Tag: Nuneaton Borough

Did Albion fans only get to see half a Lita?

PROLIFIC second tier goalscorer Leroy Lita was a Gareth Southgate free transfer signing for Middlesbrough where he scored 20 in 82 games.

Two years after Boro cashed in and sold him for £1.75m to newly promoted Premier League side Swansea City, Lita joined an injury-hit Brighton side three months into Oscar Garcia’s reign.

Goals had been harder to come by for Lita after Brendan Rodgers had signed him for the Swans and he was sent out on loan, spending time back in the Championship with Birmingham City and Sheffield Wednesday.

It was a familiar story for Lita who had been Reading’s first £1m player when Steve Coppell signed him from Bristol City in 2005.

He netted a goal every three games for the Royals, but towards the end of his four years at the Madejski Stadium, he’d gone on loan to Charlton Athletic and Norwich City.

By the autumn of 2013, Lita had become something of a footballing nomad, fed up with a lack of first team action under Michael Laudrup.

With Albion’s leading striker Leo Ulloa out for two months with a broken foot, and Craig Mackail-Smith and Will Hoskins also sidelined, Garcia brought the diminutive striker to Brighton on a three-month loan arrangement.

“He is strong, fast and direct, and he has shown he can score goals in the Championship,” Garcia told the club website. “He offers us something different going forward.”

I can remember being at the Keepmoat Stadium, Doncaster, when he scored his only goal for the club two minutes after going on as a substitute for Jake Forster-Caskey (he’d played with his stepdad Nicky Forster at Reading).

Forster-Caskey had scored a wonder goal with his left foot from 35 yards before Rovers equalised but visiting Albion went on to collect three points in a 3-1 win (David Lopez scored the other with a long range free kick).

Lita had made his debut in a 0-0 draw at Yeovil on 11 October, going on as a sub for Ashley Barnes and his home debut saw him replacing another loanee, Craig Conway, in a 1-1 draw with Watford.

The eager striker made a public plea via the Argus to be given a start but Garcia only ever used Lita off the bench for the Seagulls (he went on as a sub on five occasions and was an unused sub for three games).

“The staff have a bit of doubt but I feel fine,” Lita said. “When I am on the pitch my mind just takes over anyway.
“I don’t ever feel tired or not match fit. I know you still need your match fitness, but you have to get that at some point, so hopefully this week.”

Having got off the mark for the fifth Championship club he had served on loan, he added: “Once you get that first goal you are thinking about the next one and the next one. I am just looking forward to scoring plenty of goals.

“I know I can score goals wherever I go so I’ve never had that doubt. Whoever has doubted me it’s up to them. My belief in myself is not going to end until I am 50 years old and can’t move!”

But with Ulloa’s fitness restored, Lita’s final appearance in an Albion shirt was on 3 December when he went on for Barnes at the Amex as the Seagulls succumbed 2-1 to Barnsley.

Maybe Lita’s Albion spell was cursed from the start when he was handed squad number 44 (all the fours, droopy drawers)?

He was still only 28 when he arrived at the Amex with an impressive record of 101 goals in 330 league and cup games, 14 of which had been in Reading’s 2006-07 Premier League season.

“I know the Championship well,” Lita said in the matchday programme. “Consistency is the main thing at this level because everyone beats everyone; some teams start well and drop off, while others start badly then pick up a run of results. So, it’s all about putting a good run together then you never know what might happen.”

Lita followed in the footsteps of former Swansea teammates Kemy Agustien and Andrea Orlandi to the Amex, but he also knew Liam Bridcutt and Andrew Crofts from his time as a youngster at Chelsea.

He recalled summer training camps at Horsham with Bridcutt and he played in the same Chelsea junior side as Crofts. “They have both gone on to become really good players,” he said.

“It helps when you go to a club and know a few people but I think the style of play here will also suit me.

“It is similar to Swansea and the club only signs players here who know the system.

“I played against Brighton last season, scoring on my home debut for Sheffield Wednesday, and although we won that day, I was still impressed by the way the team played.” He had also played at the Amex before when he was on loan at Birmingham and (below right) was the subject of a page feature in the matchday programme.

Born in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo on 28 December 1984, it was as a teenager on Chelsea’s books that he couldn’t believe his luck to be sharing a training pitch with Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Eidur Gudjohnsen.

“I would go home and see them on TV and the next day I would be training with them,” he told The Guardian. “It was unbelievable.”

Reporter Jon Brodkin wrote: “Chelsea broke his heart by releasing him but his three years at the club he supports were hardly wasted. The thrill of being a ballboy was surpassed by training with the first team’s front two.”

Lita told him: “I was 15 and the academy director said he had spoken to my school and I could have a couple of days off a week to train with the first team and the ressies [reserves]. It was a great opportunity and I learned a lot from it.

“Hasselbaink’s finishing was unbelievable, he didn’t mess about. He could place it and smash it. I mainly did finishing with them, not much else, but I could see as well how professional they were and how they looked after themselves.”

After Lita’s release, he contacted a few clubs – Fulham were interested but didn’t offer a contract – and he was aware that after leaving Arsenal Andy Cole had made a new start to his successful career at Bristol City.

It was the Robins who gave Lita an opportunity and former Albion skipper Danny Wilson handed him his first team debut at the beginning of the 2002-03 season when he was still only 17.

His first league goal was a late winner on 28 September 2002 to secure a 3-2 victory after going on as a substitute at Port Vale (for whom an 18-year-old Billy Paynter had scored).

“The striker hit a glorious goal to end Vale’s hopes of a point after they had fought back to level matters just a minute earlier,” said the BBC report of the game.

It wasn’t until the following season that he was given a professional contract and it was only after Brian Tinnion succeeded Wilson as manager in 2004-05 that Lita established himself in the City side. He scored 29 goals in all competitions and that form earned him a call-up to the England under-21s, Lita having decided not to play for his birth country.

He scored on his debut on 8 February 2005 when he went on as a sub for Justin Hoyte in a 2-1 defeat against the Netherlands at Derby’s Pride Park.

Those goals also earned him a £1m move to Reading, even though Tinnion advised him against the move, believing a Premiership club would come in for him.

“Once I got down here, I knew it was right,” Lita told The Guardian. “I want to go a step at a time. Reading are a good club, they’re looking to get into the Premiership and that’s where I want to be.”

He went on to score 15 goals in 25 league and cup games (+ seven as a sub) as Reading topped the Championship, and he returned to the England under-21 fold in February 2006.

He was on home turf at the Madejski Stadium when he earned his second cap, again as a sub, replacing David Nugent in a 3-1 win over Norway (future Albion loanee Liam Ridgewell was among his teammates).

A year later, after finding the net in the Premier League with Reading, Lita got a third cap as a substitute (for James Milner) and scored again in a 2-2 draw against Spain at Pride Park. Liam Rosenior was also a substitute that day.

Lita’s first start for the under 21s came the following month, on 24 March, in a 3-3 draw with Italy in the first game played at the new Wembley Stadium, in front of 55,700. On 5 June the same year, Lita scored England’s fifth goal in a 5-0 win over Slovakia at Carrow Road after he’d gone on as a sub for Nigel Reo-Coker.

Lita was an overage player in the 2007 UEFA European Under 21 Championship: he missed an 88th minute penalty after going on as a sub in a 0-0 draw with the Czech Republic but scored in each of the three games he started: 2-2 v Italy, 2-0 v Serbia and 1-1 v the Netherlands (who won the tie 13-12 on penalties). But a full cap eluded him.

Lita was a regular throughout Reading’s first top-flight campaign. In a side that include Ivar Ingimarsson and Steve Sidwell, Lita scored 14 times in 26 league and cup starts plus 12 appearances off the bench.

But with Kevin Doyle and Dave Kitson the preferred strike duo in 2007-08, Lita’s game time was much reduced and he went on loan to Charlton in March 2008.

It was a similar story the following season when he scored seven times in 16 games during a three-month loan at Norwich City – the haul included a hat-trick against eventual champions Wolves.

The excellent Flown From The Nest website, that profiles former Norwich players, recalled how that treble attracted the interest of plenty of other clubs, but City boss Glenn Roeder said: “It’s a better problem to have than him not scoring and playing rubbish – then none of us want him. What can you do?

“He was brought here to score goals. He was a little bit rusty in his first game which was understandable. He did better in the second game against Bristol City when he had a couple of chances which unfortunately never went in, and then in the third game on Tuesday night, we saw the real Leroy Lita and what he is all about.”

Lita returned to Reading and played in a FA Cup third round defeat at Cardiff and although Sheffield United made a bid for him, he preferred to stay with the Royals.

Nevertheless, at the end of the season, he finally left the Madejski and headed to Teesside on a three-year deal.

On signing for Boro, Lita said: “The manager has been after me for about a year, it’s great to feel wanted. I have a lot of respect for the gaffer and I want to do well for him and the club.

“I aim to repay him for his faith in me with goals. That’s the main strength to my game and I’m looking forward to scoring goals for Middlesbrough.”

He told the Northern Echo: “I’m raring to go. I haven’t enjoyed the last two seasons one bit, but this is a fresh start and I’m excited about the challenge.

“Other clubs were interested in signing me, but there was only once place I wanted to go and that was Middlesbrough.”

Southgate added: “Leroy has a hunger to score goals and his goalscoring record in the Championship in particular is very strong.

“His record says he gets one in two at this level so that will be important for us. I think he has a point to prove and, when he’s fully fit, he will relish the challenge.”

It wasn’t long before Southgate was succeeded by Gordon Strachan but Lita made the second highest number of appearances (41) in that season’s squad and scored nine goals as Boro finished mid-table.

There was yet another managerial change the following season, with the return of former player Tony Mowbray, but Boro once again finished mid-table with a side that featured Joe Bennett at left back and Jason Steele in goal.

Lita scored 11 times in 40 matches, which was enough to attract newly-promoted Swansea. “I’ve had a good chat with Leroy,” said Mowbray. “He has a chance to play in the Premier League and good on him. His talent has earned him that chance.”

But he only scored twice in six starts (+ 12 appearances off the bench) all season and in September 2012, Lee Clark signed him on a three-month loan for Birmingham.

“I know Leroy very well having worked with him at Norwich during a loan spell in which he scored seven goals in 16 games,” said Clark. “He’s a proven goalscorer who has power and pace and there’s no doubt that he’ll add quality to my squad.”

Lita scored three goals in 10 games for Birmingham before being recalled early, but in late January 2013, he joined Sheffield Wednesday on loan until the end of the season.

Wednesday manager Dave Jones told BBC Radio Sheffield: “Leroy has a lot of experience at this level and the one above. It could be with a view to a permanent deal. This lets us have a look at him and he can have a look at us.” But he only scored twice in nine appearances for the Owls.

Released by Swansea at the end of the 2013-14 season, Lita was then reunited with Danny Wilson, manager at newly relegated League One Barnsley.

“He was my first manager and I like the way he works,” said Lita. “He’s got a lot of trust in me and I’ve got a lot of trust in him.

“I enjoyed my time under him as a youngster. He helped me a lot and helped me progress in my career so far. I just want to get back to playing football regularly again and I’m going to get that opportunity here.”

He scored in his first two league games but didn’t register again for 21 games. When Wilson was replaced by Lee Johnson in February 2015, within a matter of weeks Lita joined lowly Notts County on loan until the end of the season but was unable to prevent their relegation.

On expiry of his Barnsley contract, Lita moved to Crete side AO Chania in August 2015 but was back in England the following March, signing a short term deal with League Two Yeovil Town, where he scored once in eight games. That was his last league club in England.

He scored five goals in 21 games for Thai Premier League side Sisaket in 2017 and on his return to the UK turned out for a number of non-league clubs: Margate, Haverhill Rovers, Salisbury and Chelmsford City.

In May 2020, the Coventry Evening Telegraph hailed his signing for Nuneaton Borough, whose manager Jimmy Ginnelly told the newspaper: “His partner is from Nuneaton and they’ve recently moved into a house on The Longshoot, which is just five minutes from the ground, so this is a win-win situation for both parties.

“These sorts of players don’t come onto Nuneaton’s radar very often so we moved quickly and obviously all of us here at the Boro are very excited.”

He scored eight goals in 33 appearances for Nuneaton, went on to play for Southern League Premier Division Central rivals Stratford Town before moving on to Hednesford Town, where he’s still playing.

In March 2022, the Express and Star reported: “Lita lit up Keys Park last night as he smashed a debut hat-trick to help Hednesford to a 3-1 victory over Stourbridge.”

Lowe and behold, the centre back who couldn’t get a game

KEITH LOWE is one of those curious cases of a player who joined the Albion on loan but didn’t kick a ball in anger!

He played one game for the reserves and sat on the first team bench for five matches without getting on.

Lowe was just 20 and well down the centre half pecking order at Wolves when Mick McCarthy had just taken charge.

At the beginning of the 2006-07 season, Albion’s first choice centre backs, Adam Hinshelwood and Guy Butters, were both out injured, and Joel Lynch was a doubt after picking up a niggle in a pre-season game. So, manager Mark McGhee took the opportunity to get Lowe on loan for a month.

Candid former Wolves manager McGhee told the Albion matchday programme how the club had done its homework on the youngster, who he described as a “no frills central defender who gets in where it hurts to head it and boot it. Obviously, that’s something we need – a big lad in our box to head it away. With the absence of Guy Butters, we’ve missed that sort of height in pre-season so I hope he will do well for us.

“Obviously I know people well at Wolves, so we don’t think for a minute that we are signing Rio Ferdinand, but we’ve signed a steady young player who’s determined to make a career for himself and wants to do well.”

For his part, Lowe told the Argus: “I’ve found out that there are a few injuries in the defence here so hopefully I’ll get into the team as soon as possible and play as much football as I can.”

Born in Wolverhampton on 13 September 1985, Lowe had progressed through the Wolves academy and was given a first team debut by Dave Jones in the League Cup at the beginning of the 2004-05 season, three weeks before his 19th birthday. Two months later Lowe was awarded a three-and-a-half-year contract and he said:“My family are all Wolves supporters so it’s a bit of a dream come true.”

Although he made 13 appearances at either right-back or centre-back that season, he only played three matches for them under Glenn Hoddle the following season although he gained experience out on loan, at Burnley (under Steve Cotterill), and QPR in the Championship, and Swansea in League One.

“A lot of people have left Wolves but the one thing they have got is a lot of defenders and they have scrapped their reserve team now so it was best to go and play somewhere else,” Lowe told Andy Naylor of the Argus. “I’m looking to play as many games as I can. I wasn’t getting the opportunity I would have liked at Wolves so I jumped at the chance to come and play some football.”

Lowe said that even though McCarthy had not long been in charge, he had already got his starting eleven in mind. “I hadn’t asked to go out on loan yet, but from what I can gather the manager here ‘phoned up our manager and it seemed like the ideal place to come,” he said. “I’ve not been down to Brighton before but my first impressions, even from the drive in, were it seems really nice and I’m really looking forward to it.”

He added: “My aim is to get noticed at Wolves but I’m open to anything that happens. If it’s not going to happen for me at Wolves then I’ll stay here as long as the management staff want me.”

Unfortunately for Lowe, Lynch recovered from a pre-season thigh injury in time to make the starting line-up for the season opener at Rotherham, and he never did manage to force his way into the side.

By mid-August, he confessed in another Argus interview: “I’m very disappointed. I came down here to play football but it hasn’t happened. You’ve got to be professional about it, keep working hard and hopefully it will come.

“We kept clean sheets in our first two games and, when things like that happen, you can’t really go knocking on the gaffer’s door and say: ‘Why am I not in the team?’ The lads have done really well but I’ll just keep working hard in training and hopefully he’ll take note.”

Lowe pressed his claims for a place by scoring on his debut for the Reserves, heading an equaliser from a Tommy Fraser corner on 54 minutes, in front of McGhee, in a 2-1 win away to QPR. He said: “It was nice to get 90 minutes under my belt and it was a good performance and result, so I was pretty pleased.

“Hopefully I’ve caught the gaffer’s attention. I thought I did well enough and I’m just trying to push to get into the team.”

It didn’t happen, though, and McGhee was at pains to point out the circumstances. “We brought him here to play but then Joel got fit and suddenly looked absolutely fine.

“By the time we got Keith down here we weren’t sure he had trained with us enough and done enough work with us. Joel was there and we decided not to gamble with Keith but to play Joel, who has then played so well, so things have conspired against him a wee bit.”

McGhee added: “He did fine at QPR. In the second half, particularly, when we pushed them up the park and asked them to defend in behind, he did it well.”

Lowe might have got a chance in the Carling Cup against Boston United but Wolves were only prepared to allow him to be cup-tied if Albion intended keeping him longer – and McGhee had decided to add to his defensive options by signing veteran Georges Santos.

Lowe headed back to the Black Country, but the following month he went on loan to Cheltenham Town, where he finally saw some league action, playing in 18 matches. It sowed the seed for a later period in his career: he played 133 games for League Two Cheltenham between 2010 and 2014 in a career that ultimately embraced 617 appearances for 13 different clubs.

Lowe spent the final season of his Wolves contract on loan at League One Port Vale. Signed by Martin Foyle, Lowe also featured under his successors Dean Glover and Lee Sinnott, playing in 31 matches. But Vale were relegated in 23rd spot and the defender finally bade farewell to his boyhood club in May 2008.

He dropped out of the league for the 2008-09 season, appearing in 52 games for Conference Premier League side Kidderminster Harriers.

Budget issues meant he was released at the end of the season and the following campaign he was back in the league with Hereford United, playing 26 games for the League Two Bulls under John Trewick and former Wolves boss Graham Turner. That spell at Cheltenham came next.

During two years at York City, Lowe collected no fewer than four Player of the Year awards in 2014-15 – three from supporters’ groups and one from local newspaper The Press.“Keith deserves the awards for his consistency,” City boss Russ Wilcox told the newspaper. “To play every league game is always an achievement. It shows you are doing things right on and off the pitch. It means you look after yourself, train properly and are a good professional.”

Released by new York boss Jackie McNamara, Lowe returned to Kidderminster, by then in the National League, where he spent another 18 months, much of it as club captain.

National League Macclesfield Town was his next port of call and he played in all of their matches as they won promotion back into the league in 2017. However, it ended on a sour note in 2019 when he was one of six players to issue the club with a winding up order for unpaid wages.

The 2019-20 season saw him turn out for three different clubs: Southern League Nuneaton Borough, National League North side Bradford Park Avenue and latterly (until the Covid pandemic called a halt to the league) Kidderminster for a third spell.

At the end of the 2021-22 season, he announced his intention to concentrate on developing a career as a teaching assistant. He told the Kidderminster club website: “I’m not ready to stop yet and am very much planning to play part-time next year, but it feels like now is the time to move away from the full-time game and think about the future and the career I’ve been building in schools.”

Brighton trial turned sour for Gerrard’s pal Tom Culshaw

A LOYAL MEMBER of Steven Gerrard’s backroom staff once tried to revive his playing career with Brighton after he’d been let go by Liverpool.

Tom Culshaw goes way back to schoolboy days with Gerrard and was a former youth team player alongside him at Liverpool.

He is now technical coach at Aston Villa, a role he held previously at Rangers after the pair also worked together with the Reds under 18s.

Back in September 1999, the central defender linked up with the fourth-tier Seagulls a few months into Micky Adams’ first reign as manager. Culshaw played for Ian Culverhouse’s reserve side on a trial basis on a drizzly night at Woodside Road, Worthing, and didn’t make the most of the opportunity.

Albion went down 3-2 to visitors Cambridge and a subsequent matchday programme didn’t hold back in apportioning blame.

With the score level at 1-1 it reported: “Albion fell further behind two minutes before the break when Culshaw made a mess of an attempted header back to (Mark) Ormerod, and (Nathan) Lamey picked up the loose ball and took his opportunity well, lobbing the Albion ‘keeper.”

Although Albion restored parity through Scott Ramsay, Daniel Chillingworth added a third for the visitors. Culshaw was subbed off in favour of Chris Beech, and wasn’t seen in an Albion shirt again.

The Brighton trial came as Culshaw desperately tried to get a foothold in the game after the disappointment of being let go after four years as a professional with Liverpool.

A few months earlier, he played for Norwich’s under 21 side against Bristol City in a friendly; he later linked up with Conference side Nuneaton Borough and went on to Northern League teams Leigh RMI and Witton Albion.

“When I left, I found it tough going on trials for lower league clubs,” Culshaw told liverpoolfc.com. “I got offered a couple of contracts at League Two clubs and I decided to knock them back thinking I could do a bit better.

“But when I started to go for trials it was taking longer and longer, and then eventually I just fell out of love with the game.”

He walked away from football for a while, joining up with a friend who had a tarmacking firm. He admitted: “It was hard, it was a tough few years for me. Especially when I saw my mates, the likes of Steven, Carra (Jamie Carragher), Michael Owen – lads who I’d come through the youth team with – progressing.

“I probably had my first bump in the road at 21 and I just really didn’t know how to handle it.”

Until that point, it had all been going so well. Born in Liverpool on 10 October 1978, Culshaw played street football with Gerrard in Ironside Road, on Huyton’s Bluebell Estate, where Culshaw’s grandparents lived. A friendship that included a mutual love of football began when they were pupils at Cardinal Heenan High School.

Culshaw became technical coach under Steve Gerrard at Rangers

“Steven is a year younger than Tom but they both played for me in the under 14 Liverpool Schoolboys FA team in 1992-93,” their former coach Dave Singleton told the Daily Record.

“Stevie was very small and didn’t start growing until he was 16 so I used to put him on the wing because schoolboys football was based on size and a lot of teams just picked the biggest lads who could plough their way through anything.

“So I put Stevie on the wing where he wouldn’t get hurt and could use his skill. Tom was a centre half and the captain of the team.

“He was a commanding centre half but exceptionally skilful too. He could play the ball out from the back.

“We had one game where he picked the ball up on the edge of our penalty area, dribbled the full length of the pitch and scored from the opposite penalty area.”

Singleton added: “He had a physical presence and was good in the air so he was great for set-pieces and comfortable with either foot but stronger on his right.

“They were exceptionally nice lads, a credit to their school, parents and city. It’s so great to see people like that go on and do well.”

An England Schoolboys international, Culshaw spent two years at the FA School of Excellence at Lilleshall at the same time as Owen and Carragher. Culshaw joined Everton at the time Gerrard signed for Liverpool but he was let go and moved to Tranmere Rovers, where his talents flourished.

He was named as captain of the Liverpool City Schoolboys team and Liverpool snapped him up. He joined Gerrard at the club’s Vernon Sangster Centre of Excellence, near Anfield, and he progressed through the under 18s under the guidance of Steve Heighway, Dave Shannon and Hughie McAuley, signing professional aged 17.

On stepping up to the reserves, who were managed by Sammy Lee, he was handed the captain’s armband. “I was around Ronnie Moran, Roy Evans, and all the old-school Boot Room staff,” he said. “I’d progressed and everything went well for me. The national school, playing for England, joining Liverpool, signing professional at 17, progressing to the reserves, captaining the reserves.

“I was a pro for four years. It was a great time at Melwood because everyone was on the same site. I was training with Jamie Redknapp, Robbie Fowler, and Steve McManaman and learned an awful lot from them.”

However, after those four years, and having seen his contemporaries make the step up to the first team that eluded him, Culshaw was forced to look elsewhere after manager Gerard Houillier overlooked him.

Disillusioned by his prospects in the UK, Culshaw moved abroad and started coaching youngsters in Spain. Having decided to pursue that career path, he returned to the UK in 2011 in a part-time role at Liverpool’s academy while studying for his badges.

In 2017, it was his boyhood pal Gerrard who turned his job into a full-time position by promoting him to become his under 18s assistant.

Gerrard said at the time: “When I started out full-time as an apprentice, Tommy was a year above me so I know everything about him and he knows everything about me. I thought he was the perfect partner to go into it.”

Receiving a coaching certificate from former England manager Steve McLaren

Culshaw has remained a key part of the close-knit group around Gerrard ever since, following him to Glasgow Rangers and then to Aston Villa. His particular focus is on set pieces as former Albion centre back Connor Goldson once explained in an interview for Rangers TV.

“Tom Culshaw the coach works on us before every game, different set pieces, defending and attacking, and how we’re going to set up,” he said. “We always know what we’re doing. We always know the routines or what’s happening.”

Captain James Tavernier added: “We work extremely hard on set-pieces in training. TC has us working hard with them all week and it shows in the games as they can effectively give you three points.”

In that interview with the Record, Singleton added: “Whenever I watch games on TV now and see them in the dugout together I feel immense pride.

“Steven’s career achievements speak for themselves and it’s great when the person who isn’t the figurehead gets some credit and there is nobody more deserving than Tom.

“When they were younger you’d have thought both of them would have gone on to make it but there’s a lot of luck in football, being in the right place at the right time.”

Big money signing Peake hit a trough at the Albion

EXPENSIVE FLOP Jason Peake was a victim of the problems clouding Brighton’s very existence in the mid-1990s.

The blond-haired midfielder heralded elsewhere for his “excellent left foot” and “one of the best passers of the ball in the lower leagues” failed to live up to expectations at the Goldstone and was dubbed Jimmy Case’s “biggest blunder”.

Leicester-born Peake had played alongside Case for Halifax Town, where he’d moved after making only a handful of appearances with his hometown club.

Former Albion loanee centre half John McGrath, assisted by Frank Worthington, failed to halt the Shaymen dropping out of the league in 1993, and Peake spent a season in the Conference before reviving his league career with Rochdale. Nine goals in 103 appearances attracted suitors and it was Albion who bought him for a fee set by tribunal of £80,000 – a huge sum for a cash-strapped club.

A further £15,000 was to be paid after 20 games and another £25,000 if he got to 40 appearances. He made 35 appearances before being frozen out by Case’s successor, Steve Gritt. It was to be a familiar pattern: changes of manager often led to him moving on.

Apart from the bigger picture shenanigans going on at the Albion under the hated Archer-Bellotti regime, Peake’s personal issues centred around relocation expenses he said he was entitled to – but Bellotti refused to pay up.

According to fansnetwork.co.uk: “Peake was being forced to commute from Leicester following several broken promises by the Brighton board. Peake’s dream move turned into nothing short of a nightmare for him.”

The midfielder had trials at Northampton and Cambridge before he finally managed to get away, in October 1997, signing for First Division Bury. He rather diplomatically said: “The situation at Brighton has been well documented over the past year and just let’s say when I got there the situation was not as I’d been led to believe it would be.

“I have not been happy there for some time and the new consortium have been great in letting me get away.”

The official version in the matchday programme said: “Jason had problems in settling in the South after his move from Rochdale and the move has suited him and his family. Should Bury sell him for a fee at any time, Albion are assured of a share in any such deal.”

As ever, the season had begun with great expectations and in his matchday programme notes welcoming new signings Peake and Ian Baird, Case said: “They are both quality players and I am sure that they will be great acquisitions for the club this coming season.

“I firmly believe we now have a skilful blend of experienced and young players that can mount a serious challenge for promotion at the first attempt and I believe we will surprise many teams this season.”

Peake went straight into the side in the no.8 shirt but after he’d played 19 games on the trot Albion were anchored at the foot of the table.

After Case was sacked, Peake found himself on the bench more than in the starting line-up; local lad Kerry Mayo taking over from him.

Supporters were certainly not impressed by Peake, perhaps summed up by ‘Lenny Rider’ on North Stand Chat who said: “Huge outlay for where the club was at the time. His kinder critics would say he was disappointing, the more cynical amongst us would argue he was actually nicking a living at the Goldstone.”

New Albion chairman Dick Knight cut Albion’s losses by giving Peake a free transfer to Bury in exchange for the relocation cash dispute being dropped.

Bury boss Stan Ternent was lauded for pulling off something of a coup, and Peake told the Lancashire Telegraph: “It is a fantastic chance for me to prove myself. It has taken me a long time to get into the First Division and I don’t want to blow the opportunity.”

Sadly, those words came back to haunt him because he ended up playing just six times for the Shakers, three as a left-back and three as a sub.

To quote fansnetwork.co.uk again: “Peake’s silky skills didn’t really fit in with the kick and rush tactics of Ternent’s Bury team, and Peake found himself stranded back in the reserves.”

The following summer, a return to Rochdale, where he had first made a name for himself, looked like an ideal solution but things didn’t go well under the management team of Graham Barrow and Joe Hinnigan, who left the club at the end of the 1998-99 season.

In something of a twist of Peake’s usual fortunes when there had been a managerial change, his career began to blossom again under new boss Steve Parkin.

“The free flowing style of football on offer was much more suited to Peake’s natural style,” according to fansnetwork.co.uk. “Peake was awesome in the opening months of the 1999-2000 season and was at the heart of a side which led the table early on.”

He got amongst the goals including “a superb overhead kick from the edge of the area against old team Halifax Town, which saw him win the club’s goal of the season competition and awarded ‘Better than Pele’ status on Sky’s Soccer AM”.

Nevertheless, the season ended on a sour note, as the clarkechroniclersfootballers blog explained: “We lost two re-arranged home games against Peterborough and Northampton in April which would have secured us a play-off place. Jason featured in both games and Steve Parkin singled him out as the scapegoat accusing him of ‘going missing’. It’s always easier for a manager to castigate a player he didn’t sign but we knew there was some truth in it.”

With his contract up at the end of the season, Peake chose to move on, this time to Plymouth Argyle, at the time managed by Argyle legend Kevin Hodges.

Argyle move didn’t work out

It began well enough for him personally and, of Argyle’s 2-0 home win over Carlisle on 16 September, BBC Sport said: “Plymouth doubled their lead in the 17th minute when man of the match Jason Peake scored a superb opportunist goal.

“Peake’s initial attempt came back off visiting central defender Julian Darby and the Plymouth midfielder reacted with a brilliant dipping volley which gave keeper Luke Weaver no chance.

“Weaver denied Peake a second goal in the 80th minute, making a tremendous backward save to keep out the home player’s far post header.”

It followed him scoring four days earlier in a 4-1 defeat at Shrewsbury and was only the second win out of eight. When the next three games were lost, Hodges was replaced by Paul Sturrock, who didn’t take long to decide Peake’s future.

Before Christmas, the midfielder was dispatched to Nuneaton Borough on loan and the move was made permanent in February 2001. Although his league career was over, Peake played 54 games for Borough but was sidelined for periods with a troublesome Achilles tendon injury and he eventually retired in 2003 and became a full-time chiropodist in Leicester.

Born in Leicester on 29 September 1971, Peake played for England schoolboys and was taken on as a trainee by the Foxes.

Manager David Pleat gave him his first team debut in a 2-1 defeat at Charlton Athletic in a Full Members Cup game on 14 November 1989.

It was another year before he made his league debut in the old Division Two, as a sub in a 2-2 draw away to Oxford United.

The same month he also went on as a sub in a 1-0 home defeat to Wolves in the Full Members Cup, played in front of a paltry 4,705 crowd. Four days later he started but was subbed off against Newcastle in a game that remarkably finished 5-4 to the Foxes.

His involvement straddled the end of the Pleat regime and the caretaker manager spell of former Everton boss Gordon Lee, who, in the season Albion reached the play-off final v Notts County, managed to keep Leicester up by only two points while West Brom were relegated along with bottom club Hull City. (Lee died aged 87 in March 2022).

Across three months, Peake had three more starts (and was subbed off in two of them) plus three more games off the bench. Three days after City lost 3-0 at Brighton (goals from Mike Small, Dean Wilkins and Bryan Wade), Peake made a rare start and scored his only goal for the club in a 2-1 home win over Barnsley on 23 February 1991.

Earlier that month (on 6 February 1991), he earned an England under-19 cap when he was sent on as a sub for Aidan Newhouse as England lost 5-1 to Denmark at the Manor Ground, Oxford.

Peake’s last game for Leicester was against Newcastle United on 2 March 1991. He didn’t get a look-in under Pleat’s successor Brian Little and, in February 1992, he joined Hartlepool on loan, playing six matches and scoring once.

The goalscoring legend who slipped through Brighton’s net

ONES that got away always make for fascinating stories and a striker who went on to become a goalscoring legend slipped through the net at both Brighton and Burnley.

Ian Muir is hailed an all-time hero by fans of Tranmere Rovers for whom he scored 180 goals in all competitions during what many regard as the best period in Rovers’ history. If it hadn’t been for injury, he could have played in the Premier League and Europe for Leeds United.

But he’s barely remembered for the struggles he had to get games at Brighton, let alone in a month with the Clarets.

Success could have eluded himf it hadn’t been for the time he spent at Brighton alongside the legendary Frank Worthington. He was considering a move to non-league Maidstone United, but, when Worthington quit Brighton in the summer of 1985 to take his first step into management on the Wirral, he made Muir his first signing.

“Ian Muir was a fantastic forward with great touch,” Worthington told Spencer Vignes in an Albion matchday programme interview. “He did things in training you just wouldn’t believe, yet he wasn’t even making the side at Brighton under Chris (Cattlin).”

Cattlin had taken the youngster on after he had been given a free transfer by Birmingham City where he’d made just one League Cup appearance in the 1983-84 season under Ron Saunders. But competition for forward places was intense with the likes of initially Alan Young and Terry Connor, then Worthington, Mick Ferguson and later Alan Biley.

Muir’s first involvement with the Albion first team was as a non-playing substitute for the home 3-0 win over Leeds on 24 March 1984. He made his debut the following Saturday at Fratton Park in place of the injured Young and was brought down in the penalty area only 20 minutes into the game to earn Brighton a spot kick, which Danny Wilson successfully buried to put the Seagulls ahead.

Muir in his Brighton days

Connor had a chance to put Albion further ahead and, as the matchday programme reported, “Muir sliced wide as Connor made the opening” before Pompey began a devastating fight back.

Albion had been hoping to complete a fourth win in a row for the first time in six years, but it wasn’t to be, and, into the bargain, Muir couldn’t cap his debut with a goal, instead firing wide when set up by winger Steve Penney.

Unfortunately, this was the game when former Spurs and Arsenal centre back Willie Young, on loan from Norwich City, was given the runaround by Pompey centre forward Mark Hateley, and, courtesy of a second half blitz, the home side ran out 5-1 winners.

Alan Young was restored to the no.9 shirt in the next match and scored twice as Albion beat Grimsby Town 2-0 at the Goldstone, but Muir was drafted in to take Connor’s place in the away game at Shrewsbury Town.

That match ended in a 2-1 defeat, but the News of the World angled its report on an unlucky afternoon for the young forward.

“It just wasn’t Ian Muir’s day,” wrote reporter Brian Russell. “The Brighton teenager (actually he was 20) playing only his second league game could so easily have taken the limelight from Shrewsbury two-goal hero, 17-year-old Gerry Nardiello.

“Young Muir headed the ball home in the eighth minute from Jimmy Case’s corner, but it was ruled out (for a foul by centre-half Eric Young).”

Alan Young produced a powerful header from a Muir cross that Steve Ogrizovic (later of Liverpool and Coventry City fame, of course) saved brilliantly.

Russell continued: “With Brighton battling to cancel out Nardiello’s 23rd-minute opportunist goal, striker Muir suffered. His delicate chip left the ‘keeper clutching thin air, but Shrewsbury skipper Ross McLaren headed out.

“Brighton levelled it with 15 minutes to go (through Eric Young). But, five minutes later, Nardiello pounced on Chick Bates’s chested pass to beat Joe Corrigan.”

Muir was on the scoresheet when Albion’s reserve side began the 1984-85 season with a 1-0 win over reserve team boss George Petchey’s old club, Millwall. It was a very experienced team featuring Corrigan in goal, full-backs Chris Ramsey and Graham Pearce – who had both played for the Seagulls in the FA Cup Final the year before – along with Steve Gatting and Neil Smillie. Giles Stille and Alan Young were also in the line-up.

Muir had to wait until 13 October for his next first team opportunity when he was a non-playing sub as Albion went down 2-1 at Oxford United. He then got on as a sub for Connor in a 0-0 home draw with Barnsley, but the game was so dire that Cattlin very publicly forfeited a week’s wages.

After three goalless games straddling October and November 1984, Cattlin paired Muir with Worthington away to Blackburn on 10 November but still the drought couldn’t be breached, and Albion went down 2-0. The next game, Cattlin tried Ferguson and Connor as his front pair – same outcome: a 1-0 defeat at Leeds.

Muir didn’t get another chance with the Albion but in the spring of 1985 was sent out on loan to Lou Macari’s Swindon Town, where he played in three matches (and his teammates included Ramsey, who’d been released by Cattlin, and Garry Nelson, who would later become a promotion winner with the Seagulls).   

Somewhat curiously, when commenting on Muir’s departure from the club that summer, Cattlin said in the matchday programme: “I am sure Ian will get goals at whatever level he plays.”

Sure enough, Prenton Park eventually became his spiritual home and, although Tranmere struggled to stay in the fourth tier initially, Muir’s goalscoring exploits were synonymous with four years in which Rovers were promoted twice and appeared at Wembley five times. Highlights saw Muir score in the FA’s centenary celebrations in 1988 and an acrobatic and precise volley in Tranmere’s Leyland DAF Trophy victory over Bristol Rovers in 1990.

Muir and strike partner Jim Steel

He particularly began to prosper after Worthington’s successor, Johnny King, brought in tall target man Jim Steel alongside him in 1987.

Steel, who later became a police officer on Merseyside, said King, a Bill Shankly devotee, would compare him and Muir to John Toshack and Kevin Keegan. “That’s the way football was at the time,” he told the Liverpool Echo. “You looked for a little mobile player to feed off a tall striker.

“Muiry was one of the best finishers in the game at the time. If I’m honest, the intelligence of the partnership was down to Muiry, who was very good at reacting to things off me,” he said.

“I wasn’t the most technically gifted of players compared to the likes of Johnny Morrissey and Jim Harvey. But things happened around me and Muiry was very good at picking up the crumbs.”

Muir was Tranmere’s leading scorer from 1986 to 1990 and, in the 1989-90 season, he scored 35 goals in 65 games.

Such is the esteem in which Muir is held in those parts that a mural depicting him and all-time-appearances record holder Ray Matthias adorns the side of a house close to Prenton Park. A lounge at the ground is also named after him.

Born in Coventry on 5 May 1963, Muir played for the City’s schools side and Bedworth Juniors and won four England Schoolboy caps (against Wales, Scotland and two v West Germany) featuring alongside the likes of Tommy Caton, Ian Dawes, Terry Gibson and Kevin Brock.

He joined QPR as an apprentice aged 17 in 1980 and was a Hoops player for four years in total during Terry Venables’ reign as manager. In October 1982, he went on a one-month loan to Burnley. The respected all-things-Burnley writer, Tony Scholes, takes up the story.

“When Burnley played on QPR’s plastic pitch at Loftus Road in 1982 we came home with more than we’d bargained for. Two Trevor Steven goals in front at half time, we’d suffered a 3-2 defeat in the end although we managed to acquire a striker.”

Scholes pointed out how Muir had progressed into the first team squad at Loftus Road, but after a goalscoring start had fallen out of favour.

“He made a dramatic start to his first team career, scoring twice on his debut in a 5-0 thrashing of Cambridge United in April 1981,” said Scholes. “He kept his place for the one remaining game of the 1980-81 season but by the time he arrived at Turf Moor, well over a year later, he was still looking for his third game.”

It eventually came with Burnley, when he went on as a substitute in a 2-1 defeat at Charlton, replacing skipper Martin Dobson. He then started and scored Burnley’s goal in a 3-1 defeat at Leeds.

“He impressed, but the home fans never saw him and. at the end of the month, he was dispatched back to West London, his Burnley career over,” said Scholes.

Ian Muir alongside Terry Fenwick when Terry Venables managed QPR

Unable to get back into Terry Venables’ side at Loftus Road, Muir joined Birmingham and subsequently Brighton.

Finally given a platform to shine, the striker scored the majority of his 180 Tranmere goals between 1985 and 1991 and spearheaded the side that vaulted two divisions in three seasons between 1988 and 1991, before eventually being edged out by the arrival of John Aldridge.

The Liverpool Echo remembered: “It was inevitable his subtle skills and clinical finishing would make him a target for a larger club. Muir knew of Leeds’s interest as Tranmere campaigned to secure a place in the Third Division playoffs in 1990-91.

Muir told the newspaper: “Howard Wilkinson was sending scouts to watch me and coming along himself. When I went along to the ticket office before games, the Leeds scout was sometimes at the kiosk and I’d chat to him. He told me what was happening.

“Mark Proctor, who joined us from Middlesbrough the following season and worked under Wilkinson, knew about the deal and told me.”

Muir was arguably in his prime at the age of 27, but he suffered what would be a fateful knee ligament injury in a game against Chester City on 23 March 1991.

When Tranmere visited Leeds in a League Cup tie early in the following season, Muir hobbled into Elland Road on crutches. Muir recalled: “Before the game Gordon Strachan asked our midfielder, Neil McNab, where I was. Neil pointed to me standing there on crutches.

“Then Strachan said: ‘Ian is the unluckiest man in the world because we were going to sign him’. Leeds went on to win the league that season and I could have been with them, playing at the highest level playing in Europe the following season.

“I was gutted. I was so close and the injury changed everything. But that’s football. You get your ups and downs.

“I could never complain about the fantastic career I had at Tranmere and I wouldn’t swap my memories of the years at Prenton Park for anything.”

He wasn’t granted a testimonial after a decade with Rovers, but in 2020 there were moves afoot amongst their supporters to help him publish his autobiography.

Adulation has not waned and a young writer who didn’t even get to see him play wrote warmly about the striker’s achievements in this tribute.

In 1995, Muir returned to Birmingham City for a £125,000 fee but he played only twice before he suffered a groin injury. In an effort to get fit, he spent a month on loan at Darlington, and scored a goal, but his league career was over.

He went to play in Hong Kong, scoring a hat-trick on his debut for Sing Tao, and later played for Happy Valley. In June 2011, he recalled in an interview with the Liverpool Post: “The warm climate was a big help. Then the medical people found the cause of the groin problem was my spine. The pelvis wasn’t lined up properly. It could get out of joint just by lying in bed.

“One of the lads on the medical side was able to click me back into place. I have to say I have not had many problems with it since.”

Muir returned to the UK, and his native West Midlands and joined Nuneaton Borough.

“We won the league by 20 points and got into the Conference,” Muir told the Post. “We were top of the league after three months of the following season then it all went pear-shaped.”

The newspaper reported that Muir stepped down a level to Stratford Town, where his football days finished.

He did some voluntary coaching in schools and took a job in a factory for a year, and subsequently joined a friend in a business fitting out pubs and shops.

• Pictures from various online sources.