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I was always very good at football. As the years went on I got better and better. I had trials with Leeds when I was 14, and was playing regularly for the reserves by the time I was 15. I was spotted by a United scout when I was 16 and joined their youth academy.

Every day I got better and better. The press were calling me the new Pele, which I've been told is quite an honour. I worked hard everyday and was moving closer and closer to my first team debut not long after my 18th birthday. I made the bench a couple of times at the start of the 08/09 season, but Fergie didn't want to risk using me yet, even though I was getting better by the minute in training.

Then finally, the day before a Carling Cup game against Preston, I put in a performance in training that was so good that it made Gary Neville cry. He was in a right state. The gaffa had to take note and had no choice but to start me against Preston. There I was at Old Trafford having a kick about during the warm up and I couldn't believe how good I had become, every touch was better than the last, every pass was like a firework in a bird's nest.

The few fans who had turned up really early were speechless. Andy Gray said just before the kickoff that he would get "Cock Dock" tattooed on his face if I didn't score close to forty goals. I was that good.

The whistle blew to start the game, the ball came to me in the air and I brought it down with my left foot. The crowd went wild. They'd never seen such a good touch. I started to run at the goal, went past one player, two, three, four and then it happened. I became so good, I was bad. I'd heard of things being so bad that they were good, like films which become funny when they're really bad, but it was nothing like that. It wasn't like I was making mistakes or not scoring. I'd scored thirty goals in the first ten minutes, but it really was so good that it was bad. I don't know how better to explain it.

By halftime I was getting booed by nearly every fan. After an hour fans started leaving the stadium and players were vommitting all over the pitch. By fulltime, football as we knew it was dead. Cancelled. Every team in the world had called it a day. I was that bad.

Mark, Leeds.

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