Danny Rose talks depression, uncle’s suicide and gun attacks as England star reveals all

NERVOUSLY, Danny Rose admits that most of what it seems he so desperately needed to get off his chest ahead of this summer’s World Cup he has not even shared with his mum or dad.
Nor, for that matter, has he spoken about it with Gareth Southgate, although each of them knows different parts of the picture.

The full truth, though, is that this season the Tottenham defender has battled with clinically-diagnosed depression caused by injury frustrations and exacerbated by a series of intense family problems, forcing Rose onto a course of pills as he sought sanctuary at St George’s Park.

Ultimately, it was the prospect of playing for England at the World Cup this summer which saved him.
A controversial interview given on the eve of last season, in which he questioned Tottenham’s ambition and hinted at a move to Manchester United, now seems to have been a symptom of far more worrying problems for the 27-year-old from Doncaster.

Rose had suffered a knee injury on the last day of January 2017 which Tottenham initially tried to rectify without recourse to the knife.
Despite four frustrating months of pills and injections, he was still suffering pain and lacking full mobility and the club doctors finally decided to go down the route of surgery.

That sparked a long and lonely summer of rehabilitation, during which time Rose made his feelings known to a national newspaper. Soon afterwards, he was sent to England’s Burton base to continue his recovery – a move which Rose ultimately feels was vital in getting him back to where he is today.

“I haven’t told my mum or my dad, and they are probably going to be really angry reading this, but I’ve kept it to myself until now,” Rose said.

“It’s no secret that I’ve been through a testing time at Tottenham this season, which led to me seeing a psychologist. I was diagnosed with depression, which nobody knows about, and I had to get away from Tottenham.

“I’m lucky that England gave me that opportunity to get away, refresh my mind and I’ll always be grateful to them.

“I was on medication for a few months – again, nobody knows about that apart from my agent – but I’m off the medication now, I’m good now and looking forward to how far we can go in Russia.”
That silver lining cannot disguise the dark, dark clouds that surrounded Rose in the bleak days last August before he was finally advised to seek psychiatric help.

“I was getting very angry, very easily,” he said. “I didn’t want to go into football, I didn’t want to do my rehab, I was snapping when I got home, friends were asking me to do things and I wouldn’t want to go out, and I would come home and go straight to bed.

“It all stemmed from my injury in January last year, when I was advised I didn’t need an operation. I don’t know how many tablets I took, how many injections, to try and get fit for Tottenham.

“I had cortisone/PRP [platelet rich plasma] injections trying to get fit for my club, and I had to have an op four months down the line.

“All that football I missed – seeing the lads beat Arsenal comfortably, seeing them beat Manchester United comfortably – it was hard.




“I’m not saying I’ve had worse treatment than anyone else. That’s football. But it was difficult. That was the start of it.”
The final tipping point, though, seems to have been the news that an uncle on his father Nigel’s side of the family had decided to take his own life.

“Nobody knows this either, but my uncle hung himself in the middle of my rehab, and that triggered it [the depression] as well,” Rose continued. “It was really hard, and being referred to a doctor and a psychologist by the club doctor helped me massively to cope.

“But off the field, there have been other incidents. In August, my mum was racially abused back home in Doncaster. She was very angry and upset about it, and then someone came to the house and nearly shot my brother in the face. A gun was fired at my house, yeah.

“Stuff like that was happening throughout my rehab and it was a testing time.”

Incredibly, this incongruent cathartic outpouring comes amidst the hubbub of the St George’s Park Futsal Arena.
Around him the other 22 members of England’s World Cup squad are all telling their own stories to reporters huddled around their own desks, oblivious to the nature of Rose’s remarkable exposition.

In a neighbouring building back in the autumn, Rose had regularly shared meals with Southgate at the complex’s restaurant, building a level of trust which the England manager eventually leant on to select a player with so little match action under his belt. Little of any of this, though, was ever discussed.

Going into tonight’s game against Costa Rica at Elland Road – where it all started for Rose as a graduate of the Leeds academy – Southgate will only now be beginning to understand how important it was on such a personal level that he included Rose in his final 23.

“I’ve been through a lot, and England has been my salvation 100 per cent,” Rose says with compelling equanimity. “I can’t thank the manager and the medical staff enough.”

Source:www.express.co.uk