Matthew Le Tissier

By tdf, May 16, 2014

Of all the players I have seen play week in week out, mainly in the english top flight, there is one who stands out as the most naturally talented englishman ever to don a shirt in the Premiership.

That rarest of things in the modern game; a one club man. Put together his greatest goals and they stand proud and majestic alongside any rival you could place against him. Never one to lead the pack in pre-season sprints or long distance slogs, nor expected to track back and mark, let alone tackle an opponent, Matthew Le Tissier, was simply a genius.

His conversion rate of 47 from 48 penalties stands alone as a testament to his supreme ability to find the net. Yet from 12 yards or 30, the story was rarely different. For Le Tissier possessed an unerring ability to find the goal, from any range. And as his penalty record and performances in the crunch relegation battles at the old Dell prove, he thrived on the very pressure which make many players crumble.

Hardly given chance at international level. His eight appearances for the three lions leading to 0 goals, should not in the slightest, remove his god given ability from your consideration of the striker as one of the finest attacking players ever to don shirt and boots.

Undoubtedly he could have moved clubs, from relegation strugglers to title contenders, yet his loyalty to Southampton only adds to the romanticism of his wonderful career.

The sheer quality of his goals was staggering. He couldn’t run, yet he could put the ball in the net from anywhere in the final third.

Aligned to this demi-god talent was a humble, playful yet shy character. Never one to seek the limelight in front of a camera when the mike was thrust in front of his odd dental structure, Le Tissier was content to allow his divine feet to do the talking. And as for the finest strike of his glittering career, the man himself states that it was his goal against Blackburn. He had told his great chum, Blackburn goalkeeper, Tim Flowers, that he would find the custodian’s England towel in the game…And find it he did.

The world doesn’t produce many of his ilk, and I feel privileged to have been in England to marvel at his genius when it was running in top gear. At the very best of times he appeared nonchalant, but when it came to a chance to strike for goal, anywhere within a 35 yard range from the net, there was nobody finer, not just in England but the world, who I would have wanted to find the ball at his feet, as a Saints supporter, as a neutral, as a fan of football itself.

Quite simply, the most magnificent attacking english player of my time, Matt Le Tissier.