Ade Akinbiyi

[MikeyT]

It depresses me cos prior to the season Peter Taylor signed as manager, I never really liked football at all, so missed the O'Neill years. So the first sight of football for me was Peter Taylor and his signings. I'm surprised I continued to support!

[THEBIGJOHNSTEADER;]

There aren't enough superlatives to explain the shear crapness of this cvnt

[fazzyfox]

I would be interested to hear him on talk radio on Thursday but as an appropriate show of respect to the man I think I'll miss it, after all missing things is how we remember him.

I also remember he had a big problem with his movement, the midfield (and crowd) were constantly screaming at him to make a run but if anything he'd run further towards his marker, supposedly confident he could spin him with tight footwork ( which would inevitably fail). We were surprised that this wasn't worked on in training, after all we had Mr super duper best coach in England at the helm, but also questioned whether you should have to teach a £5 million signing the basics.

He said he was shocked himself at the fee and I remember reading that he was surprised to be selected ahead of others including Collymore and he just seemed out of his depth. The one time he wound me up outside of his performances was when he scored after a long goal-less run (V Sunderland I believe) and said after the match his doubters were wrong and he'd proved himself, sorry mate but for 5 million, we need more than an odd goal every now and then.

[Foxhateram]

Depressingly that Liverpool game was one of my first city league games. Had seen a few freindlies before that. Fowler really dealt ade a lesson that day.

[Munshi]

[Silverdaz]

To be fair to Akinbiyi if we brought him for a million or two then he would not of been a bad player for us its just that he cost 5 million and we expected more from him

[Langston]

The most gutting thing about just how much of a **** Wise was with us (and is now), is that I remember being genuinely excited when we signed him.

[surrifox]

I remember the hope that spending £5 mill on a striker engendered that season .

 

I heard the signing story but understood that Taylor had a budget of £5 mill  and Moxey wanted to hold on to him but the board insisted on a  £3mill trigger  to sell. When Taylor enquired about the price Moxey said we are looking for 5 . Taylor is supposed to have asked "Is he worth that?" and when Moxey said yes Taylor wrote the cheque (whilst Moxey was  struggling to keep a straight face)

[LanguedocFox]

Still remember that Liverpool game like it was yesterday. I can't ever recall seeing such an incompetent display of finishing as that day, compounded by Robbie Fowler delivering a finishing masterclass at the other end. I think that was the day the patience of the fans for Ade snapped.

 

I was there as well, in the Double Decker, and I remember thinking that I could have scored a couple of those changes that Ade missed, and I was blessed with two left feet. Desperately poor.

[LanguedocFox]

To be fair to Akinbiyi if we brought him for a million or two then he would not of been a bad player for us its just that he cost 5 million and we expected more from him

 

Not sure I agree with you. We paid 1.3 mill for Trevor Benjamin, and I don't know anyone who thinks he was other than a complete donkey.

[ithuriel]

Good old Trev and Ade, lightning pace to fly down the pitch and then able to single out which supporter In the crowd they wanted to take out with pin point accuracy, amazing really, think they actually managed to take out one of the security cameras once.

Taylor should have explained though that the big net thing was the target.

[Nalis]

We sold Lennon in the december. We were just as good if not better that season up until that point. We were constantly in the top 2 or 3..top until Man Utd, had a few game blip but still came back.

We had 35 points after 19 games(half the season). Thats incredible tbh. Then we lost Lennon..THAT was the difference. First game 6-1 loss to Arsenal, our backbone was gone.

We then did win a couple of games and after Liverpool we were remarkably 4th still in mid March! Then that Wycombe game happened and a downward spiral, was the end.

Some people say Wycombe was the end, I disagree the signs were way before March. Some say right from the start of Peter Taylor coming, again I disagree. I think when Lennon left it changed everything.

Dare I say, if we kept Lennon, at 35 points in 19 games, we'd of gone on and done better than O Neil and been in the top. Remember the top 4 wasnt so 'exclusive' back then, who knows if we'd got it, we could of been built into a big premiership club.

Couldn't agree more, even the Man U and Liverpool fans at my school were getting annoyed at Leicester that season as opposed to just dismissing us or patronising us...

Always thought it was Lennon leaving that was the beginning of the end. Even if he stayed until the end of the season it could have made such a difference.

[Mickey O'Neil]

 

For years O'Neill made shoe string signings and performed miracles. Turned down Everton and Leeds. Then we get the ground, the cash, and just that one club too far came in. Imagine if he'd have stuck around for a couple more years

You can blame that absolute, useless, clueless, stupid fvckng plank, John Barnes. Absolute tool.

[foxes_rule1978]

To be fair to Akinbiyi if we brought him for a million or two then he would not of been a bad player for us its just that he cost 5 million and we expected more from him

He was bad, even if we had spent 1 million on him, we would have spent a million more than his worth.

[Raj]

Whos got the fitter Body...Ade then..or Dyer now???

[Guest MattP]

Akinibiyi and Big Trev.

We went from the cultured and genuinely world class strike force of Cottee and Heskey to having two boxers up front in a year.

And we shelled out cash for it, after Taylor and Sven I'd be scared to ever see us have money again.

[SeattleShane]

Worst thing about that video is seeing that little **** W*se in a City shirt.

Thought the same !

[Bob Weasel Fox]

The story goes that Moxey at Wolves said we could have him for £3mill and Taylor replied how about £5mill?

Sounds about right

[Beliall]

Watched the clips with the sound down as im out, the kermogant song was playing in my head.

[THEBIGJOHNSTEADER;]

I also had the misfortune of bumping into Lee Marshall in Safeway after the 1-4 Liverpool game where I recall he slipped gifting them a decisive goal. Would you like to know what he was filling his trolley with? Loads and loads of quavers. I recall biting my lip not to say anything as I was still angry and he was a lot bigger and richer than me at the time. I did however walk down the dairy isle where I deliberately punctured a yakult in frustration. This is the first time I've told anyone about this. Still regret it to this day.

[Rhysm]

Interview with him now on Talk sport.

[davieG]

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  Ade in Leicester

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  Ade signs for Leicester

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  Akinbiyi nets for Leicester City

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  Ade in Leicester

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There is a list of Impertinent Questions That Must Be Asked when you interview Ade Akinbiyi, writes Lee Marlow. It seems a bit unfair, really. 

It’s taken years to track down the former City number 22. This is the first time we’ve spoken to him since he left City in the grim, dark days of 2002.

On top of all this, Ade seems like a decent bloke, undeserving of this kind of interrogation.

Still, the questions come anyway.

 

The record transfer fee.

The hope and expectation. The missed chances.

The long run of games without a goal. The overwhelming sense of disappointment which swept across Filbert Street, game after game after game.

The matches where the fans turned. The Saturday afternoons where he was booed off, another defeat, another game without a goal.

What does he think about all of this?

Not much, it transpires. “I don’t think about it,” he says.

Instead, he has chosen to put this period of his career behind him. He doesn’t dodge a question. He answers every one, even if it’s just: “You know what, I can’t remember that.”

That Bolton game, for instance, the opening match of the 2001/02 season, Bolton winning 0-5, the City team booed off the pitch.

“Did I play in that game?” he asks.

You did.

“I don’t remember that. Sounds like it’s probably just as well,” he says.

It wasn’t a great chapter in his career, his two years at Leicester City, he says. But it doesn’t torment him in the way it might have tormented some weaker players.

“It didn’t affect me at the time,” he says, “and it doesn’t affect me now. I knew there would be pressure – although I didn’t quite expect there to be that much pressure – so it was up to me to deal with it.”

And do you know what, he says. He did. He felt the pressure. But it didn’t beat him.

He remembers the fuss, he says. The scrutiny. The interview requests he always preferred to turn down. The coverage, the endless TV replays which only seemed to make it all worse.

He remembers the jeers. The vitriol. Being booed off the pitch by fans in the same blue shirt as him. He remembers feeling he had let people down.

And then there was one game, he says.

One game that sticks out above the rest.

Liverpool were the visitors to Filbert Street on Saturday, October 20, 2001. Peter Taylor, the man who brought Ade Akinbiyi to Leicester City, the man who made him the club’s record £5 million signing, had been sacked three weeks earlier after a run of abysmal results.

Akinbiyi had not scored in 15 games. Pressure was mounting.

That afternoon, Liverpool ran out at Filbert Street and won at a canter. 4-1. Robbie Fowler scored a hat-trick. Fowler scored more goals in that afternoon than Akinbiyi had managed in the previous 18 games.

Akinbiyi doesn’t remember much of his time at City – but he remembers the Liverpool game. It seemed to sum up his Leicester career.

“I had chance after chance in that game,” he says. “So many chances, decent ones, too. If I could have just scored one of them... I don’t know... Maybe it all would have been different.

“A header, I remember, which I mis-timed and it came off my shoulder. Then a one-on-one which I blew over the bar.”

The City team trudged off at full-time and the boos rang around Filbert Street.

“I think that was the end for me at Leicester, really,” he says.

He scored two games later, at home to Sunderland. He was so pleased he tore his shirt off and ran around the perimeter of the Filbert Street pitch, flexing his muscles.

It’s the abiding image of Akinbiyi’s time with City. A muscular, tireless trier – “his confidence may have wilted, but his willingness to battle never did,” according to City bible Fossils and Foxes – Akinbiyi became a national byword for profligacy.

Expensive failure. Akinbadbuy, according to a large percentage of City fans.

It was a nickname that plagued his career, following him around like an unwanted smell. Ade remains pragmatic about that. “I didn’t do the business at Leicester,” he says. “So, you know, you’re bound to get some stick. I was bought to score goals for City and I didn’t do that – well, not enough goals, anyway.

“I was a football fan. I used to go and watch games. I know what happens if your team doesn’t play very well.

“You work all week, you pay your money to watch 90 minutes of football. You do that then you have the right to vent your feelings. I understand that,” he says.

Ade Akinbiyi had been on a pre-season tour of Ireland with Wolves in July 2000 when the news broke that Leicester City wanted to sign him.

The negotiations started cautiously. City went in low. Wolves stood their ground. It was a game of poker. Who would blink first?

City had recently sold Emile Heskey to Liverpool for £11 million and the money was burning a hole in Peter Taylor’s pocket.

Wolves were canny enough to recognise it. Negotiations quickly escalated. Akinbiyi became a Leicester City player – for a record-breaking £5 million. “I knew very little about it,” says Ade. “I was going down for training one morning and they told me I couldn’t train. I didn’t know why. I wanted to train.

“That was it, really. I rang my agent and he said Leicester City had put a bid in, a big bid, and it had been accepted.

“I was happy at Wolves. I was living near Birmingham, I was settled there. I was playing well. I had some good friends there, too. And then there was all this talk about Leicester.”

Wolves boss Colin Lee – a former City assistant coach under Mark McGhee – called Akinbiyi into his office. He didn’t want him to go and he wasn’t happy that he’d been sold.

“The move to Leicester had absolutely nothing to do with Colin Lee,” says Ade. “He made that clear.”

But when City were waving a £5 million cheque under their nose, it was too much to turn down.

Ade, aged 25, had scored 16 goals in 37 games at Wolves. But it wasn’t about what he’d done. It was about what he might do. It was about the potential.

£5 million seemed like a lot – “I could see that,” he says – but City were willing to pay it.

Did the size of the transfer fee feel like a burden?

“I knew it was a lot, but I don’t think so,” he says. “At the time, I just wanted to play football. I wasn’t naming the price. The directors did that. It had nothing to do with me.”

Muzzy Izzet was the Leicester City captain at this time. Unknown to many City fans, the two had played together and against each other in the London youth leagues. They were old mates.

“I remember Pete Taylor calling me at home one night in the close season and asking me all about Ade,” says Muzzy.

“He wanted to know what he was like? Was he easy to get on with? Was he reliable?

“I told him the truth. He was a good, solid bloke. Good attitude, determined, always gave 100 per cent and he was as hard as nails.”

It was all Taylor needed to know. A few days later, the deal was done.

Ade flew from Ireland to East Midlands Airport. A taxi took him to Filbert Street where Taylor was waiting to greet him.

“I liked Peter Taylor. He was brilliant with me,” he says.

“He made me very welcome at Leicester and he filled me with confidence. I knew I had that backing, which was important.

“Plus, he was a good coach – and he liked a laugh. He was a very hands-on boss and it was always varied and interesting.”

What did City offer you?

“Aw, I don’t think I can tell you that. It was good money. My agent sorted all that out. I didn’t get involved in any of that. I never did. I didn’t go for the money, anyway. I went to Leicester so I could play in the Premier League.

“I remember, after meeting Peter Taylor, Muzzy Izzet was waiting to greet me. I used to play with Muz when I was a lad. We went back a long way.

“I met a few of the lads. Everyone was good. It was an old-school club. No airs or graces. No big-time Charlies.

“I remember thinking ‘I’ll settle in here’.”

Taylor wanted him to play to his strengths; a big, physical presence. Bullying defenders. Getting in behind them.

“I was happy with that,” he says

What could possibly go wrong?

The first season was pretty good, he remembers. He scored 10 goals in his debut campaign. “It’s not a massive amount, but it was okay,” he says. “I was happy with that – but I wanted to get more.”

Two months into his first season, the 2000/01 campaign, City sat proudly, if briefly, at the top of the Premier League. They finished the season in 13th position, after a dismal run of 14 defeats in the last 19 games.

Manager Peter Taylor blamed it on injuries. The City board agreed, handing him a much-improved contract and money to spend on new players. Taylor went out and bought big, again.

The first game of the 2001/02 season was Bolton Wanderers at home. City lost 0-5. Ade doesn’t remember it.

You played in it?

“Yeah, but I don’t remember it.”

Arsenal came next, away at Highbury. City lost 4-0.

“Not the greatest of starts then,” he says.

No. Not really.

City won once – away at Derby County – in their first eight games. An already restless Filbert Street turned on Taylor, who was sacked. In two months, he went from receiving an improved contract to pocketing his P45.

At a bewildering press conference at the ground the next day, Taylor told reporters City had made a mistake, that he would have turned things around.

The man in the number 22 shirt believed him. “He was a good man. He was England manager, after all.”

He was – although he never had a big job again after his two years at City, did he?

“Well, yeah, but I still thought he could have turned it round.”

A new manager, Dave “Harry” Bassett, was appointed, who arrived with a reputation for saving troubled clubs from the drop. The writing was on the wall for Akinbiyi. A goal away at Villa in a rare 2-0 City win couldn’t save him.

By Christmas, Ade found himself warming the bench, with Bassett preferring a new strike pairing of Brian Deane and Paul Dickov.

A month later, Akinbiyi was on his way to Crystal Palace in a £2.2 million move. Played 67 games. Scored 13. He was not unhappy to leave.

So, what went wrong?

“Well, I didn’t score enough goals. Simple as that, really,” he says.

“The move happened too early for me. In hindsight, it would have been better to stay another year at Wolves.

“I think they expected a bit too much from me, a bit more than I realised, perhaps, when I signed.

“I didn’t know just what a hero Emile Heskey had been at Leicester, either. I knew they were big shoes to fill – I just didn’t realise how big they were, though.”

Did the pressure affect him?

“I don’t think it did. I was focused. I worked hard. It just didn’t happen for me.”

Did you hear the abuse, the jeers and the booing?

“Yeah, of course I did. It wasn’t nice, but I understood it,” he says. “You have to deal with it. I never shied away from that. I never hid in games.

“I was paid to play football and that’s what I did. Also, we didn’t score enough goals so the forward line was constantly changed.

“Some weeks, I played up front with Trevor Benjamin. Then, Darren Eadie. Then, perhaps, Dean Sturridge, then Jamie Scowcroft.

“It was changed a lot. We never settled on a preferred line-up. It didn’t help, perhaps.

“The rest of the lads gave me great support. The atmosphere was good at the club. I was close with Andy Impey and Frank Sinclair. Even though we struggled – we kept our heads up.”

In football, as in life, you will have good times and bad times, he says. “You have to learn to deal with them both. I always did that, wherever I went.”

He doesn’t say as much, but never more so, perhaps, than at his time at Leicester.

IT’S Wednesday morning in early autumn when we speak. The football season is under way. Ade, now living in Manchester, works as assistant coach at Colwyn Bay with his former City team-mate Frank Sinclair, the club boss. “I hung up my boots four years ago at Notts County,” says Ade. “Frank asked me to come back and play for him here. I wasn’t fit enough, really. But I did it. I wanted to help out a mate.

“I played one game – and my hamstring went. That was it.

“Frank asked me to come back as coach. I was happy to do it. I like Frank. We played together at Leicester and Burnley.

“I’m enjoying it. We train on Tuesday and Thursday. It’s a very different environment, non-league compared with professional football. The dedication here is amazing.”

Away from football, he does a lot of charity work for Prostate Cancer.

“My dad died of it in January. He kept it quiet, which was typical of him, really.

“I only discovered that when he died. When I found out I vowed to get involved with that.”

He also works as a consultant, helping under-privileged kids in Nigeria and Ghana, using football as education. It’s good, he says. That and the football, the coaching, it keeps him busy.

He likes to be busy.

Ade Akinbiyi played for 15 clubs in a career which spanned two decades.

He can count on one hand the clubs where he enjoyed playing football: Gillingham, Bristol, Wolves, Stoke, Burnley. And Leicester, he says.

Did you?

“Well, yes, and no. I did enjoy my time there,” he says.

“I was settled at Leicester, not so much on the pitch, but at the club, at the training ground, the rest of the lads. We all got on.”

It’s not always like that, he says. “I’ve seen a lot of clubs, a lot of dressing rooms. It’s not always like that.

“I settled most times, I think, but there were clubs where I didn’t. I kind of rode in, did my stuff and rode out again.

“People ask me about my career. I always say I enjoyed it. I had a good time. I played football and I got paid for it. There’s not a better job in the world.

“Occasionally, I’d get stopped in the street and people would have a go.

“I remember meeting one chap in Leicester. He was really honest with me. He didn’t like the signings Peter Taylor had made and he said he used to hammer me from the terraces.”

How did you respond to that?

“I said, ‘Well, that’s fair enough, mate’. He’s welcome to his opinion. He’s paid for his ticket. There’s nothing I can say to change his mind is there?”

Do you have any regrets?

“Naw,” he says. “No regrets at all. I had a good time and I loved it. How can I regret that.”

Read more: http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/Boo-Army-Leicester-City-flop-Ade-Akinbiyi-dealt/story-23014930-detail/story.html?#ixzz3Ei2NDVIm 
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[foxfanazer]

I've got no bad feelings towards him at all. Sometimes it just doesn't work out for players at certain clubs. It's not like he wanted to be shit for us.

Peter Taylor on the other hand......

[Fox92]

 

• 

  Akinbiyi nets for Leicester City

•  

Read more: http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/Boo-Army-Leicester-City-flop-Ade-Akinbiyi-dealt/story-23014930-detail/story.html?#ixzz3Ei2NDVIm 

Follow us: @Leicester_Merc on Twitter | leicestermercury on Facebook

Read more at http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/Boo-Army-Leicester-City-flop-Ade-Akinbiyi-dealt/story-23014930-detail/story.html?#KvIclFQcO8GbJ2Kl.99

 

 

Lewis and Akinbiyi in one photo...

 

No wonder Savage is laughing.

[Corky]

 

•  
• At a bewildering press conference at the ground the next day, Taylor told reporters City had made a mistake, that he would have turned things around.

 

 

Before that season he reckoned we could qualify for Europe having lost 12 away games in a row and lost 10 out of 11 at the end of the previous season. The man is a clown who wasted millions.

 

For a couple of million Akinbiyi wouldn't have had the pressure on his shoulders, but at £5 million the pressure was enormous. Having said that, he missed some glorious chances that you'd expect most strikers to score. He doesn't come across as bitter which is credit to him because he suffered serious grief from the crowd.