Nigel Worthington Profile

A talented and industrious left-back, Nigel Worthington spent 10 years at Sheffield Wednesday before moving to Leeds in 1994. He finally hung up his boots in 1997, having made 66 international appearances for Northern Ireland, and moved into management. After a spell in charge of Blackpool, Worthington was appointed as Norwich City's assistant manager, eventually taking the reins after the departure of Bryan Hamilton. He took Norwich to the Division 1 play-offs in 2002, before winning the league in 2004 to gain promotion to the Premiership.


On The Field 

Best individual performance: Thierry Henry at Carrow Road earlier this season. It was a performance of the highest quality - he stood out as pure class.

Best team performance: Away at Newcastle in our third game of the season, we started well, competed hard and, after going 2-0 down, we showed great resilience to fight our way back to 2-2. We could have almost nicked it in the dying moments, too.

Funniest thing in football this year: Darren Huckerby’s dress sense, he’s certainly different.

A name to watch in 2005: Francesc Fabregas at Arsenal, he’s going to be some player when he’s got a bit more experience under his belt.

One rule change you would like: I’d like the rules to be left alone, so things can be black and white for players, referees and supporters. There are sometimes too many grey areas; if a player is offside, it should be offside anywhere across the line as opposed to phrases like ‘action zone’ being used. Keep is simple and straight forward to prevent so much debate.

Professional ambition for the coming year: To be in the Premiership as a manager next season, I’m a very simple person.

Off The Field

Celebrating Christmas this year: We will train on Christmas night ahead of the game on Boxing Day, but I’ll try and get some quality time in with the family in between the travelling and the games, too.

Best Christmas memories: In 1992 while I was at Sheffield Wednesday, we had a Boxing day match at home against Manchester United. It was an early kick off at 1 o’clock and our boss Ron Atkinson put a few bottles of pink champagne on the table for breakfast that morning and said he wanted us to get them down our neck before we left the table.

By quarter past two the Champagne was working and we were leading 3-0, but then it really kicked in and Manchester United came back into the game and in the last 25 minutes pulled back to 3-3 thanks to two Brian McClair goals and Eric Cantona’s equaliser.

Favourite Christmas song: The original Band Aid, Do They Know It’s Christmas. It’s a powerful song and a great one for Christmas sing-songs.

New Year's resolutions: To continue winning games.

Where in the world would you'd most like to visit in the next year: I’d love to go to Australia, a country that I’ve never been to. My Brother-In-Law is working out there and it’s a place I’ve heard so much about I want to see it for myself.

Which band, either past or present, would you like to see live on stage? Mick Hucknall and Simply Red, I’ve seen them two or three times and they’re a band I always like to listen to.

If a film were to come out next year about your life, who would you like to play you? It’d have to be Richard Gere, he’s got the grey hair.

Log on to TheFA.com over the festive period for more end of year reviews.

Date Article
20 December       Terry Venables
21 December The Barber
22 December Tord Grip - Part I
23 December Tord Grip - Part II
24 December Brent Hills and Tord Grip - Part III
25 December Sven-Goran Eriksson - Part I
26 December Trevor Brooking - Part I
27 December Trevor Brooking - Part II
28 December Trevor Brooking - Part III
29 December Sammy Lee
30 December Graeme Dell and Matt Upson
31 December Sven-Goran Eriksson - Part II
01 January  Sven-Goran Eriksson - Part III
02 January  Brendon Batson
03 January  Nigel Worthington and Lyndon Lynch
04 January  Marcus Bignot
05 January  Dave Jones
06 January  Bobby Robson and Martin Hunter
07 January  Mark Schwarzer and Zesh Rehman