It seems PG really is terrified of the sight of fish...

From Di Canio's autobiography:

His team roommate was Peter Grant, captain of the Celtic squad. Peter did not speak Italian, and Paolo had minimal English.

By sheer chance I discovered that he [Peter] had a phobia about fish. It didn't make much sense to me, I guess it was just one of those weird conditions that nobody can explain, but every time they served fish at dinner, he would leave the table or, at the very least, look away in disgust.

Anyway, I decided to exploit it for my own amusement. One night I sneaked down into the kitchen of the hotel and found a huge salmon head. It was still fresh and rather creepy. The salmon had one of those eyes that seemed to follow you around the room. Even I was a little freaked out by it, and I love fish.

I placed the salmon head in a clear plastic bag and went back up to our room. Peter was lying on the bed.

"For you," I said cheerfully, tossing the fish head on the bed.

Peter must have jumped three feet into the air. I've never seen him move so fast. He ran to the other side of the room and started yelling. I couldn't quite make out what he was saying, but it was clearly to do with the fish.

He was staring at the salmon's head in absolute terror, like it was some monster, on its way to gobbling him up.

Naturally, I played dumb.

"What? You want fish?" I said, picking up the salmon head and taking a few steps towards him.

"No! No!" he yelled.

He was truly frightened. At first, I thought he was joking around with me, pretending to be scared, but pretty soon I realized he was completely terrified. So I chased him around the room with the fish. He was going mental, running into furniture, knocking down lamps, trying to get away from me. I was running after him, laughing my head off.

He eventually locked himself in the bathroom. I could hear him screaming at the top of his lungs.

"You madman, Di Canio! You're a f**king madman! Get that fish away! Get it out of there!"

I was laughing so hard, there were tears in my eyes. I hadn't laughed this much in years. I rattled the bathroom doorknob, just to scare him even further, and whispered: "Peter! Oh, Peter! Time for dinner! Time for fish!"

I harassed him like this for a good ten minutes. I could hear him thrashing around in the bathroom and occasionally telling me I was crazy.

Eventually, I chose a different tactic. I hid the fish head in his bed, just under the duvet. He went silent in the bathroom so I knocked on the door.

"Peter? It's OK, no fish! Come Peter, come Peter come. No fish for you. Fish finish, no more fish!"

I could hear him cursing, but for the life of me, I had no idea what he was saying. After a while he opened the door and peered out. I was lying on my bed watching television, looking as innocent as I possibly could.

He gave me a dirty look and scanned the room. Satisfied that the fish head was gone, he walked back to his bed.

"You're f**king mad, Di Canio!" he burbled as he got undressed for bed.

"Sorry, no more fish, Peter," I said as sweetly as I could.

He shook his head and pulled back the duvet. I'll never forget the look on his face when he discovered the salmon head staring back at him. He let out a blood curdling cry and ran to the opposite corner of the room. He was yelling and screaming, making no sense. I was doubled over with laughter.

Eventually I got rid of the fish, but it was a while before Peter spoke to me again. Despite this incident we became very good mates."

Posted By: duke of york, Nov 13, 23:33:13