Gera gets life on the right track

He will walk out at Wembley next week as a proud new father, captain of his country and one of Albion's shining stars, writes Steve Madeley.

But Zoltan Gera's life could have taken a very different route.

The grinning figure who now lights up the Baggies training ground each day was once a teenage tearaway with the potential to go totally off the rails.

And Gera admits it was only the two Fs – football and faith – that got his life back on track after drink, drugs and gambling threatened to halt his rise to stardom before it had barely begun.

A fortnight ago the Hungarian's life took another turn for the better. His wife, Timea, gave birth to their first child, daughter Hanna.

Days earlier the Baggies had won at Bristol Rovers to ensure Gera would head to Wembley for the second time in as many seasons to represent the club where he now feels entirely at home.

"Zoltan is in the right frame of mind in training and in the right frame of mind when he is playing," says manager Tony Mowbray.

"He seems happy, his wife has just given birth and he is a contented footballer."

Life, however, was not always so happy for Gera, although he recalled that things started well enough.

"We were neither rich nor poor," he said of his family. "My parents gave me everything I asked for, and we had enough food to eat.

"Back then I didn't feel like doing anything bad."

And his footballing abilities were already becoming clear.

"I played differently, a little better than everyone else," he said.

"So we would always split the teams in such a way that I would be in the weakest team."

The problems that were to threaten his chances of making his talent count began to surface, however, when he was 10.

His father, a porter, split from his mother and the young Zoltan would switch between his parents for the next few years.

At the same time a group of teenagers appeared on the scene and offered him and some of his friends an escape route.

"They told us how good it was to smoke and to go wherever you pleased, with no-one telling you what to do," he said. "We felt that they were waking us up to what real life was all about.

"We started missing our lessons. I spent my breakfast money on casinos and started to miss my football training sessions as well."

With his parents oblivious initially to the problems in their son's life, drinking and smoking led to a gang, which inevitably placed Gera on a collision course with drugs.

"We formed a gang. We broke windows just for the fun of it and some of us smoked," said Gera, who was still playing football for the Pecs Leather Factory team.

"I went to a casino where I met some guys. They asked me why I would not give it drugs a try? First, just out of curiosity I watched them do it. I ended up doing it with them."

By now Gera was 13, and while football was still part of his life, negative influences were threatening to overwhelm him.

Both parents were now aware of their son's slide but neither was able to put him back on the straight and narrow.

An abandoned plan for the gang to break into a casino was just one example of the criminal thoughts that threatened to quicken his decline.

He already believed in God, but was a million miles from the faith that guides him today.

"This is when I started to think about the meaning of life and what I wanted to end up doing," he said.

"I planned to become a criminal, a real godfather, feared by all, who robs people and fights them every day.

"I thought that accepting God's existance would get me into Heaven. Like many people today I did not know what believing in God really meant. You need to do what he says."

By the age of 16 football was a thing of the past for Gera. But it was watching a match that finally helped turn his life back in the right direction.

He went to watch Pecs, his hometown team, play in the Hungarian league and began for the first time to lament his own wasted talent.

He recalled "As I watched them play I thought to myself 'I could have ended up playing there, I had the talent to, but I blew it, it is too late now'."

Gera believed his chances of making football his career had gone.

But if sport gave him the initial spur to change his life, it was his father and his faith that completed the transformation.

His father appeared in his regular haunt, the casino, and ordered his son to leave.

Then, to Gera's amazement, things took an unexpected turn with the pair paying a visit to church.

"I was sure that church must be a quiet place where you have to make a cross and then just go home," he said.

"I was shocked to see people happily smiling and singing. To be honest, I thought they must be crazy.

"On our way home, I asked my father why the people were singing and clapping.

"He told me they were singing to God because they had experienced his presence and they got to know Jesus.

"I had a good feeling then, on our way back home."

It was not, however, an overnight transformation for Gera. The pull of his old life was still strong and he snubbed the invitation for a second trip to church in favour of a return to the casino.

Eventually, however, he did join his father at another service as he began to feel alcohol and drugs were taking a physical toll.

"This time I liked it even more," he said.

"And towards the end of the service my father encouraged me to repent to The Lord, to accept Jesus Christ into my heart.

"I did not know what repenting meant so I asked dad what that was. He told me that I should be sorry about my sins and that I should accept Jesus Christ as my Saviour."

Still Gera tried to combine church-going with his formed habits of gambling. But decision time was just around the corner.

"One day I was sitting on a bench just outside one of the casinos and thought to myself 'What am I doing here?'," he said. "I stood up and never went into a casino again."

Instead, Gera returned to school, eventually leaving with good grades. And he returned to his previous great love – football.

"One day as I was going home from a game of football, with the ball in my hand, I started to pray," he recalled. "I said 'help me, God, that I may become a good player'.

"I honestly told God that I wanted to become a successful player, that people may see that there is a way out of the mess that I was in, that there was hope for them too."

He signed for Kinizsi but the road to success was tough.

"I looked like a skeleton," he said. "I remember that I often had to stop training because I had pain in my joints. And it took time for the pain to go away.

"When I started to play football again many thought that because of my poor physical condition I would only make it to the fourth class.

"After my encounter with God I had no doubts that I would become a first class qualified football player who will play in first class teams.

"There were no more downturns in my career, I was making progress day by day."

His career did take off. He overcame his problems and his talent took him to Ferencvaros, where he helped the nation's biggest club to the league and cup double.

In 2004 he moved to Albion, shortly after marrying Timea.

He was an instant hit at The Hawthorns and remains one of the club's most popular figures. And he continues to count his faith as one of his prime inspirations.

"Many say that they believe in God, and think that's enough," he said.

"But the Bible says that faith without actions is dead. It is no use talking about faith when your actions contradict you.

"My favourite verse in the Bible is that even the young grow weary, but they that trust in the Lord shall renew their strength. This is exactly what happened in my life."