Crouch draws strength from highs and lows of a career yet to peak

For every person who is derogatory there are eight who are complimentary, he tells Daniel Taylor

Rush-hour in central London, the traffic is bumper to bumper, the pavements are packed and, in the soaring glass office-blocks of NW1, word has got out that Peter Crouch is standing outside. Men in suits are pressed against the windows, filming with their camera-phones, banging on the glass to get his attention. One guy has left his desk and comes out to get a closer look and then, without warning, he starts to flick his feet in funny angles and jerk his arms around. The wind has blown his tie over his left shoulder and he is shouting, "Come on, Crouchy, where's the robot dance?"

Crouch does what he always does in these situations: he smiles politely. He does not look entirely comfortable but he is used to this kind of scene and, besides, he knows it could be a lot worse. When he was younger, opposition fans (or sometimes those of his own team) used to bait him with cries of "freak".

He is among the small number of England internationals to have suffered the crushing rejection of being booed by the team's own supporters and he will never forget his first day at Liverpool, standing outside Anfield, soaking in the history and feeling more than a little pleased with himself, when a bus went by and someone leant out of the window. "Crouch," he shrieked, "you lanky wanker."

People yelling stuff is one of the hazards of the occupation but Crouch, it is fair to say, gets more than most. "I went to Miami with a few mates after the World Cup," he recalls. "I used to go to America and nobody would know who I was but this time we walked past a bar and someone shouted, 'Oi, robot boy!' I carried on walking but my mate stopped. 'Isn't that Mickey Rourke shouting?' he said. And there was Mickey Rourke doing the robot dance. That's when I knew I had made it"

Brushes with Hollywood actors epitomise how life has changed for the Liverpool and England striker but Crouch, of course, wants to be recognised for something far more worthy than a dance routine he once performed for Prince William. Every sportsman wants to be taken seriously and "Tallous", as his mates in Ealing know him, has found it a long struggle at times, one he has not always looked like winning. "I've probably divided opinion more than any other player in the country," he says. "I've had to prove a lot of people wrong and, as well as the good times, there have been some fairly bleak times too. But I do think I'm getting more recognition for my ability now.

"People used to take one look at me and judge me. They would think, 'All we can do with this guy is bash long balls to him.' Now people know a lot more about me it's not like that any more. I still divide opinion but I know I'm a good footballer. And when I do get criticised I'm a lot more thick-skinned anyway. When I was younger I would really take it to heart if someone said something bad about me. But you have to be stronger than that in football. You have to believe in yourself."

At 26, Crouch has reached a stage in his life when he is able to handle all the jibes. Most of the time, anyway. "I remember after I had signed for Liverpool, I didn't score for 18 games and all the jokes, the constant sniping, that really affected me. My friends and family were telling me it would all work out but, to be honest, I stopped believing them. I was so frustrated a part of me was thinking I didn't want to be at Liverpool any longer.

"I finally got off the mark and they referred it to the Dubious Goals Panel. I was so wound up I started thinking there was a witch-hunt against me. So I tried to ring them up. Except nobody in football knows who this Dubious Goals Panel is. Do you? Does anybody? In the end I rang up Sky Sports News. I had a go at them down the phone, telling them I wanted to know who ran this Dubious Goals Panel, and 'had I done something to his son at school?' But they didn't believe it was me.

"Around this time, I turned on my telly and Eamonn Holmes was introducing some World Player of the Year awards and he made a joke about 'so don't expect Peter Crouch to be here . . . ' Nowadays I might laugh it off but, at that point in my life, I really didn't need that."

More recently, he was watching Hell's Kitchen on ITV because his girlfriend, Abigail Clancy, was among the contestants. "Angus Deayton [the presenter] had a couple of pops at me but, this time, I just laughed. He was taking the piss out of a lot of people and I suppose it was inevitable I would get some abuse, too. But I found it funny. Perhaps a couple of years ago I wouldn't have been amused but I just took it as a bit of banter.

"The thing about me is that I am willing to laugh about myself and I try not to take myself too seriously. I used to let it get to me. But for every person who's derogatory about me there are at least eight others who are complimentary. And, as I say, I have had to go through my whole career proving people wrong."

It has become such a talent that Crouch dedicates his autobiography, Walking Tall (Hodder & Stoughton, £18.99), to David O'Leary, his manager at Aston Villa, for "being wrong". The book, says Crouch, is for all the people "who have unfashionably believed in me" - first and foremost, his parents, Bruce and Jayne, who attend every game and understand what he means when he talks of the "dark days".

It has been a wild graph of highs and lows and there have been more than one occasion when Bruce, a former Chelsea home-and-away man, has tackled an abusive fan (plus a few insensitive journalists). "He's quite defensive, as I would be if I had a son," says Crouch. "When he is listening to someone in the next seat abusing me it can be hard for him to take." He understands why Tony Adams's dad, Alex, did not go to matches for many years because he could not bear the abuse. "You can't take on a whole stand."

Bruce is with Crouch when we meet and he is intrigued to know how difficult it would be for a journalist to write about his son without mentioning he is 6ft 7in. Pretty difficult, as it turns out, although the only statistics that should really matter are those that tell us Crouch has 12 goals in 21 games for England, a scoring ratio any striker would cherish. "The really pleasing thing," he says, "is that I hit the ground running with England. I started scoring goals straight away and they haven't stopped."

The paradox is that Steve McClaren preferred Emile Heskey (45 caps, five goals) against Russia last month. Yet Crouch has never been the type to complain. "If I was the manager and we had just beaten Israel 3-0 [when Crouch was suspended], I would have kept the same team, too. I wanted to play but I understood the reasoning. And I know I'll get another chance because I've always done well for England in the past."

And in the process, Crouch has made himself a popular figure, one of football's good guys. The chap in the suit who tried to get him to dance in the street wants his autograph and then there is a final request. "Our receptionist wants your number," he says. The English public have always loved a goalscorer and Crouch has shown there is much more to his fame than simply being "robot boy".

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