‘I went from working in chippy to turning into Merseyside Derby hero on £40k-a-week’

Former Premier League marksman Andy Johnson went from working in a chip shop to becoming Everton’s Merseyside Derby hero in a demolition of Liverpool

Ex-Premier League striker Andy Johnson certainly knew where the back of the net was as he became an Everton hero after working in a chip shop.

Johnson, who turned 44 on Monday, had an incredible rise as his goalscoring exploits at Crystal Palace rocketed him into the Premier League spotlight and the England squad.

The Bedford-born marksman made a reported £8.6million move to Goodison Park in 2006 and soon wrote himself into Everton folklore.

Just one month into the season, the Toffees beat Liverpool 3-0 in one of the most famed Merseyside Derbies, with Johnson scoring twice.

Johnson’s £40k-per-week contract and fame among the country’s elite was a far cry from his job as a chip shop assistant during his teenage years.

“I worked in a Saturday job in a chip shop in Bedford, a place called Andy’s Chippy — it’s still there now,” Johnson told The Times in 2021. “I was 15, a year before I joined Birmingham City [in 1998].

“Mum and Dad were sick of giving me pocket money for sweets and they told me to get out and get into the real world. It was a good laugh, and it was nice to earn a bit of money for myself.”

That “bit of money” soon became hundreds of thousands. Penning a lucrative five-year deal at Everton, Johnson earned “upwards of £40,000 a week”.

“Only regular internationals got six figures back then,” he recalled. “They say there’s a very small window now when players need to maximise their earnings.” Johnson added: “The money I was on will sound like lots to many people, but I always worried.”

The two-time Palace Player of the Year revealed that it was a serious knee injury at Fulham that changed his outlooked on frivolous spending and he started to become more sensible with his finances. “It [the injury] changed my perspective on life and I became more careful with money,” said Johnson.

“I invested in a watch once…it was an Audemars Piguet carbon concept that I picked up for £118,000. The dealer that sold it to me said, ‘There’s a possibility that these are going to discontinue in the next four to six weeks.’

“The guy called me six weeks later and said, ‘Mate, that watch has discontinued. It’s gone through the roof.’ I ended up selling it for about £165,000. I couldn’t really afford it at the time. That’s why I ended up selling it quite quickly. It was a risky decision.

“If it hadn’t been discontinued I could have lost a fortune on it. It worked out well, but it could have gone horribly wrong.”