The Aussie genius who changed football forever: Liverpool legend Craig Johnston steps out of shadows on Stan Sport

Australia's most decorated men's footballer had seen and heard enough.

It was time to come out of the shadows and speak his mind.

The great Craig Johnston, with five English league titles and a FA Cup and European Cup to his name, is enjoying the Newcastle Jets renaissance in his own backyard.

Football's new home, Stan Sport, is the only place to watch the Premier League, UEFA Champions League, FA Cup, WSL, European World Cup qualifiers, J.League, NSWL and K League

But, more broadly, the 65-year-old Liverpool legend is frustrated with what he views as stagnation in the country's football development and professional success.

Johnston had kept a low profile in recent years, turning down most interview requests.

A recent Adam Peacock column - in which the Stan Sport host bemoaned Australia having a measly 0.06 percentage share of an $18+ billion global transfer market - was the final straw.

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And so one of the country's most fascinating and successful sportspeople agreed to join Peacock on Added Time and offer some solutions, not just point out problems.

But first, the incredible Johnston backstory.

'IF YOU STILL HAVE YOUR LEG'

Pulling on Liverpool's iconic red strip seemed a fanciful dream when the Johannesburg-born Johnston was six.

The sports-mad youngster was consigned to a hospital bed as doctors delivered the devastating news that he had contracted polio and a leg amputation was likely.

That initial diagnosis was correctly revised to osteomyelitis, a serious bone infection which would require an operation. Football provided a ray of light.

"In a hospital bed, six-years-old, I saw England play in the World Cup in 1966. I was in the hospital, right, with my osteomyelitis," Johnston said in conversation with Peacock, Craig Foster and Mark Bosnich.

NEW PODCAST! Liverpool legend Craig Johnston makes a rare appearance on Added Time for a special episode to share his blueprint for the future

"So that's what I want to do, I want to go to Wembley and win a cup final. The nurse said, 'yeah, of course you do, you know, if you still have your leg after the operation'."

The operation was a success.

In the 1986 FA Cup decider at Wembley, Johnston became the first Australian to score in a final, converting a Jan Molby cross to put Liverpool 2–1 ahead against Everton.

'THE WORST PLAYER HE'S EVER SEEN'

It was not an easy journey to get there.

At just 15 and dreaming big, Johnston convinced Middlesbrough to give him a shot on trial - if he paid his own way to England.

Thanks to enormous sacrifice from his parents, Johnston took the plunge.

Running the show in Middlesbrough was none other than Jack Charlton, England's centre back rock from that iconic 1966 World Cup triumph.

"When I got to England, a famous manager said I was the worst player he's ever seen," Johnston told Added Time.

"And you could take that the wrong way if you weren't hard-headed. I'm a little bit hard-headed. I'm emotional about other things. But I thought to myself, he's 100 per cent right. Compared to the other trialists from Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and England - 15-year-old kids, same age as me - I couldn't control the ball, I couldn't pass, I couldn't dribble, I couldn't shoot."

Despite that brutal introduction, Johnston refused to give up.

He continued to hang around the club, cleaning players' boots and cars and practising his skills alone for hours in the Ayresome Park carpark.

Johnston's big break came when a virus swept through the club and new manager John Neal, who had replaced Charlton, put him on the bench for the reserve team.

Johnston came on, scored two goals and went on to make his first team debut at 17. The once-mocked midfielder from Down Under was away.

WHY ARE THE SOCCEROOS NOW 'SHIT'?

A fierce believer in Australia's sporting ability, Johnston believes the Socceroos and Matildas can win World Cups if the jigsaw pieces are put in place.

"We could be if the dream is there."

The Matildas, of course, reached the semi-finals of the last World Cup in Australia.

Johnston never played for Australia. He says he wasn't treated well by the national body and he had a lot of pressure from club managers not to make the long trips.

But he remains a patriot and cringes at how far the Socceroos' reputation has fallen abroad. Australia is ranked 27th ahead of this year's World Cup.

Johnston recalls an exchange while speaking at a FIFA conference and a man in the audience got to his feet.

"Mr Johnston, I'm from Brazil, we love Liverpool, we loved your style of play," he remembers.

"He said the Socceroos used to have a really good team, and they nearly beat Italy (at the 2006 World Cup). But now - and he had broken English - he said, now they're shit. And he said, why is that? And I didn't know what to say."

So Johnston turned the tables on his new Brazilian friend.

"I said, the Brazilian cricket team, why are they shit? He said because they don't practice every day and they don't play it.

"I said neither do we play soccer every day. You know what our kids do? They spend hours and hours going in cars, to academies and to elite training camps.

"Two hours a day, and they haven't touched the ball yet. They get there and some coach tells them where to stand, then they go home. Right, that'll be another $300 thanks.

"Holly, my daughter, did the same thing... they're not good enough at manipulating the ball."

THE BIRTH OF THE ICONIC PREDATOR BOOTS

So Johnston is not adverse to dishing out some criticism.

But he remains passionate about finding improvements.

He views himself as more of an inventor than a footballer or businessman.

After all, he was the man who designed the Adidas Predator, one of the world's most iconic football boots.

After retiring at 27 to care for his sister, Johnston was coaching kids in Australia when rain started to fall.

His instructions to put spin on the ball were going awry with leather boots.

Johnston had a Eureka moment.

"I went home and I took the cover off a table tennis bat," he told The Athletic last year.

"I stuck it on my boot, wrapped it with elastic band, went in the rain and the ball squealed like a pig when the rubber engaged with the polyurethane of the ball. You could see the ball gripping and it was squealing."

Johnston reckons he spent nearly $500,000 of his own money in the early 1990s, developing the boots and taking them to market.

He got knocked back by Nike, Puma, Reebok and Adidas but in true Johnston fashion, he refused to give up.

Johnston flew to Munich and got German greats Franz Beckenbauer, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and Hans Muller to strap his boots on and kick the ball around in the snow.

He sent the footage to Adidas and this time he had a deal.

The Predator was launched in 1994 but only achieved mainstream success when megastars David Beckham and Zinedine Zidane later jumped on board.

But by that point Johnston had been bought out of his deal which would have seen him net a two per cent share of all sales.

JOHNSTON BOUNCES BACK FROM CRUSHING SETBACKS

Once worth $15 million, Johnston was declared bankrupt in 2004 after ploughing money into a failed bid to set up football schools in the United Kingdom.

Blur frontman Damon Albarn was among the investors.

"I am beside myself. Dejected is not the word," he told the Daily Mirror.

"I'm almost finished. The one thing you don't do is owe someone money.

"I'd love to sit down with Damon but I can't get near him. Damon is a good guy though he doesn't know what I've been through. I've lost absolutely everything. Five years ago I had £5 million and more. I was getting royalties from the Predator boot but that has stopped. Now I rely on handouts."

Johnston bounced back. He always does.

He admires cricket's Big Bash League and says Australia should be looking at a similar model to promote the sport.

Johnston worked with Johan Cruyff in developing the Sony MiniDisc Euro Sixes in Amsterdam in 1997.

He told Added Time about a conversation he had with AC Milan owner Silvio Berlusconi, who would go on to become Italy's controversial prime minister.

"This is all before bunga bunga," Johnston explains.

"He owned AC Milan, and he also owned a company called Mediaset. So he called me and said 'FIFA have told me you're the clever guy on the block.'

"We want to create a Super League, and you're the guy with the brains that can do it for us... well, what's your brilliant idea?"

Johnston suggested sticking with the Champions League but developing a six-a-side tournament that would go on to feature AC Milan, Liverpool, Glasgow Rangers and Ajax Amsterdam.

"I spent a fortune of my own money. And proved the concept. So this is not a new idea," he reflects.

He implores Australia to develop a universal skills measurement rating standard, "which is the golf handicap of soccer."

"And the other one is professional six-a-side, using the existing clubs and players, so that you don't fragment the industry, like what's happened with LIV Golf and Formula 1."

WHO IS LIVERPOOL'S GREATEST EVER PLAYER?

Johnston played with Kenny Dalglish, Ian Rush and John Barnes and he is a big fan of Mohamed Salah.

But his choice of Luis Suarez as Liverpool's greatest ever player will surprise most.

"When someone bites somebody because they want the ball so much - that shows you want it," he said on Stan Sport.

"Suarez, every time he got the ball, he made me stand up. When the opposition had the ball in their half, he would chase them down to the corner flag to get it.

"Because that's how he grew up, with nothing. In the streets, in poverty, in Uruguay. And sometimes he got so frustrated that he bit them on the neck...

"My point is a skills culture comes from the love, the passion, the desire to make that ball talk. And if you get it right, it provides you a livelihood for the rest of your life to go around the world, witness other cultures, be part of something special.

"I did it in the Middlesbrough carpark."