Born: 20/9/1969 Falkirk
Debut: Brighton Away 15/9/1990. Final Game: Tranmere Home 25/4/1998
Honours: 9 Caps for Scotland Schoolboys. 11 caps for Scotland Youth. 1992/1993 Supporters Player of the Year.
A product of the famous Celtic Boys club, Stuart joined Charlton from Celtic in August 1990 for £100,000. He never played for Celtic's first team but went on to have eight years at Charlton making 263 League and Cup appearances and scoring 9 goals. The six foot plus centre half with the occasional spell at right back, Charlton career did not get off to the best of starts with a own goal on his first full start for the club at home to Leicester City in October 1990 followed by another own goal away at Notts County at the end of the same month.
However it was during the 1992/1993 that he become a regular in the side at Centre Half and picked up the Supporters player of the year trophy. The following season saw him wear the "Number one" shirt after the club choose to pick squad numbers in alphabetical order. He suffered a cracked rib and a punctured lung during the 95/96 season against Grimsby and had his only sending off against Norwich City the following season.
Stuart's last appearance in a Charlton shirt was as a late sub against Tranmere Rovers in April 1998 and whilst he was on the sub bench on a few occasions during the 1998/1999 Premiership season he was sold to Division Two Wigan Athletic in September 1998 for £200,000 where he would make over 125 League and Cup appearances during his 3 years with the Latics.
Spells at Oldham Athletic, Scunthorpe United and Boston United would follow before he moved back up to Scotland to become Player/Assistant Manager at Clyde. Further coaching roles would follow at Hamilton, St Mirren and Ross County.
November 2013 saw Stuart appointed assistant manager at Scottish League one side, Airdrie.
In 2006 Paul Scholes was asked by a magazine to name his all-time favourite XI, and at the heart of his defence was Stuart Balmer, the Scot who played for Oldham for two seasons at the start of the decade.
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Comments
Great player for us. First time I saw him was through a side window on the team coach en route to Brighton (we lost). He looked like a frightened schoolboy. He came on as a late sub in that match so didn't get an own goal in his first match for us but in his first home start. I wondered what we'd bought! But he turned out all right didn't he.
He said I have never heard of this bloke; however, he hasn't given Shearer a kick.
Good mates with Walshy me thinks.
Remember when he punctured his lung. Horrible little f***er he was marking just elbowed him in the ribs when he jumped for a header. Still one of the nastier things I have seen at football as it was definitely intended to cause an injury.
Anyone else remember the crazy season when they gave out squad numbers alphabetically?
Balmer was eventually replaced by Eddie Youds so just missed out on the glory days of the late 90s.
I remember that he was sold for what was quite a large fee at the time. All in all a typical Scots professional; tough, dependable and pretty formidable.
Headline: "Balmer: I'll give Ravanelli a welcoming kick into Division 1".
Love an old school hard man.
This game was also the league debut for superhero Clive Mendonca. It seems like only .. errrr .. yesterday ?
Phil Chapple keeping Sweaty out in 97/98 doesn't sound quite right though, I think this was quite a bit earlier in the 90s (but illogical at any time!). For some reason Curbs persisted for a while with a not-so-speedy central pairing of Chapple and McLeary, then came the embarrassing 4-3 defeat against Derby at the Valley after we were 3-1 to the good at half time. Doubly embarrassing for me as I was sat with my Derby-supporting best mate. After that, Curbs saw the light and paired Stuart with a young Richard Rufus. Watching our defence in the mid-90s never seemed quite as stressful again...