Former Doncaster Rovers player reveals painkiller addiction battle ahead of England honour

Goalkeeper Chris Kirkland has been made the guest of honour for England's clash with Greece tonight – where he is expected to be giving a rousing welcome by supporters.

The now 43-year-old made his one and only cap for England at the age of 25 as a second half substitute in a 4-0 friendly win against Greece in August 2006.

However, Kirkland - once the most expensive goalkeeper in Britain after a £6million transfer to Liverpool - oddly never received the traditional cap commemorating his appearance.

This oversight was only brought to the attention of the FA in recent months, who, following a flurry of apologies, promised to rectify the situation.

And 18 years after Kirkland's debut, he will now receive that cap as England once again play Greece.

Kirkland starred in the top flight of English football from 2000 to 2011, starring for Coventry, Liverpool, West Brom and Wigan, before later turning out for Leicester, Doncaster, Sheffield Wednesday and Preston in the Championship.

However, Kirkland was plagued with injuries throughout his career, with a back problem proving the most detrimental.

After signing for The Owls in 2012, a back spasm two days before their opening game of the season prompted him to desperately rely on painkilling tablet Tramadol as anxiety over his past knocks haunted him.

He said: "I started leaving at 5.45am and getting to the training ground hours before everyone else.

"I got really anxious about it, so I started taking more tablets for the anxiety. I was on a slippery slope.

"Tramadol is meant to be a maximum of 400mg a day. I got to the point where I was taking 2,500mg a day.

"I was taking them out onto the pitch in my goalie bag. It wasn’t for the pain. It was because I was addicted.

"They were the first thing I thought about when I woke up and the last thing I thought about at night."

Tramadol was placed on the banned substance list of the World Anti-Doping Agency nine months ago.

Kirkland opened up on his struggles with addiction to the substance, which went so far to making him not want to play football.

He said: "I was well into the addiction. I couldn’t reverse my mindset, couldn’t reverse my addiction.

"I got worse and worse. I didn’t want to do anything when I got home, didn’t want to socialise, didn’t want to go out. Eventually, I didn’t want to play football."

The Covid-19 pandemic set Kirkland back on his road to kicking his addiction before he went to rehab in early 2022.

Kirkland, who has proudly been clean for two and a half years, has revealed that players have privately contacted him asking for help to wean themselves off painkillers.

He added: "I’m not saying it’s every other player, but it’s more than you would think.

"It’s on the banned list now, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone gets caught with them.

"They’re not performance-enhancing. They’re not going to turn you into Superman or make you save every shot that comes in.

"They’re dangerous. That’s the issue. I was fainting, heart palpitations, hallucinations, violently ill. They can kill you. They should have killed me. They nearly did."

Since hanging up his gloves, Kirkland moved into coaching.

He started out at Port Vale in 2017, before moving to Liverpool as a women's team coach before becoming caretaker manager.

Kirkland reverted back to goalkeeper coach and assistant manager before leaving the club in 2019 to focus on the Chris Kirkland goalkeeper academy which he had founded in 2017.

He was on loan at Doncaster Rovers in 2011.