Nathan Blake
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| Nathan Blake | ||
 |
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| Personal information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Nathan Alexander Blake | |
| Date of birth | January 27, 1972 | |
| Place of birth | Cardiff, Wales | |
| Height | 5 ft 11 in (1.80 m) | |
| Playing position | Striker | |
| Youth clubs | ||
| Newport County Chelsea |
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| Senior clubs1 | ||
| Years | Club | App (Gls)* |
| 1990–1994 1994–1995 1995–1998 1998–2001 2001–2004 2004–2005 2005 2006 |
Cardiff City Sheffield United Bolton Wanderers Blackburn Rovers Wolverhampton Wanderers Leicester City → Leeds United (loan) Newport County Total |
131 (35) 69 (34) 107 (38) 55 (13) 75 (24) 14 (0) 2 (1) 5 (1) 458 146 |
| National team | ||
| 1994–2003 | Wales | 29 (4) |
|
1 Senior club appearances and goals |
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Nathan Alexander Blake (born 27 January 1972, Cardiff) is a Welsh former professional footballer, who played in the English Premier League for several clubs and also represented his country at international level.
Contents |
[edit] Club career
[edit] Cardiff City
Blake was a trainee at Chelsea but was released in 1990, without graduating to the first team. He moved back to his home-city club Cardiff City after this, where he quickly made his senior debut. He quickly rose to being a first team regular in 1990/91 and went on to become a firm favourite with fans.
He helped the club to the Third Division title in 1992/93 and made a strong to life in the third tier the next season, scoring 14 goals in 20 games. This form attracted Premier League Sheffield United to snap him up for £300,000 in February 1994. In total, he scored 40 goals in 164 appearances for the Welsh side.
[edit] Sheffield United
Blake scored five goals in the remainder of Sheffield United's top flight campaign, but could not halt relegation. He then finished as the Blades' top scorer in the next two seasons, but neither season saw the club mount a serious promotion challenge in Division One. During the 1995/96 campaign, his goalscoring again won him a move to the Premier League, as he joined Bolton Wanderers in December 1995 in a £1,200,000 deal (including Mark Patterson).
[edit] Lancashire life
Blake failed to make an immediate impact at Bolton Wanderers and only managed one league goal as they dropped out of the Premier League after a solitary season. He rediscovered his goalscoring prowess in the 1996/97 campaign though, as he notched 19 league goals to fire Bolton back to the top flight as champions. The next season saw his best seasonal tally in the top flight as he bagged 12 goals, however this couldn't prevent yet another relegation for the club after one season.
He started the 1998/99 season brightly, with 6 goals in the opening 12 games, which won him his third move back to the Premier League with Blackburn Rovers in a £4.25m deal in October 1998. History repeated itself though for Blake as he again suffered the drop in a season that saw him manage just 3 goals.
The striker remained at Ewood Park for two full seasons, the second of which saw him again win promotion, but he managed only 9 goals over these seasons. He started the club's return in the top flight, and scored their opening goal away at Derby County, but was swiftly returned to Division One when he was sold to Wolverhampton Wanderers in September 2001 for an initial £1.5m fee.[1]
[edit] Wolves
Blake quickly refound his form at First Division Wolves, scoring on his debut against Stockport, and ending the season with 11 goals. However, he missed out on another promotion as the club suffered a late slump to fall into the play-offs where they lost to Norwich. The next season saw Blake better his tally, as his 12 goals helped the club go one step further as they won the play-offs. Blake himself scored in the 3-0 final win over his former club Sheffield United, held in his homecity of Cardiff.
His final crack at the Premier League was hindered by a year of niggling injuries that kept him sidelined for the majority of the games. He managed just one goal, against Newcastle United, from 13 appearances as the club proved unable to survive. This relegation gave Blake the unenviable distinction of the player suffering the most Premier League relegations, with five different seasons ending in the drop (1994, 96, 98, 99, 2004).
[edit] Later career
Blake was released by Wolves upon their relegation in 2004, after making 85 appearances, scoring 26 times in all competitions. He joined fellow relegated club Leicester City on a one-year contract after having also had a trial at Sunderland.[2] His opportunities here were mostly only as a substitute and he never scored a league goal for the Foxes. Failing to make an impact, he was instead loaned out to Leeds United in January 2005, where he managed the final goal of his league career against Coventry City. His loan was cut short by a ruptured hampstring[3] and he returned to Leicester, but did not feature again before being released by the club in June 2005.
His professional career derailed as he was given a six-month suspension in August 2005 for testing positive for a recreational drug.[4] After serving his suspension, he had a trial at Stoke City but decided he was unwilling to commit to playing full-time anymore.[5] Instead, he spent two months playing for non-league Newport County, where he had originally been a trainee, before his deal ended in October 2006.[6]
He then retired from playing to focus on running his own property management company in his native Wales.
[edit] International career
Blake won 29 caps for Wales, scoring 4 times. He made his debut on 9 March 1994 in a 1-3 friendly loss to Norway, that marked the only game of John Toshack's first spell in charge. He scored his first goal against Moldova in a 1-3 Euro 96 qualifying defeat. His other three international goals came against Turkey (August 1997), Norway (October 2000) and Poland (June 2001). He also set the unfortunate record of being the first player to score an international goal at Wales' Millennium Stadium when he put through his own net against Finland on 29 March 2000.
He announced his retirement in September 2004, 10 months after playing his final match in the Euro 2004 play-off loss to Russia.[7]
[edit] References
- ^ "Wolves sign Blake", BBC Sport, 2001-09-13.
- ^ "Blake joins Leicester", BBC Sport, 2004-08-01.
- ^ "Scan confirms Blake injury fears", BBC Sport, 2005-01-11.
- ^ "Blake suspended for six months", BBC Sport, 2005-08-23.
- ^ "Blake fuelled by Newport mission", BBC Sport, 2006-08-30.
- ^ "Blake parts company with Newport", BBC Sport, 2006-10-13.
- ^ "Blake calls time on Wales", BBC Sport, 2004-09-23.
