MICHAEL OWEN'S emergence on the scene for Liverpool and England was quite outstanding.
His finishing was quite exceptional and he was a predatory number nine who has done his country, his team-mates and himself very proud.
It is quite unbelievable what he's done in the game and he's made himself quite a wealthy man off the pitch in the horse racing industry.
I think injuries did play a part in his career – he was a sprinter. And he had a common problem that all sprinters have which are hamstring injuries.
I'm sure any young gentleman who can score goals at a young age would love a career like Michael's had, and he hasn't put a foot wrong off the field has he?
Well done to him and he's been a great ambassador for football and our country.
He's into horse racing a lot and has stables, so maybe he'll go into that and train horses, but he's probably wealthy enough not to go to work now - I'm sure he's clever enough to keep busy.
Barring injuries, I think he could have easily overtaken Sir Bobby Charlton's goalscoring record for England, and he made some big decisions to go abroad to Spain as well.
Good luck to him in his next venture whatever it is.
Also in the news on Monday, I was surprised by Michael Appleton's sacking at Blackburn Rovers.
It just goes to show it's a living advert of how not to run a football club, and people think it's easy to come in and do this and that, but there has to be stability for it to work to be perfectly honest.
Without knowing Blackburn's owners, I don't know what goes on, but I think that anyone who is successful in life, they have stability and they want stability.
All I can say is what attracted me to Palace, is the stability the board have got – yes, we might get criticised and it might not work, or we might not get what we want when we want it.
We're just going to keep working towards it and I think that's the common sense Steve Parish and the board bring.
Without that, what actually do you have left? It's nothing Palace don't understand with the problems the supporters have had to live through over the past two decades.
The great thing now is you've got real supporters running the club who want to build something for the future.
And they also care about the supporters. They are getting you in for nothing and inviting you in at reduced prices along with a lot of great ideas.
It's important to me that the fans know it's about getting your young players right instead of clubs chopping and changing to get what they want.
You can't do that, but who would want to go to Blackburn now?
