Leeds United players have so far decided not to defer their wages to help the club but we went ahead with it and it turned out fine.

The situation was explained to us that the Supporters' Trust had come up with a plan to take over and within that plan, it would mean we would have to defer a percentage of our wages.

It was organised on a differential scale. The players whose pay fell into the lowest pay bracket didn't have to defer any, and it went up so whatever bracket your pay was in, you would pay slightly more.

We all chatted about it as a group of lads and we knew it was the only way forward as a football club.

We knew it was going to be hard. The ones on the highest wages deferred 25 per cent so we were losing a week of our monthly income. We all knew what would happen, and we knew that somewhere along the line we would get it back. It was a bit like a glorified savings plan in a way.

It showed the togetherness of the lads that we were willing to do it to make sure that the supporters got in control and that's what we had to do.

I am sure that if push comes to shove they (Leeds) will do it. I think they want to see that all avenues have been explored before going down that route and everyone has to agree collectively.

With ourselves it was the other way round. We were the ones who said we will make a stand and they followed suit. It was good for the Trust to know that they had our backing.

The creditors thought it was a great gesture because they had lost money but they knew that it needed to be done.

It's a shame that Leeds are in this situation. It's a tremendous club with great history and you don't want a club like that to go into administration.

I was watching a game the other day at their training ground and they were all in meetings. It flew my mind back to 12 months ago when we were going through it all. I thought about the time before New Year's Eve when we were stuck in a room for five hours together. The forms we were signing would have meant that we would have been out of contract if the club folded.

We lost the next game against Scunthorpe and we were like 'we've just signed our lives away'. The fact that we have come out the other side together makes us stronger.

If any Leeds players or supporters are reading this, there is life on the other side and we are proof of that.

It is difficult and it will continue to be so for us for a while yet but we have come through it. We have been realistic to our needs and our budgets and we have shown that you can still have success on the field.

I wish them well and I genuinely hope I'm not reading the papers at the end of the month saying they have gone into administration.

Updated: 09:32 Thursday, January 29, 2004