Ex-Blackpool captain Andy Morrison details battle with depression, alcohol and his 'barbaric demons'

The 49-year-old, who enjoyed two spells with the Seasiders, has detailed his battle with depression and alcohol in an interview with BBC Sport Wales.

The uncompromising former defender, who captained Pool after being signed by Sam Allardyce in 1994, admits he was unable to control his “barbaric” demons at times during his playing career.

"I sometimes hear people who are close to me defending me at times, saying you don't know Andy, you don't know who he is or what he's about, but it's just how things are," Morrison told BBC Sport.

"You can spend your whole life trying to prove people wrong, but it's much easier to prove that you're right. You only have to do that to one person."

"The lowest point? Waking up in a cell in Inverness," he added. "The reality of opening your eyes and seeing the bars and the four walls and that feeling of 'what have I done?'. “Checking your hands, feeling your face, did you get a gold or silver medal in the fight? No idea of what had happened the night before, just waiting to find out how bad it is.

"If somebody had opened the door and said you're being charged with murder, I wouldn't have known.

"That point was a lonely, horrible place.

"You couldn't keep on doing what I was doing and get away with it.”

Despite a number of warning and off-field incidents, Morrison says the “demon drink” would always win out.

Morrison, who also played for Plymouth Argyle, Blackburn Rovers and Huddersfield Town as well as Manchester City, believes a childhood incident was the catalyst for his troubles.

The 49-year-old, who was inducted into Blackpool’s Hall of Fame in 2006, was physically abused by two men in a Plymouth park, which he claims created “darkness and demons” which he didn’t have the “tools” to deal with.

"Not every time I drank there was trouble, but every time there was trouble I was drunk," he said.

"There were so many episodes of feeling I'd let people down, being in really strong positions in my career and then ultimately the demon drink would come back and I'd find myself in incredible situations that I shouldn't have been in with the responsibility I'd been given.

"I'd captained every team I played for and trained right, worked hard, (been) relentless in my desire to win, but when I stepped away from that and I drank alcohol, all the demons in me - which were barbaric at times - (meant) I'd get in that situation time and time again.

"You'd promise the manager, you'd promise your wife, you'd promise your parents, that's it, it won't happen again - but you never said I won't drink again.”

Morrison credits his former Manchester City boss Joe Royle with sending him down the right path.

While enjoying a rare weekend off through suspension, Morrison was involved in an ugly incident with a doorman, a smashed pub window and that cell in Inverness.

Morrison returned to City to face Royle and a conversation he believes changed his life.

"I sat with Joe and started with the apologies again, but he stopped and asked about me," Morrison said.

"Rather than saying 'you're a disgrace', he cared about me as a human being. It turned around for me there and then."

That same week Morrison went to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and, since then, hasn’t drunk since.

"There are people who have probably had to wait years for their life to turn around after the (kind of) chaos I had," he said.

"I'm very, very, very lucky because there's a lot of people who don't get that opportunity and aren't here to tell their story.”

Morrison later spiralled into depression when his career came to an early end in 2001, at the age of 30, due to a knee injury.

"I had to go into the big wide world with no trade, no qualifications, but you stick your chest out and say another door will open," Morrison said.

"But only when you look back do you see how hard it was, how mentally draining (it was) and how low you were.”

Having previously worked for a handful of non-league sides, Morrison took charge of struggling Welsh outfit Connah’s Quay in 2015.

Since then, he’s overseen five successive qualifications for European football, a Welsh cup win and now the Cymru Premier title.