After studying in Sheffield, I went down to London to do my post-graduate degree at the National Film and Television School, embarking on the movie that would eventually become ‘A Grand Day Out.’
You can go back into equestrianism any time – we’ve got a yard back home in Sheffield, and the horses are still there. They’re just on hold for the moment. I can’t ride and play football; it’s too much of a risk.
That feeling when I got the New England Revolution job on a permanent basis was one of relief, similar to when I signed for Sheffield Wednesday – I knew I was capable of doing a job at a decent level again but I just needed someone to believe in me.
Sheffield has everything as far as I’m concerned and the football club is right in the heart of it.
People just do not realise what a football life can be. Since 1968 I’ve never had more than a few weeks out of work, when I left Sheffield United and I have not had a Christmas.
I left school when I was 16; then I worked for my father, who was a welder. And I was a welder for three years, you know, welder of fabrication, metal ’cause it was a big industrial town, Sheffield. It was much steel and coal and stuff like that.
My son William is only nine but he’s had four public schools so far, one in Cornwall, one when I was at Sheffield, one in Beckenham when I was at Palace.
You can go back into equestrianism any time – we’ve got a yard back home in Sheffield, and the horses are still there. They’re just on hold for the moment. I can’t ride and play football; it’s too much of a risk.
I’m just me. Just Kyle from Sheffield. That’s all I see myself as.
I was a Sheffield United fan from when my grandad, who’s sadly passed away now, got a season ticket for me when I was four.
I never picked up a guitar as a kid, partly because my dad didn’t want the noise in our little back-to-back in Sheffield.
Places like the National Theatre or Sheffield, these great engines of theatre, make us cutting edge because they can be experimental. They can do plays that nobody else can afford to do in ways nobody else can afford to do.
I’ve come a long way from the area where I grew up in Sheffield. It’s been a journey, but I’ve fully enjoyed it.
In 2017, I boxed in front of a home crowd in Sheffield and became the WBA super-middleweight world champion. After four attempts I had finally fulfilled my childhood dream, and the experience was as great as I had always imagined it would be. It was without doubt the best moment of my career.
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