Gary Speed is a former Welsh footballer and coach who died suddenly in 2011 at the age of 42. At that time, he coached the Wales football team. When Gary Speed was still a football player, he played in the position of the left midfielder, but in fact he was a universal player - he could also play both in the center of the field and on the left flank of the defense.
Carier start
Gary Speed was born on September 8, 1969 in the city of Mancot in Wales, where he began to play football. However, only at the age of fifteen, he was able to enter the Leeds Club Academy, with which, as a result, he entered into a professional contract in 1987, when he turned eighteen. However, he began speaking for the main team far from immediately - at first he had to sit in a deep reserve.
He was able to make his debut only in 1989 at the age of 19, but in training he proved himself to be the best, and in the next season he already played much more often. When the team entered the First Division (and, accordingly, the highest) in 1990, Gary Speed was already a regular base player. He played 56 matches that season and scored ten goals.
The following year, Leeds was able to win the championship, and Speed put a lot of effort into this, having played in 47 matches and scoring ten more goals. In total, he spent seven full seasons for the club, playing 312 matches and scoring 58 goals, but that championship was the only one during his stay at Leeds. In 1996, the 27-year-old footballer decided to move to Everton, which paid five million pounds for him - a very serious amount at that time.
Going to Everton
Gary Speed, the footballer who spent almost his entire career at Leeds, decided to challenge himself - however, he stayed in the new club for only a year and a half. During this time, he entered the field 65 times and scored 18 goals. In the winter of 1998, Newcastle decided that he wanted to see a Welsh player in his squad, and eight million pounds were paid for Gary Speed. As a result, the footballer quickly changed his team - but he spent more time at Newcastle than at Everton.
The game for Newcastle
It was Newcastle that became the new home for this footballer. For seven years, the team played a midfielder who had a Gary Andrew Speed inscription on his T-shirt - that is, almost as much as Gary spent in his home club, Leeds. During this time, he played 285 matches, scored 40 goals, was a regular base player, was twice in the FA Cup finals, in 1998 and 1999, and in 2001 even reached the Intertoto Cup finals, but he’d add a single trophy to his collection and could not.
In 2004, AIDS turned 35 years old, and everyone thought that after Newcastle he would end his career, but the player turned out to be incredibly hardy and full of energy. Therefore, in the summer of that year, he announced to Newcastle that he was not going to end his career after the expiration of the contract, so he was sold to Bolton for a symbolic million pounds in order to get a game practice there.
Bolton and Everlasting Energy
Everyone thought that in “Bolton” Gary would play another year, a maximum of two, after which he would retire. However, the player again surprised everyone - he played at the club for three and a half years, and he did not sit on the bench, but was one of the key players. Moreover, he already began to gain coaching experience - in 2007 for several months he was a playing assistant coach. This was his first experience, and he performed a rather interesting task - he served as a kind of intermediary between the head coach and the players on the field, and when he returned to the bench, he assisted the head coach already outside the field. However, at the same time, AIDS remained mainly a football player, and during his stay at the club he entered the field 139 times and scored 14 goals, after which he signed a contract with Sheffield, who played in the Championship, that is, the Second League of England.
Last club
When Speed signed a contract with Sheffield in the winter of 2008, he was 38 years old - the age at which most field players have been at rest for about five years. So Speed in his own way was a unique footballer, of whom there are only a few now around the world. However, Gary could not calm down, he needed to play even at that age, so he continued to move on - and in Sheffield he was also an important player, not a reservist, replacing only in matches of the smallest scale. For a year and a half, he played in forty games, added six more goals to his account, after which in 2009 he was appointed assistant coach - but more on that later.
At the moment, it is worth noting only that in the summer of 2009, AIDS’s career as a football player came to an end - he no longer appeared on the football field, although he officially announced the end of his career in sports only when he was appointed Sheffield head coach in 2010 .
Team appearances
The Wales team in the career of Gary Speed played a very important role - for a long time he was a key player in the squad, even if he did not finish the game for Wales until he was forty, as it was in clubs. In total for the national team, he spent 87 matches, in which he scored nine goals. He made his debut in November 1990 in a match against the Luxembourg national team. He had to wait for the first goal for four years - he was able to score only in October 1994 at the gates of the Moldavian team. In March 1999, Gary first entered the field with a captain's armband. However, unfortunately, the Wales team could not make it through any major tournament during all this time - it was closest to this in 2003. The Welshmen entered the qualifying playoffs and were one step away from getting to the 2004 European Championship, but lost to the Russian team in two matches with a total score of 0: 1. Soon after, Gary completed his career in the national team - his farewell match took place in October 2004.
Coaching career
As you can already understand, not only the football player was Gary Speed. Welsh’s coaching career began already at Bolton, and continued at Sheffield, where, after the player’s career ended, Speed became an assistant coach. In this position, he stayed a year until Kevin Blackwell was fired - then Gary was first appointed head coach. Unfortunately, the beginning was far from the most convincing - in 18 matches, the Speed team won only 6 victories and earned only 21 points.
As a result, Speed was dismissed from his post in December 2010 - but he immediately received an invitation from the Wales Football Association, and in December of that year he already held the position of head coach of the Wales team. Under his leadership, the team spent ten matches, five of which won, and some of the victories were obtained in matches with strong opponents such as Switzerland or Montenegro. However, his coaching career ended in a year - as well as his life.
Sad ending
Gary Speed's life as a whole was good - he had an impressive career, a strong family and everything that a person could wish for. However, in the fall of 2011, Gary Speed's wife found him hanged in a garage. Was it suicide? Some people argue that yes, this was the case, regardless of the fact that Gary did not show any suicidal tendencies.
However, there is another potential reason Gary Speed could die. The cause of death may be carelessness. The fact is that on the evening when AIDS died, he quarreled with his wife - they had these quarrels from time to time, so nothing portended trouble. The wife left, slamming the door, took the car and went to unwind. At this time, Speed went to the garage, built a noose and waited for his wife to return. However, she decided not to return home and spent the night in a car.
In the morning, when she wanted to take a shower and change clothes before work, she saw that the door to the house was open, and Gary was not in the house. Then she noticed him in the garage - maybe he just wanted to scare his wife because of a quarrel, but she did not return home, he fell asleep with a noose around his neck, slipped and actually hanged himself. This is how the life of a famous football player and coach, who could win many more trophies in the coach’s position in the future, ended sadly - however, fate decreed completely differently, and Speed passed away very young.