Kembali
Nov 11, 2026, 9:46 AM GMT
After deciding late that he wanted a career in sports journalism, Daniel worked his way up the ladder in an unconventional manner.
Having opted against university, Daniel worked with Sky Sports as a freelance contributor and translator during transfer windows while also volunteering on several other blog pages and outlets to get a portfolio of content together.
Daniel then worked with Barnet FC as part of their social media team before starting his own website, which focused on football and MMA content.
That eventually led to work with 90min and Reach PLC with The Mirror, Daily Record, Daily Express, and Manchester Evening News.
Following that, Daniel spent two-and-a-half years with Breaking Media covering Everton, Rangers, Leeds, West Ham and other clubs before joining GiveMeSport as a Premier League editor.
As well as football, Daniel is a huge MMA fan and has appeared on YouTube and podcast content too.
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For many English football players, playing for the senior England national team is the pinnacle of your career.
Current captain Harry Kane is expected to become the most capped player of all-time when England take on Croatia on Thursday night at Wembley, where he will earn his 126th cap, surpassing Peter Shilton's 125 appearances for the Three Lions.
Just behind them is former captain and former all-time top scorer Wayne Rooney, who earned 121 caps in his senior career, who enjoyed a stunning individual career at club level during his time at Everton, Manchester United, and DC United.
While playing at Old Trafford in particular, Rooney played alongside a host of world-class talent, many of whom were English. Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand, Owen Hargreaves, and Paul Scholes all enjoyed brilliant careers at international level as well as with United, and they all absolutely loved their time with the Three Lions.
But someone else who played with those stars and represented the national team wasn't so keen, and has admitted that he was actually depressed during that time of his career.
Iconic midfielder Michael Carrick was considered to be one of the most underrated midfielders of his generation, because he barely got the nod at international level.
Carrick won 34 caps during his career, never scoring a goal, with just 22 of those appearances coming as a starter. But only 12 of those 34 appearances came in competitive games, with the rest coming in friendlies, showing that the managers rarely relied on him when it really mattered.
But speaking back in 2018, while still a player, Carrick revealed that part of the reason why he never earned more caps was because he asked for the FA to stop picking him as he felt depressed whenever he went away for camps.
“I’d been in the squad a long time and I’ll be honest, I was finding it hard going away with England. I didn’t mind going away with United pre-season for three weeks or whatever and coming back, but going with England, it was almost depressing in a way," he said.
“It made me really down, so I came to the point after South Africa where I thought: ‘I can’t do that again.’ People would be saying: ‘Pull yourself together and be grateful for it’ and I understood the position I was in, the privileged position I was in, but I just found it so hard, and I couldn’t deal with it anymore.
“I was probably on the verge of ... yes, I was depressed at times, yes. I told the FA: ‘Look, please don’t pick me.’”
Carrick was part of the England squad at the 2006 and 2010 World Cups, while he was on standby for the 2014 World Cup too. But he made just one appearance in a tournament, where he started in the 1-0 win over Ecuador in Stuttgart.
England's lack of success at tournaments was often put down to the failed partnership of Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard in the centre of midfield, and with Carrick's reveal that he asked to be left out towards the end of his career, whether he could have been the difference maker will always remain one of the greatest what-ifs of that generation.
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