Canary in the Hills

I always thought it would be Darren Huckerby. I know that can be taken a number of ways, particularly in light of the groundbreaking You Tube hit that I can't get out of my head.

Norwich City players on MTV is my point. Ashley Ward, the kind of film-star looks footballer who could have been David Beckham but lamentably never was, was on the excellent Footballers' Cribs, but that was long after his sadly brief tenure as the Canaries' great hope had ended, and I suspect had more to do with his interior designer wife, who I believe has designed gaffs for the likes of the Rooneys, among others. When I get a minute I'll write more about Ward, in particular a post-match interview I remember with It's A Knockout's Stuart Hall, and the whole Footballers' Cribs thing.

Anyway, Darren Huckerby has yet to make his MTV debut, to my knowledge. While Dion Dublin has followed the likes of other ex-Canaries Andy Townsend (minus the Tactics Truck, now allegedly the home of The Onion Bag
) and the terminally uninteresting Tim Sherwood into the pundits' little glass box, Darren Eadie has popped up on Sky from time to time, Efan Ekoku is rolled out for the African Nations by the BBC and the rest of the time is a superb pundit on international coverage of the Premier League, and even Jeremy Goss and Bryan Gunn got on A Question of Sport back in the olden days. The days when it wasn't a joke.

None of this illustrious band of former yellows can match Jason Shackell. I saw a very young Jason (he's still only 25 to be fair) play for Norwich as a left back at Crystal Palace the season we were promoted back into the Premiership (as it was at the time). Then, I suspected he would go the way of a Shaun Carey or Cedric Anselin
, particularly as I'd seen pretty spectacular early promise in Paul Dalglish and Marc Libbra, both of whom went on to achieve nothing.

Little did I suspect that Shackell would become a young Norwich skipper. Much less did I realise he had pin-up potential to rival even Ashley Ward himself.

Yet he has. Shackell was rumoured to have appeared in a 'reality TV programme', but nothing much was made of it. I know they struggle for stars on some of these 'celebrity' shows, but a Norwich player would be a real stretch, and I'm an ardent fan. No, Jason and his lady-talking ways managed to wander into an American show, The Hills, and even made the final cut.

If you watch the clip I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions. He's hardly the footballing equivalent of Russell Brand, but then it's still pretty impressive. Most lads go on holiday to pull random slappers from Mansfield (apologies to anyone from Mansfield, I had to choose somewhere. Everywhere has slappers, not Mansfield in particular. I've never been there to be honest, so it might have none. It's a fair bet there are a few though.), or suspiciously young locals.

You don't expect to head to the States, walk into the living set of a vacuous bunch of Beverly Hills natives so remarkable in their shallowness that MTV have been moved to share it with the world. Let alone get somewhere with one of them. And then head home to carve the notch on your own bedpost.

There have been a couple of Norwich youngsters who have had medium profile nightlife blunders in recent months. Initially outstanding midfielder Matty Pattison's less impressive performances culminated in getting his collar felt allegedly trying to drive to training on a Sunday under the influence. It may have had something to do with living in a travel tavern a la Alan Partridge. He'd probably been at the Ladyboys:



Young striking sensation Chris Martin, not to be confused with the Coldplay singer, has managed to destroy his reputation as rapidly and spectacularly as it was built. Apart from his lardy, lethargic performances, he has also apparently got himself barred from all the pubs in his home town of Beccles.

The pair of them need to buckle down and try to hit the heights of Sir Jason. You've pulled like a superstar, now bloody play like one.