Dean Sturridge
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| Dean Sturridge | ||
 |
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| Personal information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Dean Constantine Sturridge | |
| Date of birth | July 26, 1973 | |
| Place of birth | Birmingham, England | |
| Height | 5 ft 8 in (1.73 m) | |
| Playing position | Striker | |
| Club information | ||
| Current club | unattached | |
| Senior clubs1 | ||
| Years | Club | App (Gls)* |
| 1991–2001 1994 2001 2001 2001–2005 2003–2004 2005–2006 2006–2007 |
Derby County → Torquay United (loan) Leicester City → Wolverhampton Wanderers (loan) Wolverhampton Wanderers → Sheffield United (loan) Queens Park Rangers Kidderminster Harriers |
190 (53) 10 (5) 22 (6) 7 (4) 75 (28) 4 (0) 11 (0) 6 (0) |
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1 Senior club appearances and goals |
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Dean Constantine Sturridge (born July 26, 1973 in Birmingham, England) is an English footballer, who plays as a striker. He is currently unattached to a club and instead acting as a match summariser for BBC Radio Derby.
Contents |
[edit] Playing career
[edit] Derby County
Sturridge began his career as a trainee at Derby County, and worked his way through the ranks to make his first team debut on January 11, 1992 in a 1-0 defeat at Southend United.
He gained more first team action over the next years, particularly at lowly Torquay United during a loan spell in the 1994-95 season. He then returned to score 20 goals that fired Derby to the Premier League. His first year in the top flight was also successful, scoring 11 league goals, including one of the goals of the season against Arsenal.
He played five seasons in the Premier League for the club, and is their record goalscorer in the Premier League era (32 Premier League goals). After 9 years service, he left for local rivals Leicester City in January 2001 for £375,000.
[edit] Leicester City
Sturridge's time at Leicester was far less successful than at Derby, and the subsequent big money (£5million) buy of Ade Akinbiyi saw his place often under threat. He scored 7 goals during 25 appearances in total before being loaned to First Division Wolverhampton Wanderers in November 2001, just 10 months after his arrival at Filbert Street.[1]
[edit] Wolverhampton Wanderers
His time at Wolves started brightly as he netted four times in his opening two games. This convinced the club to make the loan permanent after the initial month and he signed for £350,000 on Christmas Eve 2001. [2]
His goalscoring form continued throughout the season, and he finished as the club's leading goalscorer with 21 goals in total, which took them to the play-offs. The following season saw him notch another 11 which again helped the team achieve a play-off finish, where they won promotion to the Premier League after a 3-0 final win over Sheffield United.
The striker didn't enjoy much of the team's top flight season as a combination of injuries and new arrivals sidelined him for all but 5 games, and he was loaned out to Sheffield United.[3]
He was unable to put his injury problems behind him though and never regained a regular starting place for Wolves again. He moved on to Queens Park Rangers on a free transfer in March 2005.[4]
[edit] Queens Park Rangers
Here, his injury problems continued and he was only able to appear in 11 matches for the team, and never scored for them. In December 2005, it was announced that he would be leaving the club.
[edit] Kidderminster Harriers
On June 26, 2006 Sturridge joined Kidderminster Harriers on a one-year deal along with former Tamworth goalkeeper Scott Bevan, possibly becoming the biggest name player the club have ever signed[5].
Sturridge's time at Kidderminster didn't work out well, despite initially earning praise from his new manager Mark Yates over his positive attitude[6]. He featured in six matches without finding the net, before suffering an Achilles injury which ended his season prematurely.
He was not offered a new contract at the end of season.[7].
[edit] BBC Radio Derby
Sturridge was acting as match summariser for BBC Radio Derby, following the sudden departure of Ted McMinn after the first match of the 2007-08 season[8]. In this role he co-commentates, alongside Ross Fletcher, on all games played by his old club, Derby County. However on the last game of the season, he revealed that he would not be returning to this role for the 2008-09 season.
[edit] Trivia
- His brother Simon was also a professional footballer, most notably playing for Birmingham City and Stoke City.
- His nephew Daniel is an up and coming striker at Manchester City.
- Dean appeared in the fictional football drama Dream Team on Sky One (as himself) as a Harchester United player and was valued as a £7 million player.
