Nigel Martyn

Nigel Martyn
Personnel
Surname	Anthony Nigel Martyn
birthday	August 11, 1966
place of birth	St Austell ,  England
size	188 cm
position	goalkeeper
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
1987-1989	Bristol Rovers	101 (0)
1989-1996	Crystal Palace	273 (0)
1996-2003	Leeds United	207 (0)
2003-2006	Everton FC	86 (0)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
1988-1989	England U-21	11 (0)
1989-1994	England B	6 (0)
1992-2002	England	23 (0)
1 Only league games are given.

Anthony Nigel Martyn (born August 11, 1966 in St Austell ) is a former English football goalkeeper . In his professional career of almost 19 years, "Big Nige" stood for Crystal Palace , Leeds United and most recently Everton FC between the posts. He was the first goalkeeper for whom a British football club paid a transfer fee of one million pounds. Martyn, who exuded a high physical presence with his "massive figure" and was still very agile, completed 23 senior international matches for the English national team and took part in two world ( 1998 , 2002 ) and two European championships ( 1992 , 2000 ). In his sporting "heyday" he could not prevail against regular goalkeeper David Seaman there.

Professional career

In the club

Bristol Rovers (1987-1989)

It was only from the age of 16 that Martyn started to keep going. Before that, he had been a regular field player and mostly played in midfield. The fact that the “Keeper”, who was born in the extreme southwest, finally moved to Bristol was due to the fact that the “Tea Lady” - in the United Kingdom a company employee who serves tea - of the third division club Bristol Rovers was called was on vacation in Cornwall , saw Martyn in action and finally gave him a trial session. The then coach Gerry Francis was quickly convinced and made Martyn debut four days after his 21st birthday in a 3-1 win against Rotherham United in the professional team.

Equipped with athletic skills and leadership skills, the newcomer quickly gained a good reputation with the Rovers and the 39 league appearances in the first season 1987/88 was followed by a season 1988/89, in which Martyn was not absent from any game. A first big success was still missing after his club in the play-off final against Port Vale had missed only one goal for promotion to the second division after the return leg. At the beginning of the 1989/90 season, Martyn, who at the time had already been in the English U-21 selection , had matured into one of the most promising goalkeeping talents “on the island” and after a run of 645 minutes without conceding a goal - three of them Outnumbered games - the first division club Crystal Palace offered a transfer fee of one million pounds for a transfer. Martyn was therefore the first goalkeeper after the move was completed at the end of November 1989, who cost an English club a million sum when signing.

Crystal Palace (1989-1996)

Martyn immediately established himself as a "regular goalkeeper" with the promoted team from London and while the league goal was the primary goal in the 1989/90 championship round , he recorded first successes in the FA Cup . After a semi-final victory against the eventual champions Liverpool FC, he was defeated in the final with “Palace” and only with a replay against Manchester United (3: 3, 0: 1). In the 1990/91 season, Martyn was part of the best defensive in the club's history to date and the only 41 goals conceded catapulted the club to third place in the final table. In addition, after a 4-1 win in the final against FC Everton, they won the ZDS Cup .

The fact that the sporting trend pointed in the opposite direction again after 1991 was less due to Martyn's achievements - this was even used for the first time in the English senior team in 1992 - but was more due to the fact that previously decisive players increasingly left the club, including Ian Wright and later Mark Bright . The consequence was the "crash" over the tenth place in the 1991/92 season to relegation in the first Premier League season 1992/93 ; Primarily responsible for this were the 48 goals he scored himself (in 42 games).

Equipped with a new coach, the club immediately "repaired" this setback at the 1993/94 second division championship and the fact that Martyn now held a key position within the team was expressed in the fact that at the end of October 1994 he completed an uninterrupted series of 100 league matches against Leicester City - only after another record of 150 competitive games in a row did a broken index finger cause an involuntary break. Martyn was especially before his injury with 13 games without conceding often as "solid as a rock", but again only 34 own goals from 42 games were not enough in the 1994/95 season to stay. Since the Premier League reduced the number of participating teams from 22 to 20 in 1995, Crystal Palace's fourth from last place meant that Martyn had to start again in the second division.

Meanwhile, Martyn was the player with the longest stay at the club and when Palace tried again for direct promotion in the 1995/96 season, the goalkeeper signed a new four-year contract in February 1996. With 48 goals conceded, Martyn was part of the league's third-best defense; However, expectations of a return to the Premier League were bitterly disappointed after Martyn conceded a decisive goal from Steve Claridge in the last minute of extra time in the play-off final against Leicester City . It was Martyn's last competitive game for Crystal Palace and he moved to Leeds United in the summer of 1996 for a new British goalkeeping record of £ 2.25m .

Leeds United (1996-2003)

The fact that Martyn was an immediate win for his new club in Leeds was expressed after good performance in the 1996/97 season in the club's internal award for "best player". With loud commands he directed his new front men and was “harmless” in 19 of his 37 missions, so he did not concede a goal. He earned final recognition in the following season, 1997/98, when he was elected to the “All Star Team” of the Premier League (“PFA Team of the Year”) after again outstanding performance. He had missed a single league game, which in turn was due to a controversial red card in the FA Cup win against Oxford United and a resulting suspension.

Martyn defended the title of "best Premier League goalkeeper" in the 1998/99 season and continued consistently good performances, especially his performances in the 2-0 win against Coventry City with the subsequent award for "Man of the Match" “Were only interrupted by short breaks from injuries that he suffered in the games against AS Roma in the UEFA Cup (three games) and in the 2: 3 against Manchester United (one game). In the following 1999/2000 season, Martyn “retaliated” in the renewed UEFA Cup duel with AS Roma and did not concede a goal in the two legs. In the Premier League, too, further progress in sport was unmistakable with the first-time Champions League qualification; the increasingly experienced Martyn had shown himself to be a sure source of support for the team, who had been younger under coach David O'Leary . A groin injury from the home win against Charlton Athletic in October 2000 caused another involuntary hiatus, but after his return in 2001 he was instrumental in making his team advance to the semi-finals with numerous parades against Deportivo La Coruña .

Setbacks followed the sporting highlights. Leeds United missed the re-qualification for the European premier class in 2002 and 2003 and had to compensate for the increasing financial gaps through player sales. In addition, Martyn fell out early with the new coach Terry Venables , when he ordered him shortly after his return from the 2002 World Cup to the Far Eastern season preparation. Since at the same time with Paul Robinson rebelled a new up-and-coming talent in Leeds, it finally came about that Martyn was not used in any game in the 2002/03 season.

Everton FC (2003-2006)

Martyn decided to move to Liverpool for Everton FC . Intended as a substitute for regular goalkeeper Richard Wright , the "veteran" was back permanently between the posts of a first division club after his injury in September 2003. Despite his advanced age, Martyn continued to be extremely agile on his feet and played the rest of the 2003/04 season as "number 1". As the oldest Premier League player of the 2004/05 season, Martyn was a regular goalkeeper part of a team that temporarily moved from fourth from last place in the previous year to the top of the table and in the end secured qualification for the Champions League preliminary round with a surprisingly good fourth final table position . He also recovered well from an injury at the end of 2004, in between playing his 800th game and finally the “Toffees” “rewarded” him with the extension of his contract for another year.

During his final 2005-06 season, Martyn sustained a serious ankle injury in January 2006. The lack of healing results due to the fatigue fracture caused the now 39-year-old goalkeeper to end his active career. The 100th competitive game for Everton on January 28, 2006 against Chelsea was his last appearance in English professional football.

English national team

After eleven games for the English U-21 team and first appearances in the B-Elf, Martyn made his debut on April 29, 1992 in Moscow as a substitute for the Commonwealth of Independent States (2-2) for the senior national team . Two weeks later he played his first full-distance game against Hungary (1-0) and then coach Graham Taylor called him into the squad for the immediately following European Championship in Sweden . There Martyn was only a substitute behind Chris Woods . His third and for a long time last international match followed in June 1993. The new head coach Terry Venables then largely did without Martyn and instead relied on David Seaman , Tim Flowers and Ian Walker at the Euro 1996 in his own country .

It wasn't until May 1997 that Martyn made his fourth international match as an established Premier League goalkeeper in Leeds, five years after his debut. He was also back in the squad at the 1998 World Cup in France under the new coach Glenn Hoddle , although Seaman had emerged as the clear “number 1” there in the meantime. This constellation didn't change two years later at Euro 2000 under Hoddle's successor Kevin Keegan , before an injury to Seaman before the decisive third group game against Romania suddenly catapulted Martyn into the starting line-up. The game ended with an unfortunate 2: 3 and the premature end for England in the preliminary round.

Martyn's career in the English national team lasted until mid-2002; his last appearance was on May 26, 2002, the 23rd international match against Cameroon (2-2) in the run-up to the 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea . Coach Sven-Göran Eriksson also took him to the Far East, where again only Seaman came into play in the tournament games.

After the active career

From March 2007 Martyn took over the role of goalkeeping coach for some time at the lower class club Bradford City , where his close friend and former teammate from the Leeds time David Wetherall was head coach.

Title / Awards

• ZDS Cup : 1991

Web links

• Nigel Martyn in the soccerbase.com database
• Profile page at Crystal Palace
• National team statistics at Sporting-Heroes.net
• Nigel Martyn in the database of weltfussball.de

Individual evidence

1. ^ "England - U-21 International Results 1986–1995 - Details" (RSSSF)
2. ^ "England - International Results B-Team - Details" (RSSSF)
3. ↑ "Holloway column" (BBC Sport)
4. ↑ "Rovers Legends: Nigel Martyn" ( Memento of the original from July 17, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (bristolrovers.co.uk) 
5. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 1995-96 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 1995, ISBN 0-09-180854-5 , pp. 140 f .
6. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 1996-97 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 1996, ISBN 1-85291-571-4 , pp. 161 .
7. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 1997-98 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 1997, ISBN 1-85291-581-1 , pp. 181 .
8. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 1998-99 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 1998, ISBN 1-85291-588-9 , pp. 198 .
9. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 1999-2000 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 1999, ISBN 1-85291-607-9 , pp. 203 .
10. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 2000-2001 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 2000, ISBN 1-85291-626-5 , pp. 213 .
11. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The 2001-2002 Official PFA Footballers Factfile . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 2001, ISBN 0-946531-34-X , pp. 201 .
12. ↑ "The Alan Smith interview: Life is so sweet for Everton's veteran" (The Telegraph)
13. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The PFA Footballers' Who's Who 2004/2005 . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 2004, ISBN 1-85291-660-5 , pp. 271 f .
14. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The PFA Footballers' Who's Who 2005/2006 . Lennard Queen Anne Press, 2005, ISBN 1-85291-662-1 , pp. 273 f .
15. ↑ Barry J. Hugman (Ed.): The PFA Footballers' Who's Who 2006-07 . Mainstream Publishing, 2006, ISBN 1-84596-111-0 , pp. 274 .
16. ^ "Keeper Martyn forced to quit game" (BBC Sport)
17. ↑ “Helping hand from Nigel Martyn”  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Bradford City AFC)