Former Everton player Royston Drenthe was told he was at ‘wrong club’ after his much talked about x-rated hot tub incident.
In 2007, the Dutchman emerged as a one to watch for Holland at the UEFA European Under-21 Championships, going on to be named the tournament’s best player and won the competition.
Drenthe finally secured a dream move to Real Madrid from Feyenoord but failed to live up his potential with his career at Santiago Bernabeu a failure.
😡 Royston Drenthe on an incident with David Moyes before the 2012 FA Cup semi-final with Liverpool…
“When I went in afterwards, Moyes told me to f*ck off. I should have accepted it, but I said, ‘What do you mean, f*ck off, bro? You f*ck off.'”
🗞️ @FourFourTwo #EFC pic.twitter.com/bshAhuT3et
— The Sportsman (@TheSportsman) February 4, 2019
He decided to move to Merseyside, joining Everton in September 2011 on a season-long loan agreement. He had previously spent his two previous campaigns at Madrid’s La Liga outfit Hercules.
After making his debut against Aston Villa as a substitute, the former Dutch international scored his first goal for Everton in a win 3-1 over Wigan Athletic. He then went on to score three more times in 27 matches.
But, a heated argument with David Moyes, then-Blues boss, was to end his Goodison tenure. Drenthe was disciplined shortly before the crunch FA Cup semi final against Liverpool in April 2012.
After a series of disagreements with the manager over time-keeping issues throughout the season, the dispute came to an end when the two had a heated row that led to the winger not playing again for the club.
“I was waiting outside the room,” he explained to FourFourTwo back in 2019. “Whereas I probably should have just walked in quietly and taken a seat.
“When I went in afterwards, Moyes told me to f**k off. I should have accepted it, but I said, ‘what do you mean, f**k off, bro? You f**k off.’ And then I left for Holland and didn’t come back. If I’d adapted more to Moyes I think I’d have reaped the benefits, as initially I did play a lot under him.
“Together with my first months at Hercules, I had the best spell of my career at Everton.”
Tim Howard on Royston Drenthe and Eto’o ahaha pic.twitter.com/9HXNfxmUb7
— Adam McNulty 🌹 (@mcnultyadamm) October 20, 2022
In an interview with Ben Foster earlier this season, former Everton goalkeeper Tim Howard spoke more on Drenthe’s antics during his time with the club, one of which about a late night party at the club’s Finch Farm training ground.
“We had some wrong’uns at Everton as well, and those are the ones that stood out more than anything,” he told The Fozcast. “One was horrific, Royston Drenthe. We’re Everton, rolled sleeves up, worker bees.
“In comes Royston in Rolls-Royces to training, bowls in with his shoes untied, he has to run the perimeter of the training ground because he’s always late, his eyes were half open… you were just at Real Madrid, what are you doing here? This is weird.
“I guess he’d never heard of CCTV and he ended up coming to the training ground in the middle of the night with friends, and they’re in the hot tub… you’re just thinking ‘you’re at the wrong club here mate’.”
In a recent interview with Italian publication Gazzetta dello Sport, Drenthe revealed some of the main reasons behind his bumpy career, which included spells out in Russia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates as well as spending time back in England with Reading and Sheffield Wednesday.
He said: “I was 20 years old and at the peak of my career. It was my dream to walk into the Real Madrid dressing room, I will never forget that.
“But you have a life as a footballer and a life as a human being. You can mix that up to a point, but I didn’t see the need to change my lifestyle right away. Now I am aware that I didn’t do the right thing, that I made mistakes. I wasn’t ready to be a pro.
“I thought I was God, loved women and to party too much and you can’t combine that with football. I learn something new every time, but what happened, happened.”
Drenthe declared bankruptcy in 2020 after losing £3.2million, but was soon back on the pitch as Racing Murcia became the 14th club of his career.
When the story about his raunchy hot tub moment was put to the midfielder in 2018, he did not deny.
Speaking to fan channel The Toffee Blues while a player at Sparta Rotterdam in 2018 – who he joined after his first retirement – he said: “The story’s true, but the stories with the girls – they just give it, like, a little extra.”
Though went on to suggest a different reason for being at the training ground at 2am.
He added: “I remember because I was not feeling well that day. I took my car because I didn’t want to come late in the morning.
“I needed my car to come back to the training ground in the morning.
“It was 2 o’clock in the morning, but in my mind it was like, what is 2 o’clock? Around this time I’m awake as well at home sometimes.
“I went to get my car but after that it was a big problem for me that I got my car at 2 o’clock in the morning.”
He detailed the brutal clash with Moyes, saying: “I remember it was a training day. I was watching a movie in my game room. I fell asleep alone, no alarm on.
“We had to be 10.30am on the training ground and 11am for training. I came in 10 minutes before training, but that day we had a pre-game meeting and I was late.
“Normally the gaffer can’t see that kind of stuff. Sometimes players were just coming in and going out to training, and we were teammates so we didn’t snitch each other out – we covered each other.
“That day it was a team meeting and I was not in that meeting, so it was spotted. We’d had some things already, so it was like, ‘F***, I’m f*****,’ you know?
“It was already done [with Moyes]. I waited until they were finished with the team meeting. I wanted to walk to him and say what happened, and he looked at me and said, ‘Roy, just f*** off and go.’
“I was looking to him, understanding him as well but also like, ‘What are you doing – just f*** off? With my temper, in that moment, I was like, ‘Oh, you want me to f*** off? OK then…’ So that’s what I did, stupidly maybe.
“I left straight away, took my car, back to Holland.”
Read more via this FourFourTwo article.
Twitter users reacted on the former Everton player told he was at the ‘wrong club’ after his x-rated hot tub incident and a row with the boss…
@ReesJones99: I remember walking into the ground 5 minutes before kick off and Drenthe walked past in his pre-match suit getting escorted by a steward, couldn’t even get to games on time. That Fulham away goal will always be a banger tho
@Steve_Austin_JR: Tim Howard on Ben Foster’s podcast talking about Royston Drenthe 😭😂 it all makes sense now
@BigDuncan29: Just watched a clip with Tim Howard about Royston Drenthe as Chris Kamara would say “Unbelievable” 🤣🤣🤣💪💙💙💙
@adamjeffrey98: Tim Howard had some very interesting words about Royston Drenthe and Samuel Eto’o on Ben Foster’s podcast 😂😂
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