Hi there, welcome along to High Performance, the show that delves into the minds of some of the most fascinating people on the planet.

And that's exactly what myself and Damian Hughes did recently when we spent a

fascinating surreal incredible day actually down on the south coast of

England pool indoors it yeah but leaving actually down on the south coast of England, Pool in Dorset.

Yeah, well, to get even more granular joke, we went to a residential street in Pool,

Dorset, where we happened to stumble upon the company of one of the greatest footballers that England has ever produced.

Indeed, living in the spare bedroom of his agent on this street is Paul Gasco, a man whose story so many of us know but what we were really

afterwards was what is life like for Paul now how has he ended up in the place

where he is now and more crucially than that what were the

key moments throughout his life that had a huge seminal impact on how he's lived

and I mean it's an amazing conversation it goes in many different places he takes us into his bedroom, shows us what a life looks like for him now. We have a good chat with Katie, the lady that he's living with, who's his agent. But it was a conversation about a moment in his childhood really that I suppose in so

many ways explains so much about the challenges that Paul has faced over his life.

Yeah it's a heartbreaking story from when Paul's A's 10 on the streets of Gateshead playing out with his best friend. I think it's important for us though to tell the full story to the people that are watching this

and I look at that time when you emerged into the Newcastle first team and like that is the

dream for so many young people and your life was just on the

up at that point. Yeah it was flying. But actually a few years before you'd

been involved in a really big tragedy I like I just wonder how how at that tragic moment that cost a life of a young friend of yours

combined with your explosion after that was probably hard for you internally.

It was a bit of namely because I started getting it after that happened and I ran down he died

and had his head on my lap. So what happened? Keith was my best mate and we used to go to the

Regia Boys Club and his brother was 10 and he was brought in his brother wanted to go and he says she went take Stephen were you?

Who did? His mom? Take Stephen were you? And Keith went no I don't want to be.

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