Details of devastating Ryan Giggs phone call emerge for first time

Award-winning football journalist Paul Abbandonato has written a brilliant new book about his 30 years covering the Wales football team. Here, an extract from In The Dragons’ Den reveals the devastating impact two telephone calls had on Welsh bosses.

As Football Association of Wales chief executive Jonathan Ford glanced down at his mobile, an unknown number flashed up. When he answered, Ryan Giggs was on the other end of the line.

“Oh, I just called you,” said Ford, having left a voicemail on Giggs’ normal number half an hour earlier asking for his regular weekly catch-up with the Wales manager.

“I need to speak to you too,” Giggs responded.

Then came the bombshell as Giggs explained the arrest by police which was to eventually see him appear in court accused of attacking and controlling his girlfriend Kate Greville and assaulting her sister Emma.

Giggs always protested his innocence. In time, almost three years down the line, not guilty verdicts were formally brought in by a judge. In the interim, Giggs’ employers were placed in a truly impossible position. Innocent until proven guilty, but clearly unable to carry on as manager of Wales at the same time.

This was another of those many unique complications that could only happen to Welsh football, it seems.

As Giggs started to tell Ford of what had occurred at his home on the outskirts of Manchester in autumn 2020, the magnitude of the situation quickly began to dawn on the FAW boss.

“'Oh heck', was my initial reaction,” reflects Ford today as he speaks about the situation for the first time for this book. “The difficult thing, I quickly realised and explained to Ryan, was the fact that the police had been called.”

Wales, under their go-ahead young manager, were flying at the time. The exciting new-look team Giggs had put together had lost just once in 11 matches, qualified splendidly for the finals of the Euros and were about to join the elite with promotion to the top table of the Nations League.

The future really did look rosy under a rookie boss doing so much to promote the Wales brand and who appeared destined to land a big club job one day. Manchester United perhaps, given the Old Trafford hierarchy have hardly nailed that position properly post Sir Alex Ferguson?

Suddenly, having been given a glimpse into those golden days ahead, it came crashing down, hope turning to despair.

Again.

This wasn’t the first time Ford had been rocked by an autumn telephone call about his highly-rated young manager. Nine years earlier, Cheshire Constabulary were on the line to tell him about Gary Speed, who, too, appeared destined for bigger things.

The two of them each boasted a 50 per cent winning record – the best ratio of any manager in Wales’ history. They each achieved the feat by creating a dynamic team built around younger players who very much had the best years in front of them.

Things could only continue on a steep upward curve, it appeared, only for the scarcely believable double dose of jolting news to change everything.

Ford had spotted the managerial potential in the two Welsh legends. He was the driving force behind their appointments. On each occasion, he was left to pick up the devastating pieces.

The telephone call Ford received from Giggs, of course, was nowhere near as grave as the one taken earlier from Cheshire Police, but it was pretty bad nonetheless.

“We knew this would be big, so we convened a board meeting to ensure quick decisions could be made. A group of us, including HR, went up to Ryan’s house to see him in person,” recounts Ford.

“Ryan talked us through it. We could see in his body language how upset he was. Drinks and sandwiches were out, but it was almost like he was too nervous to eat himself. I suppose he was talking to his boss, must have had an inkling that his job might be in jeopardy.

“Ryan was pretty candid as he explained events. Maybe he dampened down one or two bits, I’m not sure? But his barrister was also at the house and he came into the room and told us the exact same story. So I guess Ryan had been as honest with us as he could be.

“In the circumstances, he handled himself pretty well, but he was clearly gutted. How on earth have I found myself in a position like this, that kind of thing. I suppose that’s what we felt about it, too.

“Ryan realised straightaway that, while the police were investigating, it would be a difficult situation for us to navigate. It was just such a shame his career was thrown away with a matter like this. I honestly believe he would have gone on to achieve major things as manager of Wales – and then afterwards at the top of the club game, too.”

Giggs was given what was being dubbed ‘special leave’, pending a full FAW review into the matter. Cue complete and utter chaos. No-one had the first clue what ‘special leave’ actually meant at this stage.

The FAW were left in the dark, placed in a truly impossible position. How could they possibly win here?

“As manager of your country you are seen as a pillar of society, so we knew this was going to be incredibly difficult for us,” says Ford. “On the one hand Ryan was an innocent man, on the other he was potentially facing charges. It was a real conundrum for us and we had to take proper legal advice and involve HR at every stage.

“In time the bold thing to do, in a way, was probably to tell him, ‘Ryan you can’t do this any more, you need to walk away.’ But what if he replied, ‘Well I’m not prepared to walk away.’ So do you dismiss him? And if we did that, the League Managers Association, their union, would understandably fight for their man. We couldn’t just get rid of him. Under British law Ryan was innocent.

“It became a bun fight. We had to manage the entire process with various ‘what if’ scenarios hanging over us.

“As the months dragged on, we had to walk a tightrope. If it didn’t resolve itself, maybe in time Ryan would have to walk away himself. We knew that, so did he deep down I suspect. That way we could focus upon the football and Ryan could focus upon clearing his name in court.”

In the end Giggs did indeed walk away, his number two Rob Page eventually moving from stand-in manager to the full-time job. The fact that amid the impasse Page was caretaker boss for almost two years and fully 26 matches demonstrates the intolerable position Ford and the FAW were placed in. That must be some kind of world record for a caretaker gig.

Giggs was subsequently relieved to have his name cleared at a Manchester Crown Court retrial after the Crown Prosecution Service chose to withdraw the charges, but the whole saga took its toll on him... and Ford.

Looking at a parallel universe, Ford says: ‘If it had not happened, I believe Wales would have done a little bit better at the Covid-delayed Euro 2021 finals with Ryan in charge. He’d then have stayed for the World Cup, done well there too. Then it would have been thank you, I’m off, his career going in a very different trajectory with a decent club job either in the Premier League or at the very least the top end of the Championship.”

The same could have been said for Speed, the subject of an even more catastrophic telephone call Ford was to receive nine years previously, this time early on a Sunday morning.

Once again, as with Giggs, Wales’ future was starting to look golden under their popular young manager. Speed’s team were on a roll, four wins out of five, rampaging up the FIFA rankings.

They had just battered Norway 4–1, Gareth Bale and Aaron Ramsey were beginning to razzle-dazzle. FAW bosses built upon the feel-good factor by taking out giant advertising slogans, on the buses, at Cardiff Central railway station and other prominent destinations, bearing a picture of Speed with the words: ‘Your Manager, Your Team.’ You couldn’t help but get caught up in the buzz.

Just 15 days on came the news so harrowing that, a bit like Princess Diana and John Lennon, many of us remember where we were upon first hearing of it. In Ford’s case it was via a telephone call from Detective Inspector Peter Lawless of Cheshire Constabulary.

Ford quickly realised there was a limited time before the weight of the world was about to fall upon Wales. As Speed’s employers they needed to own this tragic news, in conjunction with his widow Louise, before the rumour mill went into overdrive. How on earth, though, do you deal with an unprecedented situation like this?

“Getting hold of people early on a Sunday morning was not the easiest of tasks,” says Ford as he reflects upon that terribly sad day. “Phones were either off, or people were having a lie-in and not answering.

“Eventually, when I did track them down the reaction was the same as mine had been when Cheshire Constabulary first rang – shock, disbelief, bewilderment and questions of why and how?”

More than a decade on, Ford feels the same way about what Speed would have achieved with Wales, and the path opened up for his future career, as he does with Giggs.

“It’s always a little romantic talking about Gary’s legacy, I suppose, because he was so young people put him on a pedestal,” reflects Ford. “However, there is no doubt in my mind he would have been a success, qualified us for the World Cup, taken us on.

“Gary broke down barriers, started to reinvigorate the team. In my mind the wonderful success we were eventually to achieve at Euro 2016 would have happened even sooner had Gary stayed in charge.”

In The Dragons’ Den: The scarcely believable stories from 30 years at the sharp end of Welsh football is published by Y Lolfa £14.99. It will be available in good bookshops but you can order your copy direct at ylolfa.com/products/97819

Daily Mirror

Details of devastating Ryan Giggs phone call emerge for first time