such as Jloyd Samuel, Danny Drinkwater, Stephen Bywater, Jay Emmanuel-Thomas and Aaron Ramsey, so he could certainly spot a player. But there were some who came in who didn’t do much for the team - not all of them but some.

We’d tailed off badly and ended up missing out on automatic promotion by just four points after winning only seven of our last 16 games.

The season was far from over. We had still made the play-offs and went to Reading in the first leg and got a 0-0 draw. So we were set to finish the job off at the Cardiff City Stadium and with more than 24,000 in, everyone expected us to go through to the final. But we’d lost Bellers with a hamstring injury and he was the beat of that side.

We were garbage that night and lost 3-0. I came on after 64 minutes for Chops but were already two goals down by then. That cost Dave Jones his job and, in hindsight, I wonder if we’d approached those last few months differently and had fewer loan players in whether we would have gone up, because we blew it.

So with me thinking we’d end up in the top two, I’d double my money and, happy days, things had gone a bit pear-shaped. Not for the first time, I’d failed to back a winner.”

SINKING FAST AND A HUGE FALLOUT WITH MALKY

Parkin’s hopes of getting back together with Clare didn’t work out. She and Oliver, who he adored, had moved back to Barnsley... and he had to contend with a new manager he didn’t get on with

“I was left in a big house in the middle of nowhere on my own. That was the start of my depression. Being so far away was the last thing I needed. I was sinking fast. I had that to deal with, I was apprehensive about the new manager coming in and wasn’t in a good place mentally or physically.

Malky Mackay had been installed during the summer and whereas Dave Jones was laidback and just let the lads get on with it, Mackay would prove to be the total opposite – a sergeant major type. I could tell straight away that me and Malky weren’t going to get on.

(Image: Getty Images)

I did well in pre-season, got fit and we were playing West Ham away for the first game of the 2011-12 season. On the coach down, my room-mate Mark Hudson set me up on Twitter, showed me how to use it and set up my profile. I’ve never been a techie in any sense of the word, so he had to do everything and then showed me how to send a tweet out if I wanted to. I’d soon learn that putting your thoughts out to the world could come back and bite you on the arse.

I wasn’t even on the bench for our next matches against Bristol City or our home game against Brighton, which we lost 3-1. I thought I’d give Twitter a whirl for a laugh. I watched the game from the stands and after the match, I tweeted: “Does anyone need a gardener? Looking for work.”

I’d only been on Twitter for a short while and I’d gained a few hundred followers already. A few Cardiff fans replied to the tweet asking things like: “What are you moaning at?” saying I was being well paid and so on. I replied, telling them it wasn’t about that, I just wanted to play football.

The following Friday, Malky calls me into his office and throws a newspaper down on his desk. “What the heck is that?” I looked at it and – I think it was The Sun – it had a headline ‘Anyone looking for a gardener?’

He said: “What have I told you lot about Twitter and social media?”

I had to think fast and told him I’d only been on it a few days and that I thought I’d been messaging one of my mates on it – knowing full well I hadn’t. He just shook his head and said: “That’s not good enough.” We left it at that.

We were away at Portsmouth but I wasn’t included again, and I was getting severely annoyed. I was missing Oliver, I was lonely, my head wasn’t right and things were building up."

DEPRESSION REALLY KICKS IN

Parkin had a loan spell nearer home with Doncaster, but the deal then fell through because of finances and he returned to the Bluebirds

“The moment I knew I was heading back to Cardiff, I started feeling really flat again. I went straight back into the routine of training, going to bed and staying there. The only time the cycle would break was if Huds and his wife invited me round for the evening.

That would happen a couple of nights a week, which broke things up, but I was conscious of being around too much and becoming a pain in the arse.

I headed home whenever I got the chance and I was driving 1,200 miles per week on some occasions. I had a couple of weeks’ training with the first-team before Mackay made me train with the youth team.

I was as low as I’d been and if Mackay bawled me out for any reason, I just used to ignore him. I was not arsed what happened and he could have fined me or sacked me for all I cared – I half-hoped he would.

I wasn’t even eating that much any more; it was just training and sleeping for hours on end, broken up by TV occasionally.

(Image: Huw Evans Agency)

I’ve always been a bit of a clown in the dressing room but I was hardly talking to anyone, interacting or joining in the banter any more. I still hadn’t realised I’d slipped into a deep depression for the first time. I tried to bat it off as boredom, but it wasn’t me. I didn’t want to go out, I was hardly drinking – I was just miserable and constantly tired.

Eventually I went to see the club doctor, Len Noakes – a sensational guy and a somebody I knew I could talk to.

I told him I was struggling and he asked me why, so he asked me what had been happening and how I felt about it. He just listened to what I had to say, which was quite liberating on its own.

When I’d finished he told me not to worry because he’d sort it and I’d soon be feeling better. He was great, he never judged me and told me he had thought something might be wrong because I hadn’t been my usual self for a while.

Dr Noakes set me up with another club doctor who also talked to me and asked what made me feel happy. I told him I felt fine as soon as I was on my way back to Barnsley, so he diagnosed me with circumstantial depression because of the situation I was in. He prescribed me some anti-depressants and after a few weeks, things started to improve.

Mackay had frozen me out of anything and everything. I never travelled or trained with the first-team and he made me do extra work with the youngsters. I just wanted out and he clearly wanted me out as well.”

CAN I HAVE A CUP FINAL TICKET, PLEASE?

Parkin was loaned out to Huddersfield and Scunthorpe and able to see young Oliver so he felt much better. But he was still contracted to Cardiff and wanted to watch Mackay’s Bluebirds against Liverpool in the Carling Cup final

“Scunny were playing Brentford the day before so I was clear to go to the game and, as I was still a Cardiff player and had played in the first two rounds, I fancied a day out at Wembley.

I got in touch with the club secretary and asked what the script was for the final regarding tickets and so on. I asked if I was invited or even allowed to go as a squad member – in fact, was I even welcome? He said he’d need to speak to the manager and get back to me. I knew where this one was heading.

I got a call back from the secretary who said: “Yeah, sorry Jon you’re not welcome to come. If you want any tickets, you’ll have to buy them.”

Cheers Malky.

A few of my mates are Liverpool fans so I ended up buying tickets for them and we travelled down on the Saturday evening before the game. It was outrageous, really, but it showed how isolated I’d become under Mackay. I thought, ‘Stuff him, I’m going anyway’ and ended up watching the game with the Cardiff fans in the stand.”

FEED THE BEAST: JON PARKIN is published by Sport Media (Reach plc), priced £18.99 and is available in good bookshops.