Michael Owen: 'We want to keep pushing the boundaries at Manor House'

This is a free sample of Natalie Green's brand new Weekender Q&A, in which the top broadcaster and journalist speaks to big names in racing.

When Michael Owen skipped past the Argentina defence and fired England ahead at the 1998 World Cup, I can’t imagine there were many of you who thought you’d be reading about him in the Weekender nearly a quarter of a century later.

That unforgettable night in Saint-Etienne was the moment Owen’s life would change forever, but the racing seeds had already been sown. England’s latest wonderkid’s passion was not just for scoring goals, but for horses as well.

But how, why and where? I caught up with the owner of Manor House Stables to find out exactly that.

When did your passion for horseracing begin?
I got the bug really early, aged around ten. It was my dad that caused it. If I scored a couple of goals on a Saturday we would pull outside the bookies, he’d give me a pound and I’d be able to buy some sweets while he went in and put his 50p patent on. We’d go home and put the TV on – horseracing was the only sport on at the time on a Saturday afternoon. When I got to around 13 I started to pick the horses out for Dad and the thrill of gambling was the first passion, watching your horse on the TV, cheering it on.

When did you become an owner?
When I was 18 I had just got back from the World Cup. I was good friends and shared an agent with David Platt, who was an Arsenal and England player at the time, and he said to me, “Why don’t you own a horse?’’ I just assumed it was just for the Queen and the sheikhs of the world, not the man on the street like me. He introduced me to his trainer, John Gosden. I subsequently had all my horses with John, the numbers kept swelling and by the time I got to my early twenties I was thinking, I might be a footballer now, but I won’t be one forever.

I thought about what I would do when I finished football and I decided, aged 22, to build my own yard. I was visiting my horses down at Manton, where John was training at the time. It was just the most amazing place but I thought, I want my own one of those.

Why did you choose a dairy farm in Cheshire for your location?
I looked at about half a dozen farms and I found Manor House. Cheshire is so untapped in many ways, we are the biggest Flat yard for miles around – it’s a really wealthy area with a real following for racing. Chester and Haydock are great courses for us. Newmarket is amazing but everyone is fighting for the same thing down there and hopefully we have a different selling point up here.

I had to source a trainer to start with and employed Nicky Vaughan who was John Gosden’s assistant at the time. Former trainer Michael Dickinson came and helped with advice on the gallops and it basically grew from there. I started with a trotting ring, a gallop and an old grain store to put 20 horses in, but then we extended the gallop, added new barns, a veterinary suite, the swimming pool and vibration plates.

That all happened in time but we want to keep pushing the boundaries and keep our yard at the forefront of science and technology. I wanted to try and make a business out of it. We have 131 boxes now and planning permission for two new big barns. I literally want to shoot for the stars – we’re always thinking of the next thing. It was one of the reasons why Hugo Palmer came up to Cheshire.

How old were you when you bought Manor House?
I was 24 when I bought the farm. I took an awful lot of stick in the footballing world and from the newspapers for taking my eye off the ball because people knew I had bought a farm and I was going to set up a racing establishment.

I knew that football is a very short career and as much as I was very focused on playing – I don’t think there is anyone more focused than me, I was very professional. When we employed Tom Dascombe and his assistant Colin Gorman, you talk to them nowadays and they will tell you they didn’t know what they were getting into when they first accepted the job as I used to sit in the corner of the box at Chester racecourse, my head buried in the Racing Post.

Michael Owen at Manor House Stables in CheshireCredit: Andrew Dietz

I wouldn’t be talking to anyone, I’d be drinking water and I was such a square. I was so focused on the right diet, the right fitness, the right this and the right that. Everything would be focused on how I was going to score the next goal.

I knew at the time that some footballers really do struggle when they retire, nothing to fall back on, no purpose. Unless you have a new career it can be very difficult mentally, so I knew this was going to be my life from early on.

Whenever friends and ex-players come to Manor House they are in awe. When you retire at 33 like I did, if you have got nothing else in life it’s a long and lonely road.

Your life was a whirlwind from a very young age. How did you cope with that?
I think it’s to do with the way I was brought up. I’m one of five brothers and I always wanted to hang around with my brothers, their mates, my dad and his mates. If I have one strength in life it’s my mentality. A strong mentality that’s mature early on. I was mentally ready to go, mentally stronger than some of my peers. I got into the team at Liverpool when I was 17 and I won the Golden Boot that season, as well as the following season.

You look at my oldest daughter Gemma who’s recently been on Love Island and people come up to me and say, “she’s so mature.” Well yeah, that’s the environment she’s been brought up in. One of the few things I wouldn’t change is what is between my ears, how I could get to where I got to being so young.

With the pressures of social media these days, do you think it’s harder being in the spotlight now or when you were playing?
I think I played in possibly the harshest generation. Nowadays you’re in control of your image – you have control over your social media accounts. In my era we were basically given an image. Let’s take an example where my life changed in one moment. In 1998 coming back from the World Cup, we had a guy called David Beckham who had got a red card and a guy who’s a young, fresh-faced kid called Michael Owen who scored a great goal. The media made one a villain while on the flip side they made me whiter than white.

I didn’t want my image to be whiter than white – I was the prankster in the changing room. I think the pressure back then and the power of the press was harder. Now, if you don’t want to be on social media just press the off button.

What was your greatest achievement?
Winning the Ballon d’Or was the ultimate. When I was a kid, if you asked me what I wanted to be, I wouldn’t reply, “I want to be a footballer.” I’d say, “I want to be the best footballer in the world.”

Being a footballer was a given but I wanted to be the best. There will be another British Ballon d’Or winner but I genuinely don’t believe there will be a two-time Golden Boot winner in the Premier League in his first two seasons as a 17 to 19 year old, so in terms of achievements that’s the thing I’m most proud of.

Do you have many football players as owners?
I thought I could have a slight advantage on other yards and trainers as I have a lot of football friends who might want to own horses, and I need that to supplement the yard.

Steve McManaman: among the ex-footballers involved in racehorse ownershipCredit: Athit Perawongmetha

Six of the Liverpool players own a horse called Mr McCann, and they want to reinvest into another one. Sir Alex Ferguson has been a loyal owner for years, and Paul Scholes, Steve McManaman, Ian Wright and Owen Hargreaves have been involved. A group of us own a horse called Box To Box and we have a Burnley team who have been great supporters for years.

Professional footballers and racing – do they complement one another?
It’s good you can watch racing after training and there is definitely a passion for racing among some footballers. We could do more to encourage footballers to own racehorses, and that’s what I’m always thinking about. The hard thing with footballers is they barely get a day off. For example, when we ran Mr McCann for the Liverpool lads, it was the semi-final of the Champions League. However, they get much joy coming to the yard, relaxing away from kicking a ball while getting to know their horse and watching them train.

When I was playing I could have missed 20 sitters the day before, but as soon as I entered Manor House gates it felt like a different world – all is forgiven and forgotten.

What is your role at Manor House?
I do 90 to 100 days on the TV every year with football punditry and I have a few commercial sponsors who I work with, but whenever I’m not working I’m at Manor House.

I don’t suppose I have a specific role because I can be there every day for a month and then not be there for a month. For example, during the World Cup I won’t be there.

In general I have a good understanding of the whole business. I believe that you should employ someone because they are elite in their field, so if you’re going to employ a veterinary team then listen to their advice for medical things, and a trainer like Hugo [Palmer], let him do his stuff. That’s my philosophy, try to get the best people in and do their job.

Hugo seems to have hit the ground running, how was the transition?
It was quite staggering really when Hugo came in because a lot of the horses we thought were quite exposed have improved a stone since Hugo took over.

Brad The Brief, Ever Given, Rajinsky, Flaming Rib, Mr McCann, Solent Gateway have all improved so that’s been absolutely amazing. I put on a brave face at the start of the year to reassure everybody, but the bottom line is a new set of staff, an influx of horses, a new trainer – it’s going to take a bit of time.

Flaming Rib: entered in the Sprint CupCredit: Alan Crowhurst (Getty Images)

There will be horses who might be a bit behind where we wanted them to be because of the turnover and staffing issues, but on the whole I’m very excited about the backend of the season. We have 82 two-year-olds and we haven’t run half of them yet so I’d like to think we’re going to be busy over the next couple of months.

We have a strong team of older horses too. To have the success that we’ve had already has been brilliant, but I know the best is yet to come.

How is Flaming Rib, who you part own?
He is entered on Saturday at Haydock in the Betfair Sprint Cup. He’s unbelievably tough, never misses a day’s work and he’s just so hard. I absolutely love him – he has a great attitude towards racing and Saturday will be a big day for us.

What would be the one race you’d love to win?
I’m the business owner so I want success across the board. I want people to have a good time, my pride and joy is Manor House – any horse in any silks from Manor House. I want our horses to be dining at the top table in all of the big races, that’s my ambition. The Derby is a race I’d like to win personally, but if a Manor House horse wins, that’s what counts for me. That’s what I’m in racing for.

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