Toilet tale flushed out of Johnson

(GETTY IMAGES)

Glen Johnson might be England and Liverpool's first-choice right-back earning £120,000-a-week and 11 months from playing in a World Cup finals – but to some people he will always be the bloke who stole a toilet seat from B&Q.

The England right-back was good-natured enough to put the record straight on one of the worst experiences of his football career yesterday ahead of the friendly against the Netherlands tomorrow. Johnson, 24, who signed for Liverpool for £18m this summer accepted a police caution and a fine for the incident in Dartford, Kent, in January 2007.

He said: "My best mate was doing up his house and we went to B&Q where he bought a bathroom set for £1,000. He has a kid so he wanted a slow-close toilet seat and the one in the set was just a normal one. So he swapped it over and we went through the till and he paid. So, a) What thief walks through the till? and b) It was not even me who was buying it. We then got to the other side and a guy from the shop said he'd seen us swap the seats. We told them we did not know there was a difference and offered to pay for the other seat.

"They said 'no' and said the police were on their way. We laughed because we thought they were taking the piss. The police turned up and said we could go to court and fight it, which we could not be bothered to do, or pay a £70 fine. So we paid the fine and it made us look guilty."