4 hours ago
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Do not come to the Untold UK documentary series about some of our greatest – or at least most famous – or at least most infamous – footballers looking for insight, interrogation, reflection, analysis or contemplation. Come for energetic hagiography and celebration. Or fuck off, as its latest subject, Vinnie Jones, would almost certainly put it.
Even if you have never watched an entire football match – despite your dad and his friends’ best efforts as they solemnly lined up cans of Boddingtons and commandeered the living room every FA and World Cup final, perhaps – you will have heard of Vinnie Jones. For most of the 90s he was hard to miss – first as a player, then as a liability making endless tabloid headlines, and then as a film star. His beetle-browed, charismatic, menacing face would have stared out at you between the crossed shotguns resting over his shoulders when the Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels marketing campaign briefly took over the world.
Untold UK is bracingly uninterested in giving this series broad appeal. The first was about Jamie Vardy and stayed firmly fixed on Jamie Vardy – though the presence of Rebekah and evidence to be gleaned of her firm hand on her husband and proceedings was catnip to those of us who have been obsessed since Wagatha Christie and are counting down the minutes to the launch of the new ITV reality show The Vardys. Now the focus is as firmly fixed on Vinnie. As with Vardy, he is the central interviewee and commenter. This is not a holistic portrait. It is basically another advertising poster, but moving.
The programme – definitely overlong at 80 minutes, to all but the most pathologically devoted fans – gives a quick overview of his career path before he was signed by Wimbledon’s manager Dave “Harry” Bassett in 1986. “Quite lippy,” remembers Bassett. “Most managers would have told him to fuck off.” Born just outside Watford (no date given, but Vinnie is now 61, the flat planes of his younger face slightly softened by the passage of time – although I wouldn’t let that fool you into thinking he has). He became captain of the boys’ team there, then a semi-pro at Wealdstone, which he combined with his work on a building site. When he joined Wimbledon, says Vinnie, “the VP and his vice-wankers and complete wankers said” – and here he affects a posh, fruity and well, complete wanker voice – “‘You fucking idiot, Harry! He’s a fucking hod carrier!’” Bassett shrugged and told them that if the worst came to the worst, Vinnie could do ground maintenance instead.
Despite an opening game in which he gave away a penalty, it didn’t come to that. The programme plunges with gusto into his time at Wimbledon as part of “the Crazy Gang” – which included John Fashanu, who became his best friend – that caused endless ruckus but also took the newly promoted first division (now the Premier League) team to a brief spell at the top. Vinnie remembers scoring the winning goal in a game against the mighty Manchester United, captained by Bryan Robson and overseen by new manager Alex Ferguson. “Bet you’re glad I’m not just a hod carrier now, aren’t you?” he told the wankers. It’s not the line so much that makes you smile as the thought of him looming over them with his naturally terrifying face probably not even set in its most joyful expression as he said it. I bet a few suits had to go to the dry cleaners afterwards.
On we go, through the successes (in which Vinnie very much appears to include the fact – albeit uncorroborated – that the wives of opposing team members used to ask their husbands not to play if he was on the field), his reputation as a hard man on the pitch becoming more extreme. The non-invested, more critical viewer might start to wish for a few probing questions at this point. Was he caught in a vicious cycle – known for his brutal tackles and tactics? Did he feel pressure to become ever more extreme, until he inevitably went too far and his career became a succession of yellow and red cards rather than actual football? Does he regret that? Does he feel his potential was realised, or did he effectively sabotage himself? But questions, let alone answers, come there none, though the cardings are enthusiastically catalogued and a caption at the end of the programme blazons the fact – well corroborated – that “Vinnie Jones still holds the record for the most red cards in English top flight history”.
The rest of his footballing then tabloid career (brawls, biting noses, that kind of thing) is lovingly documented, without anyone spoiling the mood by asking anything about whether, say, his appetite for cash (testified to by Fashanu, other interviewees and Vinnie himself) led to bad choices. Or whether a hard man image ever becomes a straitjacket. Or where his volatility comes from (nature? nurture? We learn nothing about his childhood or family). Let alone whether he ever felt he would like to be master of his temper rather than the other way around.
A quick look at his time in Hollywood and we’re done. Unenlightening in the extreme, but an unexpected amount of fun. I don’t have to say that, by the way. He doesn’t know where I live. I hope.
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Untold UK: Vinnie Jones is on Netflix
