From Oliver Holt, Football Correspondent, in Marseille
The Times 4 December 1997

At a hotel overlooking the point on the dockside where Popeye Doyle finally gave up the chase, Alan Shearer said yesterday that there was not an element of doubt in his mind that when the finest national teams and players converge for the World Cup here next summer, he, too, will be ready to make the French connection that England are praying for.

The speedy progress of his recovery had been widely speculated upon, but on the day when the frenzy of excitement surrounding the tournament next summer seemed to begin in earnest, when the high rollers like João Havelange, the Fifa president, and Sir Bobby Charlton came to town to grace the draw today, it was comforting to hear it from the horse's mouth.

He spoke, too, of his dream of emulating the men whose goalscoring feats at World Cup finals have made them sporting icons, men such as Paolo Rossi, Toto Schillaci and Gary Lineker, of how he could leap from injury, and one of the lowest moments of his career, to a high point and another burst of goalscoring in the 1998 finals.

Shearer, the top scorer in the European championship last year, the captain and the talisman whose presence could make the difference between England performing well in France next summer and arriving at the tournament with a realistic chance of winning it, said that his rehabilitation after the serious ankle injury that threatened his career was progressing "extremely well".

The injury, which occurred when his foot caught in the damp Goodison Park turf in August, broke bones and snapped ligaments in the ankle but Shearer said he is now running at threequarter pace, hopes to start twisting and turning soon and will be kicking a ball again in January.

Beyond that, on his rolling scale of targets, he has earmarked March as the month for his FA Carling Premiership return; time enough, he said, for him to regain match fitness in time to travel with England to Spain and Portugal for their final preparations for the World Cup and then on to France and the chance to establish himself as the deadliest striker on the planet.

As Ronaldo, the precocious Brazilian striker, and Gabriele Batistuta, the prolific Argentinian who plays for Fiorentina, arrived here yesterday in readiness for the gala match in the Stade Vélodrome that will precede the draw this evening, Shearer made a lightning trip to the south of France before flying back to Newcastle today to resume training.

He also announced that he had signed a lucrative new 14-year deal with Umbro, the sportswear manufacturers, but more than anything he wanted to make it plain that his consummate self-belief had not dissipated in the attempt to recover from his injury.

"I have got no doubts in my mind that I will be fit for the World Cup," he said. "I cannot guarantee it but in my mind, the surgeon's mind and the mind of the physio, there are no doubts.

"I was a bit down when I first had the injury but there were only about two months when I was sitting about not able to do anything so I have just taken it in stages and worked towards them. First of all, I could not wait for the plaster to come off. Then I could not wait to start jogging, then running, then sprinting, and now it is twisting that I am aiming at. That is how I have got through it."

Elsewhere, during a frenetic day's activity at the Palais de Congres next to the Stade Vélodrome, where the draw will take place, Havelange hinted that South Africa - not Germany or England - might be favourites to stage the hotly contested 2006 World Cup, and Fifa reacted coolly to the English Football Association's pleas for a larger allocation of tickets for England games next summer.

As for the draw, the last word on that went to Shearer, too. Unremittingly positive as ever, he shrugged off England's failure to be named among the top seeds. "I don't think being a seed matters," he said. "You are going to have to beat the best teams anyway. You might as well play them in the early stages than the latter stages. What we have achieved over the last few years teams will be looking at, and saying we would not fancy playing them. People are talking about whether I will be back or not but they have not done too badly without me."