Tag: Withdean

Brighton’s heroic captain Cullip clashed with Warnock

AFTER three promotions and one relegation in five years, Danny Cullip left Brighton for Sheffield United in December 2004.

Hard-up Albion needed the cash at the time and Cullip was keen to join a side who were pushing for promotion to the Premier League.

“They were a massive side and I felt that it was too good an opportunity to miss,” Cullip said in Match of My Life (knowthescorebooks.com), edited by Paul Camillin. “I felt if I didn’t take the opportunity, I would end up regretting it, and although things didn’t work out, I don’t regret it, as I would have lived the rest of my life wondering what might have happened.”

Cullip was virtually ever-present during his three months with the Blades but a clash of personalities with fiery manager Neil Warnock saw him offloaded on loan to Watford before the end of the season.

DC focusThe player who had been an inspirational captain for the Seagulls has chosen not to go into detail about what happened although Warnock had plenty to say in his autobiography, ghostwritten by journalist Oliver Holt.

“At Sheffield United I bought a centre-half, Danny Cullip, with a view to him being my leader on the pitch, my captain,” he said. “I thought he was a good talker. I realised within a week he talked a better game than he played. The only answer was to get shot of him quickly.”

Cullip swerved the controversy in an Albion matchday programme interview in 2019-20, saying instead: “We won my first three games in succession and ended up taking maximum points from five of the first six games.

“It was a great start and I was really enjoying my football but then, out of the blue, Neil said he wanted to bring in another striker, Danny Webber from Watford.

“Ray Lewington, who was coach at Watford at the time and knew me from out time together at Brentford, said they would only sanction it if they could get me in return. It was going to be a permanent move but ended up being a loan as Ray was sacked the following week, which wasn’t ideal.

“My Sheffield United career was over though before it had even begun, which was so disappointing because I’d been playing well and we’d been getting results.”

butts + DC Sheffield United’s Cullip gets to grips with ex- Albion teammate Guy Butters

Lee Connor on footballleagueworld.co.uk reckoned Cullip was one of the top 5 most pointless signings in Sheffield United’s history which seems a harsh assessment of a player who made 216 appearances for Brighton.

The £250,000 fee Brighton received for their captain was certainly much needed at the time and was a good return on the £50,000 they invested in signing him from Brentford for £50,000 on 13 October 1999.

Born on 17 September 1976 in Bracknell, Berkshire, Cullip was scouted by Oxford United while playing Sunday football and shone during a set of trial games. After getting into their under-16s, he then earned a two-year YTS apprenticeship where he was coached by future England manager Steve McLaren.

Oxford were managed by that redoubtable former centre half Denis Smith at the time and Cullip was given a one-year professional contract but faced stiff competition to make the breakthrough to the first team, where future Leicester City stalwart Matt Elliott was excelling.

“I went out on loan to Kettering Town in the Conference,” Cullip told fulhamfocus.com. “Gary Johnson was their manager and I learned a lot from him and played well there.”

Cullip had a trial at Shrewsbury and could have joined them or Kettering. But he chose to join then Fourth Division Fulham because his dad was a Fulham fan, he told fulhamfc.com in an April 2016 interview. Micky Adams had been newly appointed in his first managerial job and handed Cullip his league debut in the first game of the 1996-97 season.

It was a season fondly remembered by Fulham fans because they won promotion but the regime change the following year, when Mohammed Al Fayed took over, saw Adams dumped in favour of Kevin Keegan and Ray Wilkins and eventually Cullip rejoined Adams at Brentford in exchange for a £75,000 fee in February 1998.

Cullip found himself back in the basement division when the Bees were relegated and then on the treatment table for much of the season after suffering a cruciate knee ligament injury.

Having not played a first team game for 13 months because of the injury, Cullip was thrown a lifeline when Adams, by now in charge at Brighton, took him on a month’s loan in September 1999.

CullipHe impressed sufficiently for Adams to persuade chairman Dick Knight to make the transfer permanent, beginning an association with the club which continues to this day.

Cullip became a mainstay of the defence during the back-to-back promotions of 2001-02 and 2002-03 and famously scored the headed winner in a 1-0 win over Chesterfield at Withdean that clinched the third-tier championship.

Cullip took over the captaincy from Paul Rogers and recalls the “unbelievable day” he lifted the play-off final trophy at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff, in 2004.

After his Blades spell was cut short, and his brief Watford loan came to an end, Cullip joined Nottingham Forest where his manager was Gary Megson. “I really liked him,” said Cullip. “He was an honest guy; what you see is what you get with him.

“Unfortunately, I missed my first pre-season with Forest due to what was ongoing at United, so I was playing catch-up with the rest of the lads and ended up suffering a hamstring injury. It was a problem that would dog me for the rest of my career.”

He was restricted to a handful of appearances in his first season with Forest but he eventually became a regular in a three-man defence alongside Wes Morgan and Ian Breckin.

DC Forest Cullip in action for Forest, marking Albion’s Alex Revell

In January 2007, he was on the move again, to Queens Park Rangers, where former Albion player John Gregory was in charge. But his 18-month deal was terminated early after one of their many managerial changes saw him surplus to requirements.

With his family based in Sussex, Cullip looked for an opening in the south and spent six weeks training with Millwall before linking up with Gillingham, where he played from February 2008 to the end of the 2007-08 season.

He then played non-league with Lewes but, after a season, the hamstring injury forced him to retire.

Alongside his former Albion centre half partner Guy Butters, Cullip is now a coach with the Albion in the Community scheme.

One-goal striker Craig Davies a Seagulls flop

THE PHRASE ‘journeyman striker’ sits perfectly with Welsh international Craig Davies who, despite success later in his career, fired blanks for Wolverhampton Wanderers and Brighton.

To use that rather amusing, though well-worn phrase, he couldn’t hit a cow’s arse with a banjo during his time with the Seagulls.

He arrived on the south coast in January 2009 during Micky Adams’ second, unsuccessful, spell in Albion’s managerial chair.

Oldham Athletic received a reported £150,000 for his signature and, in 23 games for Brighton, he managed just the one goal – on his debut!

That strike came at Withdean – the opening goal in what ended up a 4-2 defeat to Peterborough United (for whom a certain Craig Mackail-Smith equalised).

When a 4-0 home thrashing by Crewe Alexandra meant it had been six games on the trot without a win, Adams was fired by Dick Knight at a Little Chef on the A23. He’d managed just seven wins in 34 matches, and ‘fireman’ Russell Slade arrived just in time to rescue the Seagulls from the League One relegation trapdoor.

Many different striker permutations were tried that season, with main men Nicky Forster and Glenn Murray sidelined by injury, and Albion’s survival was largely due to the goals of loan arrival Lloyd Owusu. Davies huffed and puffed but simply couldn’t make a meaningful connection when the goal beckoned.

Typical of the fans’ eye view was this observation by wearebrighton.com: “That Adams actually paid money for Craig Davies remains one of the more startling moments of his reign of terror.

“Rarely has a Brighton player enraged the Seagulls support like Davies, a man who mixed incompetence – such as the ability to put the ball over the bar when faced with an open goal three yards away – with a complete lack of effort.”

There had been such promise on his arrival, with chairman Dick Knight telling the matchday programme: “Craig is an exciting player with loads of potential, he is lightning-quick and his direct approach can be a nightmare for defenders. This is a major career move for him and he has every chance to be a crucial part of our future.”

Davies himself clearly thought he’d finally found a place to further his career, saying: “I’ve had a few ups and downs through my career but hopefully now I can get settled at Brighton and start knocking in the goals here.

“The gaffer seems to have a bit of faith in me so hopefully I can repay that by putting in some performances and getting a few goals.”

Albion cut their losses on Davies and loaned him to Yeovil Town (he didn’t score in four games for them, either) and then Adams re-signed him, this time for League Two Port Vale, where he finally managed to find the back of the net again.

In the summer of 2010, Davies came to a mutual agreement to end his Brighton nightmare and he joined League Two Chesterfield, from where his career began an amazing upward trajectory.

Born in Burton-upon-Trent on 9 January 1986, Davies began his career as a schoolboy at Shrewsbury Town, but did his apprenticeship at Manchester City. In August 2004, he moved on to League Two Oxford United, where he made his league debut the same month in a 1-0 win at Notts County.

In two seasons with Oxford, managed by former Ipswich and Arsenal midfielder Brian Talbot, he scored eight times in 55 appearances. In the summer of 2005, he made his debut for Wales (qualifying because he had a Welsh grandfather) as a substitute in a 0-0 draw v Slovenia. Reports linked him with a move to Premier League Charlton Athletic, but nothing came of it and instead, in January 2006, he moved to Italy to join Hellas Verona for a £85,000 fee.

It proved to be too big a step for someone who was then only 20, and he referred to feelings of homesickness in an interview with the BBC.

Remarkably, Davies hit the headlines in May 2006, when in the sixth of seven games he played for the Wales under-21 side (which featured Gareth Bale, Andrew Crofts and Arron Davies) he scored a hat-trick in a 5-1 win over Estonia, and it earned him a recall to the full international side.

Wales under-21 manager Brian Flynn told the BBC: “Craig has sometimes been frustrating to watch, but he has skill and we will help him, and them all, to flourish.”

Davies hoped the international goals would attract a club to rescue him from Italy. “I have found it very hard to settle in Italy,” he told the BBC. “Verona want me to come back and have a year on loan somewhere and then they will look at the situation again when I have a bit more experience.”

It was Wolves, then in the Championship, who offered him a lifeline back in the UK and he moved to Molineux on loan, playing 23 games, mainly in the first half of the 2006-07 season.

The only goals he scored for Wolves both came in a FA Cup tie against Oldham Athletic who, ironically, turned out to be his next club. He joined them for an undisclosed fee from Hellas in June 2007.

Davies netted 13 times for a League One Latics side in 2007-08 but, after a 10-game barren spell the following season, he was sent on loan to Stockport County where he scored six times in 13 games, including bagging a hat-trick against Bristol Rovers, and scoring a penalty against Albion as County won 2-0.

When Adams rescued Davies from his Seagulls horror spell, he was rewarded with seven goals in 24 matches for League Two Port Vale between January 2010 and the end of the season.

Chesterfield stepped in to sign him on a one-year deal for the 2010-11 season – and he was promptly sent off in his first competitive game for the Spireites!

Things did get much better, though, and he ended the season with 25 goals to his name, Chesterfield were promoted, and Davies was chosen in the divisional PFA select team for the season.

Such success drew attention from other clubs and he opted to join Championship side Barnsley under Keith Hill. He struggled to find the net in the opening nine matches but eventually finished the season with 11 goals in 42 appearances.

In September 2012, Davies scored FOUR goals in the space of 19 minutes in a 5-0 demolition of Birmingham City at St Andrews and, with nine goals in 22 appearances to his name in the first half of the 2012-13 season, Bolton Wanderers came forward with a £300,000 bid to take him to the Reebok Stadium.

He scored four goals in 18 Championship games for Wanderers but another of his barren spells struck in the opening half of the following season. Wanderers loaned him to League One Preston and he got a goal on his debut as well as a hat-trick in a 6-1 thrashing of Carlisle United. North End reached the play-offs, and Davies made his way back to Bolton having scored five in 15 games.

Hamstring injury issues plagued him in 2014-15 and manager Neil Lennon released him at the end of the season.

He didn’t have far to travel for his next port of call when newly-relegated Wigan Athletic offered him a two-year contract. He only scored twice in 30 appearances, but Wigan won promotion as League One champions.

With just one goal in 14 Championship games in the first part of the 2016-17 season, Davies was on the move again, this time linking up with League One Scunthorpe United until the end of the season. Cue another barren spell: no goals in 21 games.

The 2017-18 season saw Davies return to his old club, Oldham Athletic, and despite scoring 14 goals in 44 appearances, could not prevent the club being relegated to League Two. Davies had strong views about the ownership of the club as he departed for Mansfield Town.

He signed a two-year deal with the Stags, but injury curtailed his involvement in 2018-19.

C Davies Wales

Leicester lad Matt Heath plugged Albion defensive gap

Heath celebratesDUCK-loving Matt Heath didn’t shirk a challenge and came to Brighton’s rescue in 2009 when injury and suspension decimated Albion’s available defenders.

Albion were fighting for their League One lives and were in between managers when Heath arrived in March to plug a gap caused by Tommy Elphick, Adam Hinshelwood and Adam Virgo all being sidelined.

Experienced former Leicester City central defender Heath joined on loan from Colchester United, signed at the same time as striker Lloyd Owusu, who undoubtedly made more of a noteworthy contribution with some vital goals and his famous ‘raising the roof’ goal celebration.

As well as defensive problems, Albion also had Nicky Forster, Glenn Murray and loan signing Calvin Andrew out injured as they approached a period of games vital to their chances of staying in the division.

On signing the pair, caretaker manager Dean White told the Argus: “The injury situation meant it was vital to bring players in and Matt and Lloyd are two good additions. They certainly strengthen the squad and both have good experience at this level and higher.”

The 6ft 4ins Heath had made 11 appearances for Colchester that season but only one start since the turn of the year.

He played in six games and scored on his debut away to Leyton Orient on 8 March, the game which marked the beginning of Russell Slade’s period in charge of the Seagulls. Ultimately a recurrence of groin trouble brought an end to his brief Albion career.

Ironically, it was Slade’s predecessor at the Withdean, Micky Adams, who’d been Heath’s manager at Leicester, Coventry City and Colchester.

Born in Leicester on 11 January 1981, Heath came through the Foxes academy, made his debut in the 2001-02 season and went on to play 60 first team games for the club, including 17 Premier League games alongside Ricardo Scimeca. During the 2003-04 season, he had an eight-game loan spell with Stockport County.

Heath scors 4 Leic

In 2005, Adams went back to his old club to take Heath to Coventry City for a £45,000 fee. He played 26 games for the Sky Blues in 2005-06 but only eight games the following season and, in November 2006, was loaned out to Leeds United who made the move permanent in January 2007.

Heath relished his time playing under manager Dennis Wise and his assistant Gus Poyet but after playing 50 games for Leeds, Wise’s successor Gary McAllister deemed him surplus to requirements at Elland Road and Heath once again went to play for Adams, this time at Colchester.

He initially joined on loan but then spent five seasons on the Us’ books, making a total of 106 appearances, albeit during his time with them he had a couple of spells out on loan.

One of those was that brief stint at Brighton and the following season he played four games for Southend United.

When his contract was up at Colchester, he switched to Northampton Town, where the manager was one of his old Colchester bosses, Aidy Boothroyd, but he didn’t make any first team appearances and left the club to join non-league Harrogate Town in January 2008 where he made 29 appearances. Next up was Harrogate Railway FC.

However, Heath simultaneously pursued an education role in sport, and he became a course manager and lecturer at Askham Bryan College in York having studied football coaching at the University of East Anglia.

In March 2019, Askham Bryan College announced it was becoming a sports hub for Leeds United, with Heath playing a prominent role.

Heath talked about the importance of former professional players having a plan for life after football in an interview with Non-League Yorkshire.

He said: “I’ve had so many good friends in the pro game and they’re all five years younger than me and I’ve told all of them to do something because you have so much time on your hands when you’re playing pro football.

“I’ve said: ‘Get a qualification or do something because when it all finishes, you either get lucky and fall into something like myself or you’ll be in a place where you’re not sure what to do’.

“I think most of the lads in the pro game don’t realise that it just stops like that.”

In 2015, Heath combined his day job with captaining Northern League – North West Division side Tadcaster Albion and then became assistant manager for two years, working under Billy Miller, who was his boss (head of sports and public services) at Askham before being promoted to a director.

Heath subsequently became a teacher-coach in Leeds’ education department, working with a group of would-be footballer students in Nottingham.

“The kids finish their GCSEs and want to carry on in education and the college provide a programme where they carry on with their education, get a Level 3 BTEC-extended Diploma and we link it alongside training every day and play in the National League as well, ” he explained to Jonathan Waldron of the Colchester Gazette, in a February 2021 interview.

“So the kids get the training, the education and luckily I’ve got a role there where I’m part of both of it, in the classroom and out on the training field as well and matchdays for our college.”

Telling the reporter that he still looks out for the results of all the clubs he used to play for, he added: “It’s nice to reminisce but my family just tell me to shut up if I go on about it!

“I was lucky; dedication and hard work gets you a long way in football and you have to have a bit of a rub of the green, along the way and managers and coaches who take an interest in you and see something and then roll with it a little bit.

“I’m proud of what I achieved.”

Heath college coach

Much-travelled Ade Akinbiyi a big hit in brief Seagulls spell

A STRIKER with wildly differing fortunes in a varied and much-travelled career made a good early impression when joining Albion on loan from Norwich City back in the autumn of 1994.

Ade Akinbiyi had not long since broken through to the City team as a teenager and he scored four times in seven games on loan to the Seagulls.

Just turned 20, Akinbiyi arrived at a time when Liam Brady’s Albion hadn’t registered a win for 11 games and, although Albion lost the first game he played in, the remaining six produced three wins and three draws.

AA scores

There is some YouTube footage of him scoring Albion’s second goal on a snowy pitch at Hull City’s old Boothferry Park ground in a game that finished 2-2.

“He is powerful and big and he can take knocks and we have missed having somebody in that mould,” Brady wrote in his matchday programme notes.

Later in his career Akinbiyi would prove to be a real handful for the Seagulls – I recall him shrugging off a powder-puff challenge from a young Dan Harding at Withdean and muscling his way to a winning goal for Stoke City. Manager Mark McGhee subbed Harding off and publicly lambasted him afterwards.

Born in Hackney on 10 October 1974, Akinbiyi was more interested in athletics at an early age, as he told the Lancashire Telegraph.

“I was interested in football but not massive on playing it,” he said. His school PE teacher persuaded him otherwise. “I went to play for my district team, Hackney, and it all started from there.”

From Hackney, Akinbiyi joined nearby Senrab, the team that blooded the likes of Bobby Zamora, Leon Knight, John Terry and Jermain Defoe.

His age group earned a place in a children’s tournament in Great Yarmouth called the ‘Canary Cup’ where he was spotted by a scout for nearby Norwich, who signed him as a schoolboy.

“The schoolboy and youth team system was second to none, as it still is now,” said Akinbiyi. But he found it hard living away from home, missing his mum’s native Nigerian cooking.

But after finding new digs with a few of his team-mates, he stuck at it and earned a dream debut as a substitute against Bayern Munich in the return leg of their UEFA Cup second round game, less than a month after his 19th birthday.

“I thought my debut would come in a cup game, perhaps against lower league opposition, not against Bayern Munich,” he said. “Not many people make their debut in a European cup competition.”

Although Akinbiyi made 51 league appearances for Norwich, his Canaries career never really took off, hence the Brighton loan spell and a similar move to Hereford United.

Eventually, though, a manager who believed in him, Tony Pulis, made him a record £250,000 buy for Gillingham in January 1997. Akinbiyi repaid Pulis’ faith in him with 29 goals in 67 starts, leading to Bristol City paying £1.2million for the striker following their promotion to the old Division One (now the Championship).

akinbiyi + colin lee

After scoring 21 goals in 47 league appearances for the Robins, in 1999 he completed a £3.5m move to Wolverhampton Wanderers. In the same year, he played his one and only game for Nigeria, in a friendly against Greece in Athens.

He made a great start at Wolves, scoring eight times in his first 12 games for Colin Lee’s side, but a year later, switched to Premier League Leicester City, after the Foxes’ boss Peter Taylor (later to replace Micky Adams at Brighton) paid out a £5m fee for the striker.

Ade A LeicesterAkinbiyi was brought in to replace Emile Heskey, a real Filbert Street hero who had been sold to Liverpool for £11m. However, his goal touch eluded him and he managed to score only 11 goals in 58 league appearances for the club – some Leicester fans dubbing him Ade Akin-Bad-Buy!

Akinbiyi looked back on it in an interview with Four Four Two magazine and said: “I came in as Emile Heskey’s replacement, but he is a different breed of footballer.

“He’s big, strong and scores goals, but, back then, if Heskey wasn’t scoring a lot he could get away with it. He was the local hero. I was a different player – I’d be running in behind and trying to cause people problems. But Leicester looked at my record in the Championship and thought I’d come and do the same thing.”

Eventually they cut their losses and sold him to Division One Crystal Palace for £2.2m. At Selhurst, he was rather ignominiously given the number 55 shirt! Having scored just one goal in 14 league and cup appearances, in 2003 he was loaned to Stoke City, under his old boss Pulis.

He scored twice – the second goal coming in the last game of the 2002-03 season, when the Potters won 1-0 against Reading to seal their Division One (now the Championship) status (the season Albion were relegated).

Akinibiyi discussed the events in an interview with another ex-Stoke, Burnley and Brighton striker, Chris Iwelumo, for Stoke City FC TV.

AA chat with CIIt led to Akinbiyi joining on a permanent basis, on a free transfer, and he became a cult hero with the Stoke City crowd.

In March 2005, Burnley signed him for £600,000 – and he was promptly sent off on his debut! The game was only two minutes old when he head-butted George McCartney of Sunderland, and was shown a straight red.

Less than a year later, he was on the move again, switching to Sheffield United in January 2006 for what was then a club record £1.75m fee.

He scored on his Blades debut against Derby County but by October that year he was in the news for his alleged involvement in a training ground bust-up with team-mate Claude Davis.

In all, Akinbiyi made only five appearances for the Blades in the Premiership in 2006 and, on New Year’s Day 2007 he returned to Burnley for a £650,000 fee, with add-ons.

He scored in his first game back, against Reading, but only notched three by the season’s end. Burnley fans have some good memories of him, particularly in a brief spell when he played alongside loan signing Andrew Cole, but on 2 April 2009, Burnley offloaded him to Houston Dynamo.

Dave Thomas, a prolific writer on all things Burnley, talked about Akinbiyi’s cult hero status among Burnley fans, telling thelongside.co.uk: “Ade certainly had a talent and that talent was scoring goals. The story that he was utterly bad at this is totally inaccurate, but that is the legend that developed, at one club in particular, Leicester City.

“In truth, at Burnley too, he missed sitters that Harry Redknapp might say his wife could have scored. But then so do all other players and, in many games, he displayed all the things that he was good at, and the attributes that he had in abundance.”

After he was released by Houston, back in the UK he played 10 games for Notts County, as they won the League Two title In 2009-10, and the following season pitched up in south Wales to play for then non-league Newport County.

In July 2013, Akinbiyi became a player-coach for Colwyn Bay, managed by his former Burnley teammate Frank Sinclair, but both resigned in January 2015 after a 5-0 defeat at Boston.

Akinbiyi now lives in Manchester and in 2015 was interviewed about work he has done as an ambassador for Prostate Cancer UK after his father died from the disease.

Rami’s route from Rome’s Olympic arena to Albion’s ‘Theatre of Trees’ – and then the World Cup!

IN ALBION’S 2004-05 Championship season, both regular goalkeepers, Michel Kuipers and Ben Roberts, were injured.

A rookie American ‘keeper, David Yeldell, was signed on loan from Blackburn Rovers but didn’t inspire confidence and was discarded after just three games.

Instead, Albion manager Mark McGhee turned to Rami Shaaban, a Swedish-born goalkeeper with a Finnish mother and Egyptian father who hadn’t played a competitive match for two years!

However, that game had been for Arsenal in the Champions League in the 70,000-capacity Olympic Stadium in Rome!

Now, here he was on 19 February 2005 lining up for Albion in front of 6,647 at Withdean – The Theatre of Trees – against eventual champions Sunderland.

It proved to be an eventful debut, which I watched with my 10-year-old daughter, Holly (during her brief flirtation with wondering why her Dad was obsessed with this football lark). Albion played more than an hour of the game with only 10 men, Adam Virgo being sent off by referee Dermot Gallagher for two yellow cards.

Shaaban, Albion’s fourth different goalkeeper in the space of five games, did not have that much to do but he made an instinctive stop to keep out a cross from Dean Whitehead, fisted away a Sean Thornton effort and did well to hold Julio Arca’s shot from 15 yards.

He told The Argus afterwards: “It’s a great start. I’ve always been lucky with my first games at new clubs.

“At Arsenal, I had a clean sheet. That was in the Champions League, so it was a bit different, but you have to start somewhere and I’m very pleased to get 90 minutes of competitive football.

“I was more nervous playing here than for Arsenal, because before I went to Arsenal I was match fit. Here I had not played competitive football for two years, so this was a big milestone for me.”

albion action

Against all the odds, Albion won the game 2-1 with Albion’s goals coming from a deflected Richard Carpenter shot and a rare Mark McCammon header from a corner.

Born on 30 June 1975 in Solna, Stockholm, Shaaban’s professional football career began with the local Saltsjöbadens IF who he played for 39 times in 1994-95. Then, while studying at university in Cairo, he played for Zamalek and Ittihad Osman.

After university, he spent four years in Chile, between 1997 and 2001, playing initially for Coquimbo Unido and then Deportes Temuco.

Good performances there alerted his hometown club Djurgårdens, of Sweden’s first division, and it was while he was playing there that Arsenal snapped him up.

But his good fortune was to run out quite quickly. Originally drafted in by Arsenal as a possible successor to David Seaman, he suffered a freak training ground accident on Christmas Eve 2002 that left him with a broken leg.

It took him a year to recover and during that time the Gunners signed Jens Lehmann who went on to establish himself as Arsenal’s no.1.

Shaaban did play five games for Arsenal – three Premier League games and two in the Champions League – but he never did make it back to play for Arsenal competitively again after his injury.

However, he did warm the bench in the latter part of the famous Arsenal ‘Invincibles’ season (2003-04), because regular back-up ‘keeper Stuart Taylor had picked up an injury.

In January 2004, Shabaan was loaned to West Ham for a month, but didn’t play for the first team, and then at the season’s end he was released.

Immediately before joining Brighton, he had been training back in Sweden with Djurgårdens, but he was recommended to McGhee by former Wolves goalkeeper coach Hans Segers who had moved to Spurs where Shaaban had recently had a trial.

After spending two weeks training with the Albion, the ‘keeper impressed McGhee, who told the matchday programme: “He’s done well. There’s no doubt about it, he’s a good goalkeeper. We have to now consider what we do with him. We’re going to need two goalkeepers that can play in the team between now and the end of the season.”

Shaaban kept goal for the Albion for six games one of which, on 12 March 2005, saw him harshly penalised in a 5-1 defeat away to Plymouth Argyle, which I attended with my son, Rhys.

Of course, as fans, we would say it, wouldn’t we, but it was never a 5-1 game, and that was largely down to an unbelievable performance by referee Phil Crossley.

Albion, wearing yellow, started brightly enough and soon had the ball in the net. Admittedly the action was at the far end from us, but we couldn’t see anything wrong with the goal (I think the ref ruled out Guy Butters’ header because he claimed the ball from Carpenter’s free kick curled out over the line before the cross came into him).

It was the first of several injustices meted out to the Albion that afternoon by Crossley. Plymouth took a lead as early as the ninth minute when Nick Chadwick finished off a neat one-two with Dexter Blackstock, who, ironically, manager McGhee had tried to sign on loan from Southampton earlier that season.

Our hopes were raised, though, when Charlie Oatway, on his 200th League appearance for the Seagulls, scored with a deflected header from another Carpenter free-kick.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t long before Plymouth were back in front when Crossley failed to spot Adam Hinshelwood being pushed as he went to head the ball. Instead he saw the ball hit the young centre half’s hand and awarded a penalty which Paul Wotton converted.

Then, though, came an almost unbelievable bit of nitpicking by a linesman which led to Plymouth scoring again!

Goalkeepers often go right to the edge of their penalty area before drop-kicking a clearance up field and, just as Shaaban did so, the lino flagged to claim he had taken it out of the area.

Crossley was obliged to award a free kick right on the edge of the penalty area and Wotton duly dispatched a thunderbolt into the net. It was as good as a penalty.

close-up shout

Although 3-1 down, it still looked like Albion were in with a chance, but Plymouth got a fourth on 36 minutes when David Norris evaded several despairing tackles before slotting past Shaaban.

To make matters worse, shortly into the restart Carpenter was consumed by red mist when Chadwick stopped him taking a quick free kick and, having pushed the guy in the chest, was sent off for the first time in his career.

So, 4-1 down and with only ten men, a difficult task just got harder: Plymouth continued to plug away and with just seconds remaining, substitute Scott Taylor rounded the hapless Shaaban to notch a fifth.

In the post-match interviews, McGhee described Chippy’s dismissal as “an absolute joke” and the refereeing as “shambolic”. And of the decision which led to Plymouth’s third, he said: “We see goalkeepers kicking at the edge of the box week in and week out and never in my career have I seen a linesman so sharp to put his flag up.”

Unfortunately for Shaaban, in his short time with the Albion he had conceded 13 goals, so McGhee turned to another loanee ‘keeper, Alan Blayney, from Southampton, who took over between the sticks for the remaining seven games of the season, when four draws and a win saw Albion do just enough to avoid the drop.

Shaaban remained on the bench and, at the end of the season, Albion decided not to take him on long-term. A year later he was called up to the Sweden squad for the 2006 World Cup!!

After his release from Brighton he had a trial with Dundee United but played only once, and also went on trial at Bristol City, but wasn’t taken on. Instead he went to Frederikstad in Norway, where he spent two years, and then joined Stockholm-based Hammarby, where he managed 26 appearances.

Those games led to him being selected for Sweden’s 2006 World Cup squad, although he had never previously been involved with the national side. In fact, in 2006 (and 2007) he was named Swedish goalkeeper of the year.

He made his debut as a half-time substitute in a warm up game with Finland and he played in his country’s 2006 World Cup opener, a 0-0 draw against Trinidad and Tobago, in place of injured first choice Andreas Isaksson.

He also played four Euro 2008 qualifying games for the Swedes, in which he kept a vital clean sheet in a 2-0 win over a Spain side which included the likes of Fernando Torres, Cesc Fabregas and David Villa and was also a member of their final stage squad.

Earlier in his career Shaaban could have chosen to play for Finland but decided to represent Sweden because, at that time Finland had two strong national team goalkeepers in Antii Niemi (later Albion’s goalkeeping coach) and Jussi Jääskeläinen, a Premier League ‘keeper for Bolton for many years.

After retiring from the game, Shabaan set up his own Swedish-based company, Rami Fresh, supplying Egypt-grown fruit and vegetables. The Sun did an article about him on 5 July 2023.

 

Photos from Albion matchday programme.

Oatway took off with Bluebirds and soared with Seagulls

CHARLIE Oatway had not long earned his break in professional football with Cardiff City before he found himself behind bars in Pentonville Prison.

Up on a charge of GBH for his part in a fight, when an Afro-Caribbean friend was racially abused, Oatway didn’t expect to get incarcerated but ended up serving two months of a four-month sentence.

Before he headed off to court in London on a Monday morning, he had told Cardiff’s general manager, the former Leeds and Wales international Terry Yorath (broadcaster Gabby Logan’s dad), to expect him for training on the Tuesday morning!

The story is explained in detail in Tackling Life, the book Oatway published about how he turned his life round to become captain of Brighton and part of three promotion-winning sides.

The tale reveals how imprisonment was just one of the hurdles Oatway had to overcome in a life that’s taken many colourful twists and turns.

It was sadly ironic that his career as a player with Brighton was cut short in a Boxing Day clash against Queens Park Rangers, the team he followed home and away from an early age.

The family lived a stone’s throw from Loftus Road and Charlie – a nickname given to him by an aunt – was named by his Rs-daft dad after the whole of the promotion-winning 1973 QPR team: Anthony, Phillip, David, Terry, Frank, Donald, Stanley, Gerry, Gordon, Steven, James.

He was even starstruck at an Albion Legends event when he saw John Byrne who had been a hero of his during his days playing up front for the Rs alongside Gary Bannister.

Albion reaching the Division 2 play-off final in Cardiff in 2004 was the highlight of Oatway’s career – but a feature in the match programme was angled on the disappointment he had suffered the year before, when he had gone as a spectator with all his family to see QPR lose to Cardiff.

“Everything about the day was perfect apart from the result,” Oatway told reporter Alex Crook. “Being a QPR fan at heart, I felt the pain of the defeat just as much as the other 35,000 fans. But this time I am going up there as a player and not as a fan and I am determined our supporters will not go through what I did last season.”

The youngest of five kids, Oatway grew up in Shepherd’s Bush and even though he started to struggle in school from an early age, he displayed quite a talent for football.

“I knew by the time I was eight that I was as good as any of the eleven-year-olds I was playing with,” he recalls in Tackling Life. He had trials for the West London District schools team and played for Harrow Boys Club and Bedfont Eagles.

Oatway reveals how it was Wally Downes, the former Wimbledon player and later loyal assistant manager to Steve Coppell, who helped to get him noticed, along with his cousin, Terry Oatway.

The young Oatway joined up with Wimbledon in the year they won the FA Cup – 1988 – and played for the youth team, but he was let go at the end of the 1989-90 season because they thought he was too small. He went to Sheffield United on trial but was homesick so he returned to London and joined non-league Yeading on semi-professional terms. Off the field, life was by no means straightforward. “By the age of 19, I had two children with two different mothers,” he said.

After helping to get Yeading promoted in 1993-94, Oatway found a pathway back into the professional game when a community worker (Ritchie Jacobs) on the estate where he lived organised a trial at Cardiff City for him and two pals.

He was the only one of the three invited back and he said: “When Cardiff asked me back for another month, I knew it was the chance I’d been waiting for, and I was going to grab it with both hands.”

Not surprisingly, the two months he spent in Pentonville didn’t greatly help his cause but remarkably he was welcomed back to the club and accepted by the fans. However, in his absence there was a change in team management and ownership and, before long, new team manager Kenny Hibbitt was instructed to send Oatway out on loan to Coleraine in Northern Ireland.

On his return to Cardiff the following season, they had by then been relegated to the Fourth Division. Still he was unable to get back in the first team and he happened to play a reserve team game against Torquay United, who were managed by his old Cardiff boss, Eddie May. May asked if he fancied a move for first team football and, although he only joined just before Christmas in 1995, by the end of the season he had been voted Player of the Year.

When May moved on to become manager of Brentford, he put in a bid for the combative midfielder and took him back to west London to play in the Bees’ third tier side.

In 1998, Oatway had a brief loan spell with Lincoln City but on his return to Griffin Park he came under the managership of Micky Adams for the first time.

Adams had taken over the manager’s chair at Griffin Park but he was sacked when owner Ron Noades thought he could make a better job of running the team. Oatway was sent on a month’s loan to Lincoln, somewhat against his wishes, but on his return to the Bees he forced his way into the side and worked well with coach Ray Lewington.

Adams then took the reins at Brighton and, as the Albion began life back in Brighton & Hove after the two-year exile in Gillingham, Oatway and Bees teammate Paul Watson joined the Seagulls for a combined fee of £30,000.

Adams wanted the pair to join a nucleus of players who’d all played under him previously at Brentford and Fulham.

In an Albion matchday programme profile of Oatway to coincide with the visit of his former club, Torquay, on 2 September 2000, it noted: “Despite getting sent off rather stupidly in one of his earliest games for the Seagulls – he bit a Darlington player’s face – he soon became a great favourite with the Brighton crowd, who hadn’t seen a midfield scrapper like him since Jimmy Case retired.”

oatway prog cover

He went on to be a vital midfield cog in the back-to-back league title winning sides of 2001 and 2002. Although he was in the team that was relegated from the second tier in 2003, he was full of praise for the effort made to avoid the drop. “Steve Coppell was one of the best managers I’ve ever played under because of his attention to detail,” he said. “Steve’s team talks on the day before a game were brilliant.”

When the departed Coppell was replaced by Mark McGhee, Oatway remained a cornerstone of the Albion line-up and described that 2004 play-off final at the Millennium Stadium as “the best day of my career”.

But at one point it was touch and go whether he was going to be able to carry on. In October 2003, he underwent major back surgery to repair a slipped disc and trapped nerve.

He was out for nearly three months and he admitted in an Argus interview: “There was a good chance I wouldn’t play again.”

When the Albion cashed in on captain Danny Cullip in December 2004, selling him to Sheffield United, Oatway took over the skipper’s armband full-time, a role he had previously embraced as a stand-in.

The following season’s Boxing Day clash with QPR at Withdean was only two minutes old when Marcus Bean tackled Oatway from behind and escaped without even a booking.

Oatway was stretchered off and McGhee later told the mirror.co.uk: “Charlie has been a tremendous leader and captain and this is a huge blow. I’m very upset about it.”

Oatway had four different operations to try to fix the ankle injury, but he never recovered sufficiently to return to the required level to play league football.

“I tried to get back to playing again but by the pre-season of 2007 I had to call it a day,” he said.

However, even when he was out injured, Oatway was always a strong influence on the dressing room.

Stand-in skipper Dean Hammond said in an Argus interview in November 2006: “Charlie has been out injured but he has been fantastic for everyone. He comes in, he gets everyone up for it, he’s always laughing and joking. He’s got the enthusiasm and he is still determined, even though he is not playing.

“His personality is fantastic for everyone and I think he deserves a massive pat on the back.”

He also used the time productively, studying how the coaches worked with the youth team players and starting to take his coaching badges. When it was clear he wouldn’t be able to return to play full-time professional football again, he got involved with the Albion in the Community scheme as a community liaison manager.

Rather than give up the game completely, Oatway took the opportunity to become player-coach at Havant and Waterlooville and, in January 2008, he found himself in the national media spotlight when the Blue Square South minnows played away to Liverpool in the fifth round of the FA Cup.

Oatway wasn’t fit to start the game but he got on as a substitute in the 74th minute and later recounted how his former teammate Bobby Zamora fixed it for him to swap shirts with Liverpool’s Yossi Benayoun, who scored a hat-trick in the Reds’ 5-2 win that day.

Then, in 2009-10, Oatway began helping Brighton manager Russell Slade to coach the first team and, after Slade’s departure, continued in the role under Gus Poyet.

When Poyet left the Seagulls to join Sunderland, Oatway went with him and he was also in the dug-out alongside Poyet and his assistant Mauricio Taricco at Chinese Super League team Shanghai Greenland Shenhua, AEK Athens and Seville-based Real Betis.

Pictures: matchday programme; The Argus; Tackling Life (Quick Reads, 2011).

Saint Dean a sinner in some Albion fans’ eyes

HASTINGS-born Dean Hammond enjoyed two spells with the Albion having joined the club aged 11 and progressed from the school of excellence though the youth team and reserves to become a first team regular and captain of the side.

He also went on to captain Southampton as they rose from League One to the Premiership.

However, it’s a pretty surefire bet to say fans would be divided if asked to judge his contribution.

An over-the-top celebration in front of the Albion faithful after scoring for Southampton at Withdean made him public enemy number one in many people’s eyes.

The way he left the club under a cloud, suggesting they lacked ambition, was another catalyst for rancour.

Personally, I struggled with his penchant for missing some unbelievable, gilt-edged chances to score. There was one away at Leicester (one of his future employers) – a proverbial ‘easier to score than miss’ – that was particularly galling in a game that finished 0-0.

Putting all these things to one side, there is no denying that he ultimately enjoyed a decent career and, while his most successful years were spent in the second tier of English football, he also got to play at the highest level.

Albion have struggled for a good many years to bring through promising local talent from schoolboy level but Hammond was one of the few who made it.

Born a couple of months before Brighton’s 1983 FA Cup Final appearance, he made his Albion bow in December 2000 when former Saints full-back Micky Adams put him on as a substitute in a 2-0 Football League Trophy win over Cardiff, but it was only when former youth coach Martin Hinshelwood briefly held the first team manager’s role that he got his next chance.

That came as an 85th minute substitute for Nathan Jones in a 4-2 defeat at Gillingham in September 2002 and 10 days later he made his first start and scored his first Albion goal (celebrating below right) after only eight minutes in a 3-1 League Cup defeat to Ipswich.

When Hinshelwood was sacked, new boss Steve Coppell opted for experience over youth and Hammond’s next competitive action came during two spells out on loan in 2003 – at Aldershot (seven games) and Orient (eight games).

In an Argus interview in November 2006, Hammond said: “It’s been up and down for me at Brighton. I loved it when I came through the youth team and then broke into the first team at quite a young age.”

Hammond watched from the sidelines at the Millennium Stadium in May 2004 as the Albion won promotion to the Championship via play-off victory over Bristol City. A couple of months later, the Argus was reporting how he had been given three months to prove he had a future with the club.

He did enough in a handful of games to be offered a contract until the end of the season and, although he was mainly used from the bench between October and March, by the season’s end he was playing a pivotal role in helping to steer Albion clear of the drop zone, scoring the equaliser in a 1-1 draw away to Burnley and getting both goals in a vital 2-2 draw at home to West Ham.

Before the 2006-07 season got under way, manager Mark McGhee obviously felt players like Hammond needed toughening up and sent him and a few others to some boxing sessions with former world heavyweight title contender Scott Welch, from Shoreham, at his Hove gym.

Hammond told Andy Naylor of the Argus: “When the gaffer mentioned it, I think the boys were thinking ‘Boxing? How is that going to help us’. But he worked on the mental side, as well as the power and strength stuff.

“If we felt tired or felt we couldn’t go on, he was pushing us and he said it would help us in a game. I think he’s right. When we went back for pre-season training you tended to push yourself that bit more, so I think it will help in the long run.”

Unfortunately, it didn’t help enough because the season saw Albion relegated back to the third tier. It wasn’t long before former youth coach Dean Wilkins was installed as manager and youngsters were given a chance to flourish in the first team, with Hammond appointed captain.

“I would say it is the best time of my career and I am really enjoying it,” he told Naylor. “It’s brilliant at the moment.”

In the same interview, however, there were perhaps the first rumblings of his discontent with the progress of the club.

“I’ve been here since the age of 11. I’m like every other player. I’m ambitious and I want to do the best I can in my career and play as high as I can. Hopefully that will be with Brighton.”

A career-ending injury to Charlie Oatway and Richard Carpenter’s departure from the club in January 2007 led to Hammond taking over the captain’s armband and 2006-07 was undoubtedly his best Albion season. He finished with 11 goals from 39 appearances and the award of Player of the Season.

D Ham v W HamIt was in the 2007-08 season that it turned sour between player and club, even though before a ball had been kicked he told the Argus he thought Brighton had it in them to make the play-offs.

“We can beat anyone in the division. It’s just about being consistent. Realistically we can push for the play-offs,” he told Brian Owen.

Considering he had been at the club from such an early age, what happened next clearly rankled with chairman Dick Knight, who talked about it in his autobiography, Mad Man: From the Gutter to the Stars, the Ad Man who saved Brighton.

Knight accused Hammond’s agent, Tim Webb, of touting his client around Championship clubs while there was an offer on the table from the Albion that would have made him the highest paid player at the club.

“Hammond kept telling the local media that he wanted to stay and sign a contract, but I think he was being told to hold out for more money,” said Knight.

Because Hammond could have walked away from the club for nothing at the end of the season, the pressure was on to resolve the situation one way or another by the close of the January transfer window.

All the off-field stuff was clearly affecting Hammond’s head and I can remember a game at Oldham in the second week of January when he lunged into a reckless challenge after only nine minutes which certainly appeared to be a deliberate attempt to get himself sent off. That early dismissal was his last action for the Seagulls until his return to the club in 2012.

“I didn’t want to sell Dean but I was forced to,” said Knight, who persuaded Colchester United to buy him for £250,000, with a clause added in that Brighton would earn 20 per cent of any subsequent transfer involving the player. “In normal circumstances, I might have got more, but time was running out,” Knight added.

The move to Colchester wasn’t an unbridled success because his arrival couldn’t prevent them being relegated from the Championship, but, with Paul Lambert as manager, Hammond took over the captaincy in December 2008 and by the season’s end was voted Player of the Season.

Throughout the season there had been speculation that Southampton wanted to sign him and a deal duly went through in August 2009. At the time, Alan Pardew was the Saints manager and Hammond’s former Albion youth team coach and first team manager, Dean Wilkins, was Southampton first team coach, and played a part in him deciding to make the move. “His knowledge of the game and his passion for football is second to none and he was really good for Southampton – he had a good partnership there with Alan,” said Hammond.

D hammo trophyAs had happened at his previous two clubs, it wasn’t long before Hammond was taking on the captaincy and he got to lift the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy at Wembley on 28 March 2010 (above) when Pardew’s team beat Carlisle United 4-1 – the first piece of silverware Saints had won since the 1976 FA Cup.

“I was really enjoying my football and it was like a new beginning for everyone connected with the club,” he said in an Albion matchday programme article. “Nicola Cortese came in off the field and a raft of new signings had been made, the likes of Rickie Lambert, Jason Puncheon, Lee Barnard, Radhi Jaidi, Dan Harding, Michail Antonio and Jose Fonte. When you add the likes of Morgan Schneiderlin and Adam Lallana, we had the makings of a really good team. It took us a little time to gel, but once we clicked we had a really good season.”

When Albion travelled to St Mary’s on 23 November 2010, the matchday programme inevitably featured their captain and former Seagull. It said: “Hammond was barely out of nappies when he first started supporting the Seagulls. He can even recall the days they played in front of 20,000 crowds at the old Goldstone Ground.

“The new Brighton stadium will hold just over 22,000 and the Saints midfielder said: ‘There’s no doubt they’ll fill it, certainly for their early games. That’s just about the size of their fan base and, if anyone deserved a bigger ground, it’s them’.”

Reflecting that he had certainly made the right career move, Hammond said: “I’ve developed as a player. I have a slightly deeper midfield role which means I pass the ball more and get involved in the game more.”

After two seasons in the third tier, Southampton famously finished runners up to Brighton in 2010-11 to regain their place in the Championship. Hammond was a regular throughout the 2011-12 season, although at times contributing from the bench, as Saints won promotion back to the Premier League, runners up behind Reading.

However, manager Nigel Adkins obviously didn’t see Hammond as top tier material and on transfer deadline day (31 August 2012) the midfielder agreed a season-long loan deal back at Brighton.

D Hammo 2By then 29, Hammond told the Argus: “It’s a different club now. The stadium is amazing and I can’t wait to get going.

“I saw the plans when I was 15 and it’s amazing to see it come to life. It will be a dream to play at this stadium as a Brighton player and I have been dreaming of that since a boy.”

Hammond made 33 appearances plus five as a sub during that season, alongside fellow loanees Wayne Bridge and Matt Upson, and said: “I loved my year back at the club. It was brilliant.

“I’d been sold the dream of the new stadium since I was 15 coming through the ranks, so to walk out of that tunnel for the first time as an Albion player was a fantastic feeling and one I’ll always cherish.”

Hammond reflected that the side did well to reach the play-offs but drew too many games. “We were only four points off automatic promotion and just didn’t do ourselves justice in that play-off game against Crystal Palace.

“Having drawn 0-0 at Selhurst Park, we really fancied finishing off the job at the Amex, but it just didn’t happen for us on the night. That has to rate as one of the biggest disappointments of my career.”

When manager Gus Poyet departed the Albion in the wake of the play-offs loss, Hammond returned to parent club Southampton, but, three months later he signed a two-year contract with Championship side Leicester City. Manager Nigel Pearson told the club’s website: “We’re really pleased to be able to add a player of Dean’s quality and experience to the squad.

“As well as having played a considerable number of games in his career, he also arrives with promotion credentials and will be a very positive influence on the squad both on and off the pitch.”

DHLCFC

Hammond added: “Once I knew of Leicester’s interest I wanted to come. My mind was made up. There was some interest from other clubs, but once Leicester was mentioned, and I spoke to the manager, I wanted to come here.

“It’s a massive football club. They came close last year in the play-offs and they’ve got a good history. It’s a club that’s going places and wants to push to the Premier League. It’s very exciting to be here.”

While facing midfield competition from Danny Drinkwater and Matty James, Hammond nevertheless played 29 games as Leicester were promoted and he finally got to play in the Premiership, albeit competition and injury restricted his number of appearances to 12.

Not all Saints fans felt it right that he had been abandoned as soon as the club reached the Premiership and, on the eve of his return to St Mary’s as a Leicester player, Saints’ fansnetwork.co.uk considered supporters might like to “thank him for his contribution to our resurgence in the game …. without Dean Hammond perhaps none of what they are enjoying in the Premier League would have been possible”.

Although Hammond earned a one-year extension to his contract in July 2015, he was not involved in the side that surprised the nation by winning the Premier League.

He had gone on loan to Sheffield United, then managed by his old Saints boss Adkins, and made 34 appearances for the Blades by the season’s end. However, he didn’t figure in new boss Chris Wilder’s plans and left the club in the summer of 2016.

Russell Slade gave him a trial at Coventry City in January 2017 but he didn’t get taken on and eventually he returned to Leicester to work with their under 23s. He later became loans manager for the Leicester City Academy.

Hammond opened up about his career, and some of the difficulties he’s faced since stopping playing, in an interview with James Rowe for The Secret Footballer.

  • Most photos from Argus cuttings; plus Southampton programme, Albion programme and Leicester City website.