From The Voice newspaper, Tuesday:
Titus Bramble does not even bother to give interviews anymore.
And why should he? For the last six years he has been the recipient of some lacerating media coverage.
His so-called lapses in concentration have been jumped on by a section of the press, who seem only too eager to humiliate the Ipswich-born centre-halve.
In a sport where your every performance is analysed microscopically, criticism is expected. But when it becomes personal, well that’s another issue.
“It was Brian Oliver [sports Editor] at the Newcastle Chronicle that started it and it all got rather personal,” Bramble explains to the Voice of Sport about the vitriolic criticism he has received from the mainstream press.
“After he started, people just started jumping on the bandwagon and started saying this and that about me. I used to read the papers and get quite down, but Kieron Dyer told me not to let it bother me.
“To be honest, for awhile I’ve thought that certain journalists have an agenda with me. Of course it hurts, no one likes to read things like that but again that’s just football.
“The criticism hurts my family more than it hurts me – especially my mum. She reads the paper and gets upset but I tell her it’s personal and not to read them.
“For me to be playing as many games as I have done in the Premier League, I must be doing something right. I’ve been playing in the top flight since I was 19 and I’ve worked under some very good managers, so they must see something.”
Signed last summer by the now departed Chris Hutchings, the former England U-21 international made an encouraging start to his career at Wigan.
Playing regularly – something he had not done in his five years at Newcastle – he began to look like the player Bobby Robson had envisaged when he signed him from Ipswich for £5 million in 2002.
At Newcastle, the fans never really got to see him at his consistent best, something that affected their relationship.
“The Newcastle fans aren’t as good as everybody says,” adds Bramble. “They think that they should be winning things – but why? They haven’t won a trophy for 50 years. It was the fans that got Sam Allardyce the sack there. Can you believe that? The fans up there are powerful but I think he would have brought them success.
“Maybe I should have left Newcastle to get first-team football earlier. You can only really get judged when you are playing week in week out.
“At Newcastle I wasn’t playing week in and week out so it was good to get away and get a fresh start. I was always confident in my own ability and when I did get in the Wigan team, I think I was showing some consistent performance.
“Around the New Year my form dipped and then the manager took me out of the team, which was fair play to him as the others have come in and done really well.”
Bramble has seen his place at the heart of the Wigan defence go to Paul Scharner but he is desperate to win his place back and change the way he is viewed – much like Portsmouth’s David James has.
“I just want to get back in the team as soon as possible and look forward to being part of a successful Wigan team.
“I look at David James and what he done and he’s an example of how you can reinvent yourself. I could have a very good season next year but it will take two or three seasons for the critics to stop. I think it’s personal – that’s what I think.”
