'I rejected Manchester United Class of 2011 for Liverpool... went to prison and became a professional boxer'

Paddy Lacey was banned from professional football in 2017 for testing positive for cocaine, he served five months in prison after a subsequent offence, but it was a particular afternoon in Italy, not his downfall, that almost reduced him to tears.

Lacey was watching his youngest brother, Shea Lacey, make his first start for England and he was confronted with emotion.

"It was the first game when I went over to Italy to watch him and they were singing the national anthem," Paddy told the Manchester Evening News. "He’s standing there with the shirt on and I was welling up with tears just thinking how far he’s come."

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Since the age of three years old, Shea Lacey had a ball at his feet and it didn't take long before he was competing with his middle brother, Luis, in the garden, which often led to the pair exchanging blows after sporting disagreements.

"Shea was the best boxer out of the three of us," Paddy added. "He'd fall out with Luis, who is two years older, over a shooting drill or something and then the boxing gloves would come out. They’d suddenly be knocking 12 bells out of each other.

"My mum would come in the garden screaming, saying: 'I hate this boxing!' He was always boxing his older brother, so when he went to the boxing gym, working with lads his own age, who were the same size, it was dead easy for him."

It's rare to find someone that was born in Liverpool that supports Manchester United but the youngest of three brothers,15-year-old Shea, is that anomaly.

Shea Lacey is from a family that's had footballers in each generation to varying degrees of success. His oldest brother has described him as technically exceptional, brave in