Mark Lawrenson: The Deborah Ross Interview

Confessions of a soccer pundit: He went from toothless Liverpool defender to mustachioed football sage. But on the eve of the World Cup, Lawrenson is clean-shaven, and convinced that England haven't got a hope

I remember, all too clearly, the last World Cup when the telly was always on and Mr Lynam was always on it and it got to the point where I was pretty much convinced that he'd actually moved in. Indeed, I even started laying a place for him at the dinner table. "Des," I would shout. "Supper's ready." But he didn't ever come in, which was rather impolite, considering the trouble I'd gone to opening that tin of Fray Bentos (a delicious pie of two halves), and then my partner and son said if Des wasn't coming in, neither were they, and they all had to be served in front of the telly, and then? Des never touched his pie! My partner said not to be upset, that Des had probably had a big lunch. "Usually," he continued, "Des just loves a Fray Bentos." Also, I should point out, that even though Des stayed with us for a good four weeks, and I went to the trouble of putting out little shell-shaped soaps for him, and a fancy guest towel, I never saw him take a wash. Des's personal hygiene might not be quite what it could.

Anyway, that was 1998, this is 2002 and while Des will certainly be about (on ITV, of course) I'll now, also, have the BBC's Gary and Alan and Mark plonking themselves, without so much as a by your leave, in the corner of my living room. Mark Lawrenson, by the way, is popularly known as "Lawro". All footballers, past and present, it seems, must have a nickname, and if they can't take the "y" – as in Giggsy, Scholesy, Besty and, for all I know, Becksy – then they will take the "O". (It's a shame, now I think about it, that there was never a footballer called, say, Stan Marshmell who, in turn, formed a unique striking partnership with Ray Brill.) Whatever, if "Lawro" is going to be my houseguest from next week, I'd like to get a few things clear; lay down some ground rules. I mean, once bitten twice shy and all that, and Des never even offered to take the rubbish out or baby-sit or anything. It was just take, take, take with Des. So, Lawro, can you cook? "No. Nothing. And I mean nothing. I wouldn't even know how to turn the oven on." This is not welcome news. Can you do a wash? "Yes. I do know how to use a washing machine." This is better. Are you clean about your person? His personal hygiene is exemplary, he insists. I say I'm glad he's lost the moustache, which he did in response to some bet with Bolton fans. Des, I tell him, should take a leaf from his book. Moustaches are filthy, germy things, always revoltingly decorated with splashes of yesterday's soup. "I suppose," agrees Lawro, "that can be a problem, if you eat soup." We are beginning to bond, I think.

And tidiness, Lawro? Are you tidy? "Obsessionally so," he replies. He says that he has a son, coming up to three years old, and as soon as he's gone to bed at night he meticulously puts all his toys away. What, even though they are only going to come out again first thing in the morning? "Yes. I can't stand it otherwise." He adds that he was like this even as a kid, and once begged his father to make him a special board for his Subbuteo pitch so it could be raised from the floor. This, he continues, prevented the little players from getting scattered about or, worse, trodden on. He also, he says, sometimes used to "throw a glass of water over the pitch, to simulate wet conditions. How sad is that?" Um... very?

Now, where to go from here? Ho, hum, twiddle my thumbs. I am not, as you've possibly already gathered, an aficionado of the beautiful game. I could, I suppose, ask for an explanation of the offside rule but then think this is a bad idea, as it's so obviously beyond my comprehension. (My partner and son say that if I ask about it one more time they are going to put me out the cat flap. And lock it from the inside. And seal it with masking tape.)

So, I ask him if, as a TV football pundit, he ever fears he'll run out of things to say about the game. He is aghast. "There is always something to say about football," he says. His look is one of utter astonishment. I haven't seen such a look of astonishment since I refused to play Barbie with my little niece on the grounds that Barbie is stultifyingly boring. "Barbie," she gasped, "is never boring." Her name is Stella. She does not play football and, therefore, is never called Stelly which is good because it rhymes with Smelly, and could lead to endless problems in the playground.

Where to now? Well, we meet at a London hotel, where Lawro seems to be staying. He actually lives in Southport, in a house on the beach. What's your house like? "Mock Georgian, big garden, overlooking the sea." I can't say for certain, but if I had to bet my moustache on something (and, believe me, the older I get the more my upper lip seems to sprout) I'd bet that his house has a conservatory. And a really, really big telly. Whatever, he lives with his girlfriend, Susie, who I guess might once have been Sue, and their son, Sam, who has yet to become Sammy, but will doubtless do so in due course. Sam is, it appears, not as exemplary when it comes to personal hygiene as his father. Sam's potty training was quite something, says Lawro. "He understood the basics but sometimes got confused. One day he pooed in his hand and then walked about showing everybody." I am glad Sam is not coming to stay, frankly. I'd have to substitute the little seashell soaps for an industrial-sized vat of Dettol extra-strength handwash, which would be a pity.

The little seashell soaps are very pretty, not that Des ever properly appreciated them. Talk about feet of clay.

Anyway, Lawro is here with me this morning, but then this afternoon has to go off to the Bluewater Shopping Centre to promote the Burton England suit. Lawro says that Burton's England suit is an exceptionally fine thing representing excellent value for money. "You can buy it all for £165. Suit, shirt, tie, belt and cuff links. Or you can get it made to measure for £250." As I understand it, at these in-store promotions Lawro and his mate Stubbsy (Stubbsy? "Ray Stubbs") host football forums, taking questions from the general, Burton-going public. He says that they are always asked the same three questions. Which are? "What are England's chances of winning? How far will England get? What's to be done about the left side of midfield?"

This, thankfully, has opened up a whole new line of questioning. So, what are England's chances? "Nil," he replies cheerfully. "They have no chance whatsoever." What's to be done about the left side of midfield? "England have tried 15 players, and still can't find anyone. If they had Giggsy, that would be the answer to the problem." I forget to ask how far England will get, probably through a mixture of complete incompetence and total lack of interest. I do, though, ask Lawro where his World Cup single is. He says he's only made a record the once, which was when he was a player with Liverpool, and he and "the lads" did something called "The Anfield Rap". It was, he says, "just a matter of someone saying: Come into the studio, and here are a couple of beers to hide your embarrassment." They only agreed, he says, "because we thought it would be a laugh and we might get on Top of the Pops and meet Babs from Pan's People." It was not a chart hit. I wonder if Lawro has any hinterland at all. What do you like to do, that has absolutely nothing to do with football? He thinks for a while. He then says: "Golf." He adds: "How boring is that?" Um... very? Later, I ask him what he sees in golf. He says: "The ball doesn't move until you hit it." This, unlike the offside rule, is probably something I could learn to live with.

Yes, he plays golf with Gary and Alan (Lineko and Hano?). Indeed, Lineko and Hano are even madder on golf than Lawro. "I've got a handicap of 11, Hanson's is two while Lineker's is four, but they play every day." Lawro's most immediate neighbour is Hano. Lawro's and Hano's houses, with their conservatories and really, really big tellys, and the beach one side and Birkdale Golf Club on the other, are just 25 yards from each other. Who, I ask, followed whom? It sort of happened simultaneously, says Lawro. "I said to Alan that we'd just bought number 55 and he said, that's funny, we've just bought number 54." Of course – and I say "of course" as if I know what I'm talking about, which is always a good trick – the Lawro/Hano partnership goes back a long way. They were Liverpool's defence throughout much of the 1980s and terrific players, by all accounts.

Mark Lawrenson was born and brought up in Preston where his father, Tom, had been a winger for Preston North End. Mark always wanted to be a footballer, although his mother, Theresa, rather wanted him to be a Jesuit priest. And you didn't fancy it? "No. She was fighting against the tide." This, I think, makes a nice change from having to swim against it. I do adore the way footballer's reach for clichés then spectacularly fluff them. Indeed, it was even Lawro who, I think, once famously said: "There won't be a dry house in the place." He insists, though, that he has yet to say "sick as a parrot" or "over the moon". But have you ever started a sentence with: At the end of the day? "Yes. We all have." This is a sad and unforgivable abuse of our language. And I'd scold him roundly, if only I didn't feel so gutted. And choked.

In Preston, he attended a Catholic school run by Jesuit priests "who were strict. Severely strict. They'd beat you with a ferula, which is similar to a cane but made of whalebone." Did you cry? "No. You couldn't cry. Another boy gave me a very good tip, though. He said when walking out the head's room, avoid turning the brass door handle, because after having six strokes it stings like hell." He first played for Preston North End, then Brighton & Hove Albion, then Liverpool under Bob Paisley. He loved Bob, who first greeted him "in a cardigan and an old pair of slippers. He was like your grandad." He also played for the Republic of Ireland under Jack Charlton. Did you, I ask, ever say to him: "Jack, that hairdo is fooling nobody?" He did not, he says. He loved Jack. "What you see is what you get with Jack. He's very, very good." His career was over at 30, when he snapped his Achilles tendon. He didn't know he'd never play again until after the plaster was off and he was sent to a specialist who taught people to walk after serious injuries, and the specialist said: "Are you a northern boy? OK, I'll give it to you straight. Pack it in." (I don't know what he'd have said to a southern boy. Ever thought of becoming a florist? There are plenty of opportunities for limping florists these days?) I say it must have been heartbreaking. He says no, not especially. "I'd had a few months to get used to it." I'm finding it hard to get at Lawro's interior life. Are you romantic, Lawro? "No." What do you think romantic means? "Telling someone you love them and flowers and all that. I'm not romantic, but I am caring."

He went into management, first at Oxford United, then Peterborough, where "the end came when the chairman rang me up one Saturday morning and ordered me to drop five first-team players because we could not afford to pay them the agreed appearance money". Then it was a spell as a defensive coach for Newcastle before turning to full-time TV punditry, which I think he adores. How could your life be better than it is now? "Less travel," he says. "I've got 300,000 BA air-miles that I've yet to use and probably won't bother with." Really? There is nowhere you'd like to go, just for its own sake? "I might go to Australia next year." That's the spirit. "To watch the Ashes."

He has to go to Bluewater now. We part amicably. He seems a decent sort of fellow, and much more passable minus the moustache. I forgot, though, to ask him what crisps I should get in. The expensive, hand-made sort or just the regular ones? I got in the expensive, hand-made sort for Des, but have yet to receive a thank-you. Des was something of a disappointment. I expect better things of Lawro, and hope he's not going to spend all evening doing his "highlights". I mean, if he's got time to fuss with his hair, then he's got time to do his bit around the house.