Stan Collymore

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Stan Collymore
Personal information
Full name	Stanley Victor Collymore
Date of birth	January 22, 1971 (age 35)
Place of birth	Stone, England
Height	6'2"
Nickname	Stan the Man
Position	Centre forward
Professional clubs*
Years	Club	Apps (goals)
1989-1990 1991-1992 1992-1993 1993-1995 1995-1997 1997-2000 1999 2000 2000-2001 2001	Wolverhampton Wanderers Crystal Palace Southend United Nottingham Forest Liverpool Aston Villa → Fulham (loan) Leicester City Bradford City Real Oviedo	0 (0) 4 (1) 30 (15) 64 (41) 57 (28) 35 (7) 3 (0) 7 (5) 5 (2) N/A
National team**
1994-1998	England	3 (0)
* Professional club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of November 7, 2006. ** National team caps and goals correct as of November 7, 2006.

Stanley Victor Collymore (born January 22, 1971 in Stone, Staffordshire) was a talented but controversial English footballer.

Contents 1 Early career 2 Professional career 3 Collymore in the news 4 Post-football career 5 Possible football return 6 External links

[edit] Early career

A talented centre forward, Collymore started his career as an apprentice footballer with Walsall, and also Wolverhampton Wanderers, before being released and signing for then GM Vauxhall Conference team, Stafford Rangers, where again he caught the eye of several football league clubs by demonstrating the ability for spectacular goals before being given his chance as a full-time professional with Crystal Palace at the age of 19, when he signed for them in December 1990.

[edit] Professional career

After learning his trade as understudy to the prolific Crystal Palace partnership of Mark Bright and Ian Wright, Collymore dropped down a division to Southend United and there scored 18 goals in 31 games to help keep the club in the then First Division when the odds of relegation seemed certain.

Collymore enjoyed his time at Southend saying, "I count helping to keep Southend in the first division in my season there as one of my finest achievements." [1]

It came down to the last game of the 1992-93 season and Southend beat Luton Town 2-1. Forget the England caps and fetching almost £20 million in transfer fees, memories of that game are as vivid as any Collymore possesses. "I’d scored two or three on the bounce, it was a real bone-hard pitch and the weather was nice" he said. "When the final whistle went there must have been 1,000 fans on the pitch. I got stripped of everything but my underpants — nobody wanted those. It was an incredible day. A lot of people will go through their careers without knowing what it feels like to experience that happiness at lower-league level."^{[citation needed]}

He nearly went to Nottingham Forest on deadline day in March 1993, but Brian Clough had not seen him play, so reversed a decision made the previous day.

However such were the quality of his goals, usually spectacular solo efforts, Nottingham Forest changed their minds and bought the striker for a club-record fee that reached ₤3 million in the summer of 1993, having only been bought by Southend also for a club record fee of ₤150,000 six months earlier. Collymore's goalscoring record with Forest (50 goals in 71 games) was highly regarded, and after being the main catalyst for helping Forest to immediate promotion back to the Premiership in 1993, cemented his reputation as one of the brightest young talents in British football by finishing his first season in the top flight with 25 goals and helping a team that had been relegated only two years earlier to finish third in the Premiership. That prompted Liverpool to come in for him with a then British transfer record bid of ₤8.5 million at the end of the 1994-95 season.

Collymore scored a spectacular goal on his Liverpool debut and began a fruitful, enigmatic, and controversial two-year spell at Anfield. Highs included scoring at a ratio of a goal every other game and creating many goals in a superb partnership with Robbie Fowler, who were regarded as one of the best strike partnerships in Europe, to winning caps for England. He also scored two goals, including the winner against Newcastle United at Anfield in a game that was regarded as one of the most exciting in the history of the English Premiership. Indeed, it was voted by viewers of Sky Sports as the greatest sporting moment in the channel's first ten years. Lows saw Collymore fined after refusing to play for the reserves, refusing to move closer to Merseyside from his home town of Cannock, publicly criticising manager Roy Evans and his tactics, and playing badly in the 1996 FA Cup final against Manchester United, during which he was substituted. Liverpool lost 1-0.

Collymore was also labelled along with his colleagues at the time like Jamie Redknapp, David James and Steve McManaman for being 'Spice Boys' - a derogatory term used to signify the players as underachieving lad culture playboys in the game. He also helped Liverpool to third place in the Premiership, the club's highest position since winning the old First Division title in 1990. Undoubtedly a great footballer on his day, Collymore set himself up for a head-on collision with his club that made a transfer inevitable and was compounded with the emergence of Michael Owen through Liverpool's ranks. The striker was sold to Aston Villa in 1997 for ₤7 million, again a club record.

Collymore's time at Villa was eventful off the pitch, with his long-term treatment for depression earning him harsh criticism in the British tabloid press and the ridicule of manager John Gregory, yet widespread public support for confronting an illness that affects so many people. In the three years that he spent at the club, Collymore scored only 15 goals, having been frozen out of the squad for over a year of Gregory's reign as manager, and received regular treatment for clinical depression. Highs included being only the third Aston Villa player in history to score a hat-trick in European competition (the other two being his boyhood idols Gary Shaw and Peter Withe).

[edit] Collymore in the news

Collymore admitted to punching his girlfriend, television presenter Ulrika Jonsson, during an argument in Paris in 1998. However, Collymore suggests in his biography Tackling My Demons that the bruises that occurred on Jonsson's face were in fact a reflection of rain drops from a photographer's lens.

After this incident, and Gregory's refusal to play him, Collymore moved from the West to the East Midlands, with Leicester City, in 2000. He was initially successful, having scored a hat-trick on his home debut, but within days he was embroiled in an incident involving a fire extinguisher during some hi-jinks on a club break abroad. After a widely-regarded successful but short spell at the club, misfortune struck when he broke his leg in a Premiership game at local rivals Derby County which ended his season. After Martin O'Neill left the club for Glasgow Celtic, Collymore was unsettled and agreed a short-term move to Bradford City. Again, he showed on his debut the talent he possesses, scoring an overhead kick against local rivals Leeds United. Collymore then moved to La Liga club Real Oviedo, where a lack of form combined with difficulties adapting to life abroad saw his retirement from football at the young footballing age of 30 shortly after signing for them. This incurred the wrath of the club who then began legal action against him.

In 2004, Collymore was duped by The Sun newspaper into signing a confession declaring that he was "a lying scumbag" and that he "threw the first punch" in a fracas with six Bath rugby union players at a nightclub in Dublin the previous weekend. He also apologised to readers for "wasting all that football talent throughout my unfulfilled career". Collymore later complained to the Press Complaints Commission in a case which he subsequently won. [2]

[edit] Post-football career

After he finished playing, Collymore took up a role as a summariser for BBC Radio Five Live and showed insight and much promise, in keeping with his long-time assertion that he was far more articulate than the majority of footballers. During the 2002 World Cup a caller recommended that Sven select him for the upcoming game against Sweden. When Stan asked why the caller said it, it was because he was good at beating Swedes. However, he was then relieved of his duties after publicly admitting that he took part in open-air sexual activity known as dogging. He argued that there was more to life than tea with digestive biscuits, insisting dogging was the future of British relationships. Collymore made the point after being relieved of his BBC duties that he was the subject of double standards at the BBC as the Corporation have employed and continue to employ people that have serious criminal convictions, which were far more serious than a consensual sexual activity.^{[citation needed]}

Collymore contributed to his biography with Oliver Holt (2004). Stan : tackling my demons. ISBN 0007198078. which was released to critical acclaim for its portrayal of the modern footballer. In 2005 he acted the character of Kevin Franks in the film Basic Instinct 2 alongside Sharon Stone. In the opening scenes, he and Catherine Tramell (Stone), have sex in a car. Collymore is seen and heard regularly on television and radio in the UK, and owns Maverick Spirit Productions, a UK Television Production Company.

[edit] Possible football return

Despite retiring from football in 2001, he was recently in advanced discussions with Australian Hyundai A-League club Newcastle United Jets,[3] after employing the services of a Sydney agent to secure a contract in Australia. He was set to join a league with a ever growing amount of ex-Premiership stars, however this move was later turned down by the Australian FFA citing "concerns over his image". [4]

In 2003 his name was linked with the manager's job at his old club Southend United. Southend were looking for a new manager after the departure of Steve Wignall, and after a brief spell by David Webb as caretaker-manager, and then Steve Tilson, they were looking for a permanent manager. Collymore's happiest times were with the seaside club, who were now in League Two with relegation looking a real possibility, and many felt that his 'hero' status at the club could be the morale boost they needed. But it was not to be, Collymore's lack of managerial experience and Southend's subsequent improvement under Steve Tilson meant the job went to Tilson, who has since taken the club from strength to strength.

On 4 October 2006, the 35-year-old Collymore revealed that he was planning a comeback - and insists he can make the grade in the Premiership again. Collymore told the Daily Mirror.

The former Liverpool and Aston Villa forward flew to Tenerife earlier this week to embark on a three-week fitness programme. He said: "A month from today I guarantee I will be able to stand side by side with any striker in the country and my physique will be up there with any of them. This time I'm not going to self-destruct. You are not going to see headlines about me being kicked out of a bar somewhere in the early hours rolling drunk."

He added added: "I know I can still be among the best."[5]

In November 2006, Collymore was linked with a possible player/coach role at League of Ireland side Sligo Rovers.

[edit] External links

• Profile at Soccerbase
• Stan Collymore at the Internet Movie Database
• BBC Nottingham : Interview