One of the most bizarre transfers in recent times, his contract with us would only have finished at the end of last season if he’d stayed for the duration.
a few tears wept from a fair number of fans when he was sold but there’s no way he’d have gotten into the team last season.
signed on a free and sold for a fee just 5 months later?
All I remember him for was, whilst I was sat in the posh seats watching another terrible game I’d flown over especially for wearing my tricolour, there were a bunch of injured players sat around me. Leaburn was amongst them & I was whatsapping his mum joking about what I’d say to him & one of the other players keep looking at me smiling. Now as I am a women of a certain age I knew it wasn’t cos he wanted to take to me out to dinner but I just smiled back thinking he’s just being nice, maybe I remind him of his mum etc etc. It wasn’t until the game was done, we’d lost & I was walking back through the stadium I realised who it was……….I felt a bit guilty for not recognising a fellow Irishman………for about a minute lol
You have to do that before the window closes don't you or he can't join another club till the next window? I assume they did.
Surely you can't cancel a contract of a player and they can't work for 4 months?!
You can’t just cancel the player’s contract, you have to buy them out of it. That could be the full value of the contract or a percentage of it because then they can go on and do another job
He was ok. Your typical lower-league ball playing defender where he was pretty decent on the ball but he'd have moments where he put the team under pressure unnecessarily and he wasn't that strong or dominant. I was surprised when he left as quickly as he did but I think there's an argument that we might not have got Gillesphey if he hadn't gone. Holden liked Hector, Ness and Inniss over him initially, then Jones joined, but Appleton ultimately wanted defenders who were comfortable on the ball and the abortive January window before Nathan Jones came in was to bring in ball players either side of the Jones role for a 3 at the back setup. REG and Gillesphey ended up being the picks for both sides but I think Appleton would have liked O'Connell enough to have kept him around and surely would have preferred him over Thomas. Gillesphey ended up being the Wembley hero. Sliding doors and all that
I'm surprised Wrexham signed him because they were very direct and his biggest asset is playing through the lines.
For us, he seemed like a system signing for Garner and there wasn't much point him staying around after the sacking. We were so defensively frail for all those years and I don't think he was going to be the answer, though I'm not sure he could have been much worse than the rest of them. And, to his credit, he's been playing at a much higher level than Hector/Innis/Thomas.
It will be interesting where he ends up, considering Thomas and Inniss are now in the NL, Ness and Lavelle in L2, while Hector is a free agent.
It would be odd to cancel his contract just after the window closes, rather than just before. As a player, I'd rather have a club than be stuck at home for 4 months, as at least you have somewhere to keep fit and some company, even if it's with the U21s.
It would have been interesting to see how much Nathan Jones could’ve improved him.
He was here at a not very good time and reckon he could’ve been part of last season’s promotion winning side in another universe (he did it with Wrexham after all).
It would have been interesting to see how much Nathan Jones could’ve improved him.
He was here at a not very good time and reckon he could’ve been part of last season’s promotion winning side in another universe (he did it with Wrexham after all).
He started 38 times for Wrexham in L1 last season, which is a way higher level than his replacements Hector and Thomas played at last season, so getting rid of him so quickly did seem premature. I guess the money from Wrexham was enough to make us sell.
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Whether that was a little 'best of a bad bunch' with Lavelle etc playing games as well, I'm not sure.
a few tears wept from a fair number of fans when he was sold but there’s no way he’d have gotten into the team last season.
signed on a free and sold for a fee just 5 months later?
Now as I am a women of a certain age I knew it wasn’t cos he wanted to take to me out to dinner but I just smiled back thinking he’s just being nice, maybe I remind him of his mum etc etc.
It wasn’t until the game was done, we’d lost & I was walking back through the stadium I realised who it was……….I felt a bit guilty for not recognising a fellow Irishman………for about a minute lol
For us, he seemed like a system signing for Garner and there wasn't much point him staying around after the sacking. We were so defensively frail for all those years and I don't think he was going to be the answer, though I'm not sure he could have been much worse than the rest of them. And, to his credit, he's been playing at a much higher level than Hector/Innis/Thomas.
It would be odd to cancel his contract just after the window closes, rather than just before. As a player, I'd rather have a club than be stuck at home for 4 months, as at least you have somewhere to keep fit and some company, even if it's with the U21s.