Craig Fleming
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Craig Fleming | ||
| Position(s) | Defender | ||
| Team information | |||
Current team | King's Lynn | ||
| Number | 26 | ||
Craig Fleming (born October 6, 1971 in Halifax, Yorkshire, England) is a former footballer. He was a defender.
Football career
Fleming began his professional career with his hometown club Halifax Town (69 appearances, no goals) where he made his debut aged 16. He also picked up the Barclays Player of the Month award at the same age. In the summer of 1991 he moved to Oldham Athletic, where he made 192 appearances, scoring one goal. His spell at Oldham included three seasons in the top division in the early 1990s. In this period, Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson described Fleming as "the best man-to-man marker in the country" after playing some memorable games against a young Ryan Giggs. In 1993 he was involved in Oldham Athletic's great escape when they narrowly avoided relegation from the premier league on goal difference. He became captain of the Latics in 1997 which was also the season when he left Boundary Park for Carrow Road, the home of Norwich City. In his first season with the Canaries he suffered some injury setbacks but this was soon behind him and he became a first team regular for nearly 10 seasons. In this time he also had spells of captaining his team and was a well respected member of the squad.
On October 23, 2004 he made his 300th senior appearance for Norwich City in their home match against Everton.
Fleming was a key figure in the Norwich side that won the first division championship in the 2003-2004 season, and the supporters recognised his outstanding contribution - not just during that season but over several years - by voting him Norwich City player of the year ahead of Darren Huckerby (2nd) and Robert Green (3rd). During Norwich's Premiership season Fleming played every minute of every game, spending the most minutes on the pitch of any top flight player.
To mark the fact that the 2006-07 season was his tenth with the club, Norwich City granted Fleming a testimonial match against Newcastle United which took place at Carrow Road on 26 July. This game finished 2-1 to Newcastle with Fleming playing for the majority of the game. There was increasing speculation that Bournemouth would attempt to sign Fleming during the January transfer window in 2007, but Rotherham United were the club to snap him up on a free transfer on 31st January.[1]
Fleming ended his Norwich City career finishing 12th in the all time appearance list after clocking up 382 appearances.
Fleming signed for non-league King's Lynn shortly after the start of the 2007-08 season, where he was under the management of former coach Keith Webb. On 12 March 2008, however. Fleming announced his retirement due to a persistent ankle injury.[2]
Notes
- ^
"Millers swoop for veteran Fleming". BBC Sport. 2007-01-31. Retrieved 2007-03-25.
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External links
- Craig Fleming at Soccerbase
- Career information at ex-canaries.co.uk