Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Lee Matthews was top-scorer in the same Leeds youth team as Paul Robinson, Ian Harte and Harry Kewell. They won the FA Youth Cup and he was one of the star players. Apparently Lee Matthews was actually a big prospect because he played for all the England youth teams, but he fell out with David O'Leary and never played again in the Leeds first-team after that (having played a number of games under George Graham in the Premiership!). He was apparently very good friends with Lee Bowyer. Matthews was top-scorer in the Leeds reserves every season, he went out on loan to a few clubs a few times and spent some time out injured now and again before he came to us. I remember we signed him on loan about an hour before the Millwall night match and he drove down to be on the bench, he didn't get to Ashton Gate until 7pm to meet the players before they went out, he came on as a late sub and scored a penalty with the last kick of the game for a 2-1 win against the league-leaders and eventual champions, most confident player I've ever seen, without him and the spark he gave us we'd of been in the bottom half of the table in 2000/01 after losing form and key players to injury, but we got damn near the play-offs thanks to his help, I think he came on as a sub at Reading the next game and it changed the game when he came on, it was either 1-1 or we were 1-0 down, we went from looking awful to looking really dangerous when he came on and we won 3-1 in the end, he scored one and set-up one I think, I remember he actually got hold of the ball and didn't give it away like the others had been doing. I kind of forgot about the glimpses we saw of him when he looked awesome, but I remember now, we didn't see him often enough because he was ALWAYS out injured, but how can we forget the brace he scored against the Gas and the way he terrorised them and just ran rings round them all game, shame really, he's never got a string of games together in his career yet because of all his injuries. Each Leeds United player had this short one-line desciption on their profiles and Lee Matthews was described as "a big forward player, fast and direct, he can work the channels and get shots on goal". BLOODY INJURIES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Haha imagine if he stayed injury-free all season and found some sharpness back and scored 20+ goals for play-off winners Port Vale in 2004/05 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Lockerman Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 He will probably come back and bite our asses. I thought that he was quite good but as you said because of his injuries we really didn't get the chance to see how good he really was, our loss i'm afraid., Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myoudale Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 i have always liked matthews the only problem was he was injury prone so we hardly never saw him at his best. i wish we had kept him on but good luck to him at port vale. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest STORTFORDRED2 Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Agree with the injury side and always seemed a top bloke when warming up (kicking the ball into crowd for fun etc). Also saw him at Cardiff and Hartlepool-obviously there to cheer rest of lads on. However on park, and I saw him quite a bit, although he held ball up well and could shoot, he was so slow it looked like he was running through treacle. Reckon he could pass a ball but (allegedly) not pass a hostelry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Well because he never got much of a run in the side and was always injured it meant he was always rusty and couldn't gain his sharpness back, I thought he was quite a fast runner actually. I felt sorry for the lad because the constant injuries were getting to him, in the end he was so depressed, whenever he saw a City fan in the street or whatever they'd just take the piss out of him asking him what injury he had this time! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 "England's centre-forward Lee Matthews" -http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/1998/07/22/phead.htm "Wilkinson had to rely on a two-goal blast from Leeds United's Lee Matthews to see off the host nation and group minnows." - http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/1998/07/21/phead.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Paul Robinson, Ian Harte and Harry Kewell Sorry, Ian Harte wasn't in that FA Youth Cup winning side, but Paul Robinson and Harry Kewell were Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 He played against Lazio bloody hell - "Ian Harte, was among the successful marksmen for the Elland Road club, as they triumphed 4-2 with the other successful penalty-takers being Derek Lilley, Lee Bowyer and Lee Matthews." - http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/1998/08/01/phead.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myoudale Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 hes a good player and I'm sure if he will not get injuries this year he will play very well. shame we lost him but thats football Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bristollionheart Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 Seems as if he was a huge prospect if you read all of these guys views in the following thread - http://www.leedschat.com/site/matthews.shtml "Could be our secret weapon next season. He is unbelievably unlucky with injuries and has spent about 18 months out till recently. Prior to that, was scoring like a man possessed for England U-18's and was hailed as 'New Michael Owen' in many quarters. In his enforced absence lots of his old academy teammates are playing every week for the first team and driving around in sports cars... Rumour has it LM is now working his nuts off to join them and he was apparently awesome in his recent reserve comeback. Also he is a big lad and exactly the type of striker DOL wants. May save the club a fortune if his injury nightmare is behind him. GG rated him very highly also." "If this lad can get rid of his injuries he's going to be another young lad in our side, he's pure quality. If he turns it on we could have ourselves a gem!" "youve got to be gutted for him everyones been going on about hime for years but every time he gets fit and is playing well in the reserves he picks up another injury he's got the talent so lets hope he can stay free of injurys and show people what he can do." http://www.leedschat.com/site/matthews.shtml Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brady bunch Posted June 21, 2004 Report Share Posted June 21, 2004 agree with all the above, he is/was a very good player who never was able to get a run in the side whilst also being 100% fit. I remember the game v rovers where he got two great goals and if he does sort out his injuries he will be very good again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.