José Dominguez

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Personal information
José Dominguez
Full name	José Manuel Martins Dominguez
Date of birth	February 16, 1974 (1974-02-16) (age 34)
Place of birth	Lisbon, Portugal
Height	160 cm
Playing position	Winger
Club information
Current club	Retired
Senior clubs¹
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1994-1995 1995-1997 1997-2000 2000-2002 2002-2005 2005	Birmingham City Sporting Tottenham Hotspur 1. FC Kaiserslautern Al-Ahly Vasco da Gama	35 (3) 45 (4)
National team
1995-1996	Portugal	3 (0)
¹ Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 2 May 2007 (UTC). * Appearances (Goals)

José Dominguez (born 16 February 1974 in Lisbon, Portugal) is a former professional footballer who has had stints at clubs including Benfica, Sporting and Tottenham Hotspur. Famous for his trademark acrobatic somersaults as goal celebrations, and his diminutive appearance, José Dominguez was a firm fan favourite at Spurs, following his signature by then Tottenham manager Gerry Francis in August 1997, for £1.6m. He usually played as a winger, and regularly started under Francis, but more regularly came off the bench during Christian Gross's tenure as manager. He won the Worthington Cup with Spurs in 1999 as an unused substitute, before falling out of favour during the following season under George Graham, becoming a reserve team regular. He signed for 1.FC Kaiserslautern in 1999 for £250,000, before playing his final seasons in the Qatari league.

He made his Spurs debut in the Premiership match against Derby County at the end of August, winning a penalty after coming on as a second-half substitute. A Portuguese international, Jose had already had a spell a season in English football, joining First Division Birmingham City (under the management of Barry Fry - whom Dominguez described as “a nice character, eccentric but very funny”) in March 1994 and he made a few appearances towards the end of the season but was unable to save the Blues from relegation. He played his part in helping the St Andrews club to promotion the following season and became a firm favourite with fans. Dominguez only scored three goals in thirty five games in the Second Division, a low amount for an attacker, but was responsible for assists in many more.

Having started his playing career with Benfica, Dominguez returned to Portugal in May 1995 after Sporting Lisbon made a £1.6m offer for his services which Birmingham accepted. He was keen once again on another spell in English football and Sporting recouped their entire outlay on Jose and sold him to Spurs at the start of the 1997-8 season.

Despite being at White Hart Lane for over three years, Jose’s appearances for the first team were limited. He only managed eight league starts during his first season. What did not help Dominguez was the fact that Gerry Francis, the manager who had signed him in the first place, resigned from his post less than four months after Dominguez had joined. Neither Christian Gross, who succeeded Francis at the Lane, nor George Graham, who joined Spurs when Gross was sacked after less than a year in charge, rated Dominguez and the winger was left to ply his trade in the reserves.

In the 1998-1999 season Jose didn’t start a first team match until the end of April. During this time he was a rather expensive regular in the reserves.

The 1999-2000 followed the same pattern. Only two starts for the first team, both against West Ham United, and in neither game did Dominguez manage to last the ninety minutes. Placed on the transfer list, thus alerting other clubs to his availability, there continued to be a distinct lack of interest in him, until Kaiserslautern decided that the winger was worth a quarter of a million pounds and Dominguez finally left White Hart Lane.

On his departure, Jose launched an attack on manager George Graham for not giving him a chance, and was quoted in a tabloid as saying “My Tottenham career ended the day George Graham arrived. He killed me at Spurs. He left me with nothing”.

Spurs fans believed that Dominguez, a pint-sized floppy-haired winger had a few tricks, and could be an exciting player, but all too often the end product was not there. The fans loved the odd run at defenders, the drop of the shoulders, the twists and the turns and it was good to watch, but Jose’s contribution to the team was never sufficient to earn him a deserved regular place.

His cameo appearances as substitute kept him in the public eye. The Spurs faithful would welcome the upcoming introduction of flair, of something a little bit different, as soon as Dominguez left the bench and started warming up. He was suited to the role of substitute, where he could come on for twenty minutes and be noticed for three or four runs, whereas if he played for the whole, or most of the game, he would be largely anonymous.

The Portuguese winger stayed in Germany for four years, before following the trend of many ageing footballers and moving to Qatar,He stayed only for 6 months with Al-Ahly in Doha,Qatar before moving on to Brazilian Giants Vasco Da Gama in Rio where he was a teammate of Romario. Again he only stayed there for 6 months and retired officially in August 2005 after failing to get his playing license back from the portuguese football association. Dominguez's Best Friends in the game include David Ginola, Dani(ex sporting lisbon, west ham & ajax) Ramon Vega and Alex Dias. The now retired Dominguez recently played in the Beach soccer allstar game in the Algarve, Portugal. It is not known what he is currently doing workwise.

He is the shortest player to have ever played in the Premier League^[1].