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We grilled former Liverpool defender John Scales for the lowdown on keepy-uppy world records and those horrendous FA Cup final suits.

Who was your sporting hero growing up?

Daley Thompson. I always wanted to be a decathlete. I loved what he did in the event. I was a budding athlete when I was younger - I still have dreams that perhaps I could have done it if I had tried. As for footballers, the guy I looked up to the most was probably Franco Baresi.

Who was the best player you played with or against?

When you played against Eric Cantona you knew he could produce such unexpected moments of brilliance that it made you scared right from the off.

If you hadn't become a footballer, what would you have done?

There was a time when I was really thinking about becoming an architect, but I don't think I had the intelligence or the discipline to go through six or seven years of training.

What one thing do you think would improve football?

I think that video technology could be used to a degree. If it can be done in 5-10 seconds then we should be looking at it. With so much at stake, football has to look at that seriously.

What was your most embarrassing moment as a player?

Probably at Leeds. I'm from Harrogate, so when I went up there with Wimbledon I begged, borrowed and stole about 30 or 40 tickets for all my friends and family to come to Elland Road. During the game I played a poor backpass to Hans Segers and Cantona just strolled in and finished past him. The stick I got for that was unbelievable!

So both of those were worse than wearing those cream suits before the 1996 FA Cup final?

There are certain things that make you wish you could turn the clock back and do differently, and that was one of them. It was a horrible experience. I still blame David James for that. It wasn't just the suits, but the ties, the shirts, the shades. Not even Jamie Redknapp made that look good!

What was the first record you ever bought?

The Jam - Going Underground, I think.

What are you listening to these days?

My wife loves her rock music, and we've been listening to Nickelback in the car. I'm no singer though. Whenever I start my two daughters scream for me to stop.

Is there a word you say too often?

I've been doing loads of interviews today, and so many of my answers have started with the word 'obviously'.

What's your guilty pleasure?

I hate to admit it, but I do enjoy the odd cigarette. I used to have the odd one towards the end of my career. I'm ashamed to say that because it's such a disgusting habit.

Right, so what's this world record attempt all about then?

We've been doing the Playstation Schools Cup for about six or seven years, and we were looking at different ways of getting the message out there. I had seen that Freestyling was an up and coming sport, and saw it as an exciting way of getting kids involved.

I met Dan Magness about six months ago, we got talking and he told me he wanted to try to break the record for keeping the ball up. He'll be in a glass case in the middle of Covent Garden for 24 hours - fingers crossed there won't be any incidents like when David Blaine came over here!

John Scales was talking at the start of the freestyle football 24 hour world record attempt by Dan Magness, in association with PlayStation Freestylers.(www.youtube.com/psfreestylers). Dan succeeded in keeping the ball up for 24 hours .

Tony Mabert / Eurosport