AS RETURNS to fashion go, it is up there with Bruce Springsteen, Wispa Bars, and the Rubik's Cube. Until the other day, when Manchester United, of all clubs, breathed new life into his ailing career, Michael Owen, and perhaps more pertinently, the role he has filled in 13 years as a professional footballer, was about as fashionable as a pensioner wearing socks and sandals.
Approaching 30, stripped of the pace that made him great, and possessed only of a poacher's instinct that was so 1990s, the critics had him down for the knacker's yard, or Hull City, which may or may not be the same thing.
And yet, suddenly, in
explicably, just as his career seemed to be hitting the skids quicker than his club, Newcastle United, the former boy wonder of English football finds himself back in favour, back on the front line, with the English champions no less. His wages will be nothing like those he earned on Tyneside – whose are? – but the bonus money will be good, and he has the ability, the hunger and the big-game temperament to earn it. If he does, few will begrudge him the rewards.
Owen has had a torrid time of it these last few years, with injury, loss of form and the peculiar frustrations that come only with playing for the circus that is Newcastle United. The last of his ten goals for them during the 2008-09 season was against West Ham United on 10 January, after which the rudderless club slipped inexorably into the Championship. The club he arrived at with European ambitions were now confronted by trips to Doncaster and Peterborough United.
The pity is that Owen seemed to decline with them. This, after all, is a player who burned his name on to the national consciousness with that iconic goal against Argentina in the 1998 World Cup, consolidated it with a hat-trick for England in Munich, and was crowned European Footballer of the Year in 2001. His scoring ratio was phenomenal, with 40 goals in 89 international appearances, 158 in 297 games for Liverpool, 13 in 35 for Real Madrid (only 22 of which he started).
So where did it all go wrong? It is a curious tale of tweaked hamstrings and changing tactics, starting in Spain, where he put not a foot wrong during 12 months in La Liga. Having decided in the summer of 2005 that he wanted to be back in the Premier League, Madrid demanded £16.5m, which was too much for Sir Alex Ferguson, too much for Rafael Benitez – who had sold him for half that 12 months earlier – but not too much for the Newcastle chairman, Freddy Shepherd. The Tyneside club were not Owen's first choice; they were his only one.
His reputation as a regular in the treatment room did nothing to attract England's biggest clubs. Although Graeme Souness, Newcastle's manager at the time, referred to him as "a 20-goals-a-season man", he had never reached that tally in seven full campaigns with Liverpool. However impressive his strike rate, he didn't play enough matches. Ankle, groin, hernia, metatarsal, knee ligament: you name it, he had it. The explosive burst of pace that was his stock in trade also exposed his body to more than its share of injuries.
That England's big four were not prepared to gamble on his fitness must have been something of a reality check for one of the game's greatest predators, who was also discovering that an out-and-out goalscorer was no longer enough for some of the game's most advanced coaches. With tactics becoming increasingly sophisticated, and defences frequently on top, the richest clubs needed something new, something different, something unpredictable.
Scoring goals was just too damn boring. Just as 4-4-2 went out of fashion, so did the classic poacher, who could be marked out of the game. He made it his business to exploit mistakes, but there were precious few of those in the Premier League. He also liked to spring the offside trap, but the liberalisation of that law meant that only the boldest of defenders would hold a high line. More to the point, Owen had lost some of the searing pace with he used to burst on to through balls.
The new watchword was flexibility. Gone were the goalscorers modelled on Lineker, Muller and Inzaghi, replaced by strikers with more strings to their bow, forwards who would drop deep, alternate their attacks and disorientate their opponents. Defenders didn't know who to mark. It perhaps explains the renaissance of Emile Heskey, whose strength is hold the ball up, and bring others into play.
Manchester United have had an embarrassment of riches up front these last few years, but none of their many goalscorers has been a centre forward in its traditional sense. It didn't stop Cristiano Ronaldo scoring 42 times the season before last. Benitez gets much more from Fernando Torres, who doesn't need a partner to play off, than he ever would have from Owen.
When Guus Hiddink partnered Nicolas Anelka and Didier Drogba towards the end of last season – a decision that worked, by the way – it was dressed up as the work of a manager who might as well be wearing a camel coat.
His predecessor, Jose Mourinho, had taught Chelsea fans to believe only in the transition, flexible systems and three-dimensional players. "I can't believe that in England they don't teach young players to be multi-functional," he said. "To them it's just about knowing one position and playing that position. To them, a striker is a striker and that's it. For me a striker is not just a striker. He's somebody who has to move, who has to cross, and who has to do this in a 4-4-2 or in a 4-3-3 or in a 3-5-2."
Even at Newcastle, where Owen scored 26 goals, and rescued them from more than a few tight spots, it wasn't enough. Near the end of last season, he was dropped by both Alan Shearer and Chris Hughton. Late in the previous campaign, Kevin Keegan deployed him in the hole. In his 2004 autobiography, the striker had criticised England's former manager for demanding that he add variety to his game, but it seemed to do the trick at St James' Park. Playing behind Mark Viduka and Obafemi Martins, he was as prolific as ever, while knitting the team together with an unexpected range of passing.
There is just a chance that Sir Alex has that in mind for this season. It might even be the answer to questions about Owen's proposed partnership with Wayne Rooney, who has been making no secret of his desire to play through the middle in Ronaldo's absence. The England manager, Fabio Capello, would watch with interest.
It's unlikely, though. If he had wanted someone for that position, there are numerous others the United manager could have called upon, players more experienced in that position. It will be a huge surprise if Owen is asked to be anything other than the first natural finisher at Old Trafford since Ruud Van Nistelrooy. With Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez gone, he will be given his chance, in the team and in the box, where he fed only on scraps at Newcastle.
Ferguson was right about Henrik Larsson, as he was about Teddy Sheringham and Eric Cantona. The game's romantics will hope that he's right about Owen.
