Top 66 Sol Campbell Quotes

Once you start realising where you are, then you can start realising what you have to do to get the best results.

Most of my players have come through academies with clubs. That’s not a bad thing, but it’s very different to what I grew up with.

As long as I do a good job and do it professionally and people see the quality, and see who I really am, then I think that’s all you can do in football.

I’m a street footballer. I’m hardcore. Growing up in east London, you’ve got to be a little bit self-confident. As a player, I would go into detail, watch who I was playing against. Who might come into my vicinity. That gives you self-confidence.

Michael Owen was made a captain ahead of me.

I am a naturally big guy, but I cannot rush my conditioning, otherwise trying too much too quickly could result in injuries.

With the Tube, it just needs more investment. Maybe lengthening some of the platforms to get more carriages in, things like that. It just needs more investment put into it.

At the time, when I was growing up,my habits were misconstrued as laziness, not caring. But when I got out onto the pitch I actually did care about football, I just showed it in a different way.

For too long executive officials, businesspeople and hangers-on have enjoyed this private casino, using the payments into Fifa’s account to fund their lavish lifestyles.

I’m a winner. I love to build. I’ve got great ideas. I’ve got the passion. I’m very diligent, and if given a chance I’ll work my rear end off to be a success.

I think in the end football wins hopefully, and people start looking at all scenarios. In the end I just want to be a manager. Forget whatever colour you are – that’s the way it should be really.

You can be yourself and still have fun without crossing the line. Sometimes I feel like today’s players don’t want to do anything! Come on, be yourself! That’s what people want.

I am going to fight on the pitch for Newcastle and if it comes to the stage where someone says can you fight for England then I will fight for England. But I am not going to go on about it. It is just not worth it.

I’m a doer and I just want to do it. Whatever attitudes, prejudices, stereotypical ideas that are in front of me, I will break them. But the only way I can break them is by getting a job, and if I need to start in the gutter, I will start in the gutter and work my way up. Money isn’t an issue.

Look at France and Didier Deschamps; he was just a guy who just did his job but he was captain of one of France’s most successful teams. Then you’ve got Iker Casillas; he’s not into PR or things like that, but he’s one of the most successful captains of Spain.

Most footballers are quite tense, aren’t they? So many footballers have been stitched up over the years. They’ve got to mind what they say, be careful about this, careful about that, because something might be misconstrued, twisted around.

If you get an opportunity, you get an opportunity, but it really comes down to the people behind the scenes and the manager. You can’t do anything about it.

Football is always moving and you’ve got to keep up with it.

People have to recognise I’m a working-class lad. Forget what I’ve done and where I’ve been. I’m a working-class lad. I’ve come from nothing and I’ve not forgotten that.

Politics is very hard work. You have to really commit to things. Some people get into it for the wrong reasons.

My values are in my DNA and were shaped by my environment.

I think the FA wished I was white. I had the credibility, performance-wise, to be captain. I was consistently in the heart of the defence and I was a club captain early on my career.

I could have started playing professional at 16, 17 quite easily. For my position, I was far better than a lot of people around me. All the people in front of me had was experience but, talent-wise, I easily could get in.

Coaching is definitely different. I’ve got the knowledge but it’s about communicating that to others in a manner they can understand. There’s an art to that and the more you practise, the better you get.

People may think that I just want to manage in the Premier League but I’m prepared to go to a non-league club, and if they can’t pay me a salary just pay me a win bonus. I’m up for that.

Fifa has lost the trust of the people. We cannot allow the architects and controllers of world football to get away with dragging the beautiful game through the grime of corruption and bribery.

Look, I’m an entrepreneur, I want to create things, I’m a builder. I don’t want handouts. If I didn’t play football I’d be doing something else. That’s me. I don’t want to be held back. I want to go forward. I want to better myself.

I think that what London wants are people with ideas and the willpower to get things through.

Don’t change being you, because it’s hard work being something that you’re not.

I’ve got a furniture range with my wife, and I want to get into designing hotels and restaurants as well. We’ve got a big studio in Victoria and a showroom in Belgravia. I’ve always been interested in architecture.

Fifa would benefit hugely from the experience of former players from a variety of backgrounds including Africa and Asia. There aren’t many senior staff who have played at the top level and the organisation needs balance.

I’m used to having strong women around me. My mother was. My wife is. I like their strong mentality.

I’m a street footballer and you still get street footballers from Africa, South Africa and really poor parts of Europe.

With Newcastle there are 50,000 people watching and they want it to be a success, and that is what I am all about.

My message is simple to all the knockers: I am knuckling down and want to play my football with a great club and a great manager. Then you can judge me.

I have all sorts of country clothing because we live in Northumberland as well as London. You need good quality gear.

I like building teams and I want to run my own show, in the nicest possible way, to see how far I can go, starting with getting Macclesfield further up the table.

People like to put people in little boxes and if you don’t fit you’re odd. But they don’t really know anything about me.

But sport is about character. It is about understanding how a team works, about pushing the team. I also wanted to do it because of where I am from as a human being. That’s what London people want: thinking outside the box, new ideas.

I want to do some coaching, maybe a couple of days a week, and start building up slowly – find out my philosophy, how I like to play and things like that. I want to be a coach now and eventually I want to be a manager.

Sometimes I am the ‘philosophical professor, or I can do the voice like thunder if necessary… or if I want to keep the lads on their toes I might sit back and give them a thousand-yard stare.

I believe if I was white I would’ve been England captain for more than 10 years.

We all like a party but when that ‘becomes the main feature of your lifestyle as a footballer, I haven’t got time for that.

When someone intelligent comes around, and looks at life around football in a different way, it can be alien.

The main thing is to have strings to your bow. You get your badges, you see where life is, and then you see what things come your way, if any.

Sometimes you get a team that has almost forgotten how to win. That’s maybe fallen away from the standards that should be set at this level. Some are big problems, some of them are small problems.

I don’t rely on off-shore tax havens, and I don’t want to invest in stocks and shares as we have seen how volatile that game has been since the financial crash.

When I left Spurs I was one of the best defenders in the world and had done so much for such a long time with ultimately little reward. I practically kept the club up on my own for two years.

I became insular because at home there was no space to grow or to evolve, everything was tight and there was no room to breathe. People don’t realise how that affects you as a kid. I wasn’t allowed to speak, so my expression was football.

I don’t want to sit by the edge, like some other guys who have played their game. Earned money, have nice lifestyles, and don’t say anything.

My parents worked hard. My mother, Wilhelmina, was a very strong woman. She had to be with 12 kids. She would do anything for the family. She was a light, the glue in the family.

A hotel is so restrictive. You haven’t got your own space. Yes you get the food, yes you get everything all clean and blah, blah – but sometimes it’s nice to have your own space with the your family.

I learned a lot from Arsene Wenger, especially his tactical systems and how to plan things game to game, week to week and month to month.

My wife’s family kept inviting me to shoot and I just didn’t want to go, but since retiring from football I’ve had more time and I thought… let’s get all the kit and practice.

I’m from Stratford, East London. I can get down and dirty. I just roll my sleeves up and get on with it.

Training-wise, you have to work on your weaknesses, preparing yourself properly for the game, on and off the field.

If you have got diversity on your board, then you are going to have new ideas come to the table.