While their husbands get all the attention, just who is it behind Bermuda soccer's representatives in England, Kyle Lightbourne and Shaun Goater. Lifestyle's Lawrence Trott talks to Anita Goater and Rosemarie Lightbourne on the life of a soccer wife

The life of a footballer isn't always all it's cracked up to be... as the wives of Bermudian professionals Shaun Goater and Kyle Lightbourne will tell you.

They have seen up close a side of that profession that many don't get to see. And though it has largely been a wonderful experience living in England over the last decade, Anita Goater and Rosemarie Lightbourne cannot wait for their lives to return to some degree of normalcy.

"It's only the ten per cent, the David Beckhams, who have that glamourous life," said Anita. "They (players) miss their children's births and birthdays."

Added Rosemarie: "You can't plan anything and are not guaranteed a day off. Every time we have a birthday party we plan it for a Sunday, but come Sunday if they lose on the Saturday, the manager could say `you are in (to train) on Sunday, no matter what you have planned'."

And on Christmas Day the players are either training or travelling to an away match on Boxing Day. Matches are also always scheduled for New Year's day.

Times were hard in the beginning as Rosemarie remembers living in a hotel with Kyle for six months when he joined his first English club. Kyle had just signed for Scarborough and Rosemarie joined him in England after finishing four years of school in Canada. They lived in a bed and breakfast from December 1992 to the following May when the season ended.

Anita also moved permanently to England after Bermuda's World Cup qualifying campaign in `92 after going back and forth between England and Bermuda during Shaun's early days at Rotherham United. Adjusting to the English culture was a challenge. "The only thing that there was a shock about was the weather, and it didn't help that we were in South Yorkshire," said Mrs. Goater.

"It was really, really cold, I didn't have my licence then so I had to catch the bus a lot."

About an hour-and-a-half away in Scarborough were Kyle and Rosemarie. As the two Bermuda internationals formed a close friendship, so too have their wives who did not know each other while living in Bermuda. They have a lot in common, though. Each has two daughters; Kyle and Rosemarie the parents of Kiant? (six) and Kianya (five) while the Goaters have two-and-a-half year old twins Amaya and Anais.

"I found it quite difficult being away from family because I am really close with my family," Anita revealed. "We stayed in a hotel, Kyle and I, for six months," Rosemarie recalls. "I went to school when I was in Scarborough, at Yorkshire College, so I was continuing my education when I was out there. The people we lived with in Scarborough we are still in touch with today. They had the hotel (bed and breakfast) and were originally from Sheffield which was close to Shaun and Anita and when they went up to see their family they used to take us."

Kyle and Rosemarie married in 1995 and Shaun and Anita the following year. Ironically `96 was also the year that Shaun transferred from Rotherham to Bristol City and things began to look up for the striker.

Two years after that Shaun was sold again, this time to Manchester City, though his wife needed a lot of persuading that it was a good move as Manchester City dropped into the Second Division a few weeks later while Bristol City replaced them in the First Division. Plus she loved the Bristol area.

"I remember one of the first games he played for Man City and one of the midfielders played a back pass and scored an own goal," Anita recalled. "I remember driving home in the car and asking him `are you sure about this (move)' and he said `mark my word, it's going to work out'. When he gets like that I listen to him!"

Things did eventually work out as Goater went on to be the regular top scorer for the club, his goals leading them to three promotions in five years. Both he and Lightbourne are at the crossroads of their careers now and could be joining new clubs in the coming weeks leading up to the start of the new season.

Lightbourne, 34, has been released by Macclesfield and is contemplating retirement, while Goater has been granted his wish to leave Manchester City because of a lack of playing opportunities despite his impressive scoring record. Rumours have linked him with a number of clubs and his wife knows they may have to move again to another part of England.

"Before (without the children) it was different, I just saw it as a new experience, getting to see a new place and learn new things," said Mrs. Goater, giving her first interview as a footballer's wife.

"Now it's possible for us to have to move and it's going to be different now with the children. That's a part of being married to a footballer and I knew that going in. For me, if it's good for his career and it's not too much of a disruption for us as a couple and as a family, then that's what it comes down to."

While the Goaters have lived in Rotherham, Bristol and Manchester, the Lightbournes have remained in the Midlands since Kyle joined Walsall, despite playing for a number of clubs like Coventry and Stoke City. "With football you have the whole package and you know a contract means nothing," said Mrs. Lightbourne. "Ultimately Shaun and Kyle have the final say in whether they want to go or not. Anita and I are both very strong and they do respect our input.

"Fortunately we have always stayed locally. Even though we have moved house once or twice, we have been in the Midlands the ten years we have been in England.

"Since having the girls I have always said I won't move them, so Kyle travelled the two hours each way to Macclesfield every day. We have lots of friends who play football and they do move house and the kids therefore also move schools.

"Had we moved every time Kyle changed teams they would have been at three or four different schools."

Said Anita: "Most times they (club officials) like to meet the family and they take the family around and sell the club to you. This is Shaun's career and I know what the possibilities are. His career has given us the lifestyle we have so there are some minuses and pluses.

"I look at this time as Shaun's time and for his career, but when he finishes playing football that's when decisions are going to be made for the family and what I want to do. That's the payoff to being a footballer's wife, it can't work any other way and we knew that going in.

"It's only for ten or 15 years. I couldn't do this forever, be one of those wives whose husband then becomes a manager because a manager's schedule is even worse than a player's."

The wives, just like their husbands, have learned not to pay too much attention to transfer speculation in the newspapers. Earlier this week, Shaun was linked with yet another club, Cardiff City.

Anita reads the papers, Shaun doesn't, while Kyle does and Rosemarie doesn't.

"Shaun and I are alike, Anita and Kyle are alike, it's something we always notice," said Rosemarie.

Anita went to Maine Road regularly to watch Shaun's games and was there when he played in what could possibly be his final game for the club. And while City are a big club, one of the biggest in England, Anita admits she enjoyed the homely atmosphere of Bristol City.

"I loved Bristol City, it was a family club and the chairman really sold it to me," she said.

"They know that if they sell somewhere to a wife then if the wife is happy the footballer is happy. All the girls (players' wives) were at the same age, we all had the same interests and we used to get together once a month and go out. I was sad to leave Bristol City because I really liked it there."

She is also sad about leaving Manchester City where Shaun has had five productive years and where the couple have settled. She knows nothing is forever in football.

"It's the staff you know you are never going to see again, and at times when they were wishing us goodbye I was a bit teary-eyed," Mrs. Goater disclosed.

"I will always remember the good times, but I just know that things come to an end and you have to move on."

Kyle was more successful at Walsall than any other club and it is the club and the area that his wife has fond memories of. "I still go to Walsall to shop," she said.

"My favourite club would have to be Walsall, it was a small club, a family club, we had our first child while there and got married while he was there, so there are a lot of memories.

"Each club was significant and important. Coventry was an experience because it was that taste of something that we always wanted (Premier Division). To get there was different but I can honestly say I didn't enjoy it."

Even though Shaun has played in England longer than Kyle, it was Kyle who reached the Premiership first, when he joined Coventry City from Walsall. In the last five years Shaun's career has gone to new heights while Kyle moved to Stoke City after a short period with Coventry. Through it all the players have remained supportive of each other.

"We're friends, it's not a competition," said Rosemarie. "We're just as happy for Shaun's success and just as happy for Kyle's.

"We spend holidays together, Shaun and Anita are our girls' godparents and we are godparents for their children. They are our family in England."

Criticism of their husbands is something that the wives have to cope with. One has to be in England to appreciate their passion for football.

"At Rotherham I used to sit in front of two old men who used to rip into Shaun all the time and early on in his career I really didn't like it," Anita admitted.

"But then I got to accept that they spend their money every week, pay for their tickets and have the right to say what they want. But it only takes a goal for them to change their minds."

Said Mrs. Lightbourne: "That's why I don't read the papers. Football fans are very fickle. Today they like you, tomorrow they don't.

"You don't need the bad article to know that you had a bad game. And you don't need that fan to yell something to know that you are disappointed in your own performance."

Both couples were teenagers when they began dating, with Shaun and Anita in the same class at Whitney Institute. And because she sees a side of Shaun that few others see - when he is home as a husband and father - she sometimes wonders what all the fuss is about.

"When he did those talks and went to Whitney, I don't necessarily get to see that side of him when he goes to football functions," said Mrs. Goater.

"When we go to games I don't see the person that they are talking about. I always think `who are they talking about and what's the fuss, it's just Shaun'."

And Anita doesn't mind admitting that she wasn't impressed with his so-called star status as a North Village teenager, either. "I didn't know anything about football," she admits.

"When Shaun was trying to get to know me he said something to me like `don't you know I'm the star footballer for North Village?' and I said `who's North Village?' I think I knew that North Village had a team but I wasn't very impressed.

"I probably only watched Shaun play once here, I really didn't care about sports. I really didn't start watching him until he went to England. He has had to teach me everything about football and it took me years to get the offside rule."

Rosemarie, who was 15 when she and Kyle started dating, was different.

"Kyle played football and cricket and I've caught the bus to St. George's to watch him play in the Alliance Division," she remembered.

`I also watched him scramble (motocross) and when Kyle played Cup Match I went to the presentations."

Anita has always been private and had to get accustomed to being the wife of a famous footballer whose life is open to public scrutiny.

"I'm just a private person, and my life isn't that interesting, really," she said.