Windass finds answers in the past

CITY HERO REFLECTS ON HIS LIFE

- By BARRY COOPER

It's 17 years since Dean Windass rattled in That Goal against Bristol City at Wembley to give Hull City promotion to the Premier League for the first time in their history.

In the almost two decades since Windass’ iconic, mesmeric volley which changed the course of City’s history forever, the Hull-born powerhouse has come face to face with his struggles.

Against a backdrop of alcoholism, Windass has gone through the wringer, but he’s still here to tell the tale. And telling the tale is how we come together. Given where he’s come from, working at Birds Eye and in a rice factory, grafting in all weathers on various building sites, sitting in a back office at Waterstones on the site of the old Hull Daily Mail buildings on Jameson Street is probably quite salubrious by comparison.

Windass arrives on a day when he launches his latest book. Written over the course of the past few years, and started BC - before Covid - he openly admits there are parts of it he can’t remember. 'I've got dementia;' he says, when certain elements are put before him.

"My first book was stressful, I can’t do another one,’ he tells the Mail. “It might help someone. It’s more of my personal life. I gave my mate one last night, and he said he’s read three or four chapters, and he went, it’s deep, it's honest. I had to go to the toilet cos I was gonna start crying. He said it’s unbelievable. So that’s why I went: ‘Right, if it can help somebody, then great’