GAZZA'S 'BENEFACTORS' HAVE GOT IT WRONG

I CAN tell you now that it will be a small miracle if Paul 'Gazza' Gascoigne returns from America cured of alcohol addiction.
    I can tell you because I was just like Gazza almost 20 years - I could not stop drinking and my life was a terrible mangle of a mess.
    The thing is this: I didn't want to stop drinking - and you can only get well when you have a true desire to stop.
    So all the flashy rehabs in America will not provide the answer if Gazza has gone there merely for another spa break.
    He has been to AA and he has been to rehabs before - and look where he is now. He seems to be like George Best; another tragedy unravelling in front of our very eyes. He does not appear to want to stop drinking.
    There is no miracle cure. Just a reprive contingent on him changing his thinking - and there you have it. There is all this talk about his problem drinking but it is actually his problem thinking that is his real curse.
     Drinking, drugs, sex, spending sprees - they are all but the symptom of the illness of addiction.
     And until Paul really wants to stop drinking, and accepts he has to change his thinking, he will struggle.
     And while the apparent generosity of his 'benefactors' - including Chris Evans and Gary Linkeker - is admirable at face value, it does leave me feeling slightly uneasy.
     It would have been all the more admirable if they hadn't felt the need to go public with their generosity - and it might have made Paul's exodus easier. If he had left quietly and anonymously, he would not have had the added pressure of press intrusion when he arrived in Phoenix.
    Good luck, Gazza. Get honest, get humble, go to AA again when you come back home - and listen and ask for help in the rooms.
    Then you will have a proper chance of not  becoming another George Best.