Dessie Baker
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Desmond 'Dessie' Baker (born Dublin August 25th 1977) is an Irish footballer who currently plays for Longford Town F.C.
A graduate of Dublin youth clubs Marks Celtic and Stella Maris, Baker spent his late teens as a trainee at Manchester United. Baker enjoyed a fruitful career at underage level, winning the F.A. Youth Cup with Manchester United and numerous schoolboy international caps for Republic of Ireland. He failed to earn a professional contract at Old Trafford, however, and after a brief detour to Oldham returned to Ireland in the summer of 1996, having been offered a contract by League of Ireland club Shelbourne F.C.
Baker would remain a fixture in the Shels line-up for the remainder of the decade, but rose to wider prominence as a member of Brian Kerr's Republic of Ireland squad which placed third at the 1997 FIFA Under-20 World Cup. Baker famously headed the opening goal of Ireland's 2-1 victory over Ghana in the third/fourth place play-off after less than a minute of play had elapsed.
Baker (who scored another memorable goal against Kilmarnock F.C. in the 1997-98 Cup Winners' Cup, although Shels eventually lost the tie) was an integral member of the Shelbourne team which won the League of Ireland championship under Dermot Keely in 1999/2000, frequently operating on the left-hand side of a forward trident which also featured his brother Richie on the opposite flank.
Another league title followed in 2001/2002, but this time Shels were crowned champions under contentious and unsatisfactory circumstances, while Baker himself hardly muddied his boots all season. Keely, bemoaning the pressures of full-time football management, vacated his position, and his successor Pat Fenlon consigned Baker almost permanently to the substitutes' bench.
Baker served out the remainder of his contract during two frustrating and largely inactive seasons under Fenlon (incorporating a brief loan spell at U.C.D.), before signing a two-year contract with Longford Town in January 2003. Longford manager Alan Matthews (formerly attached to the coaching staff at Shels) declared that "[Baker is] a good asset to us and he has something to prove to people after his last two seasons which have seen him play very little football." Baker himself was of the opinion that "the squad of players he [Matthews] has should see us challenging for more silverware next season."[1] This view was instantly vindicated as Longford won their maiden FAI Cup in 2003, a feat they remarkably reprised in 2004, when the additional conquest of the League Cup reinforced the club's status as connoiseurs of knockout football.
Despite participation in the UEFA Cup and newly-instituted Setanta Sports Cup, Longford's form has deteriorated markedly in recent seasons, although Baker himself (primarily a midfielder) continued to perform to a relatively high standard. As of September 2006, however, he no longer enjoys the status of automatic selection for the first XI.
