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The Story Of Serie A's Oldest Goalkeeper - And No, It's Not Buffon

The Story Of Serie A's Oldest Goalkeeper - And No, It's Not Buffon
SH

Sam Hudspith

17 Mar 2023

A predecessor of Buffon at Parma Calcio, Ballotta made his last Serie A appearance aged 44 years, 38 days. 

Italian goalkeepers seem to age like fine wine.

At least, that's the impression Gianluigi Buffon's imperious career has created.

There is a striking longevity in Italian goalkeepers. Buffon, Salvatore Sirigu, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Alex Meret. All goalkeepers - and only a handful amongst several other examples - who debuted at a senior professional level before the age of 20. 

Rolling back the years, Dino Zoff was also 19 when he made his Serie A debut, and Gianpiero Combi had recently turned 20 before his first professional outing.

Yet it's not as if Italian goalkeepers start young and strong, and fall away within a decade. They simply keep going. Buffon is now 45, and will play into his 46th year if he sees out his deal until 2024 with Parma. 

Sirigu is 36, in his prime, and the aforementioned Zoff played to 41. Walter Zenga was 39 upon retirement. 

But it isn't Buffon, or Zoff, who can claim the record for being Serie A's oldest ever goalkeeper. Buffon's name would be on that medal, yes, if he'd stayed with Juventus for a few more seasons in Serie A rather than dropping to Serie B to rejoin Parma in 2021. And, in fairness, Buffon did equal and break a number of records in what could be one considered the most accomplished personal two year goalkeeping spell in world footballing history during his second spell with Juve.

One of these was breaking the record for being the oldest Serie A goalkeeper to save a penalty, when he kept out Domenico Berardi's penalty in a 3–1 away victory against Sassuolo at the age of 43 years, 103 days. A number of other Juventus records were also slashed by the eminent Italian goalkeeping Godfather between 2019 and 2021.

But this article isn't about Buffon, for all his goalkeeping virtues. It's about the man who Buffon didn't quite outlast in Serie A. 

His name, Marco Ballotta. 

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Ballotta currently holds the record for being the oldest goalkeeper to play in both Serie A and the Champions League. In the case of the former, he was 44 years and 38 days old, and 43 years and 252 days in the case of the latter. Both appearances came for Lazio in the 2007/2008 season. 

Over his 26 year professional career, Ballotta made a total of 542 appearances, with 177 of those coming after he turned 36 in 2000. By 2005 - then 41 - the Italian was still going strong, guarding Lazio's goalposts on a further 49 occasions until his retirement in 2008.

Well, we say retirement. Ballotta pertained to the maverick goalkeeper stereotype in his post-retirement footballing antics, briefly coming out of hibernation to play up front for eighth division side Calcara Samoggia in 2008. They say that variety is the spice of life and the Italian personified that in more than just positional diversity, with his name recorded in the squad list of ten different clubs between 1982 and 2008. 

Born in the quaint commune of Casalecchio di Reno in northern Italy, Ballotta's local boyhood club was Bologna. The year of his birth (1964), Bologna won what was to be their last Serie A trophy to date. Ballotta's formative footballing years were spent with Bologna's academy, but he never made a professional appearance for the club. His first, in a career that would stretch far ahead of him, came aged 18 for another side in the region, the now dissolved A.S.D. Boca Pietri.

It was at his next club, Modena, where he would make the most appearances at a single club over his career. 188 outings later he joined Cesena, where he'd stay for no more than six months before a move to Parma Calcio in 1991. The same year that Ballotta was joining the first team set up at Parma, a certain Gianluigi Buffon was taking the first steps in his goalkeeping career with the same club, signing for their youth team that year. 

Geographically, Ballotta had spent the first decade of his career close to home. Every club he played for between debuting at Boca, as they were known, and leaving Parma for Lombardy-based club Brescia in 1994 was situated on the E45 highway - with Parma and Cesena being of near equal distance of each other (Parma being around 12 kilometres closer to Casalecchio di Reno) from Casalecchio di Reno.

A stand of Parma Calcio's stadium full of fans behind the goal (Goalkeeper.com)

Ballotta only managed 33 appearances for Parma, but they were notable. The 1992/1993 season saw him in fine form as Parma powered their way to a third placed finish and the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup trophy, but it wasn't to last. Only three appearances in the following campaign saw Ballotta again on the search for another club; his new destination taking him out of his boyhood province of Emilia-Romagna and to Lombardy, where Brescia were awaiting his arrival.

Three yo-yo years followed with a relegation being the culmination of his 32 appearances with Le Rondinelle and an immediate promotion to Serie A with Reggiana in 1994/1995. They too went straight back down, and Ballotta was once again searching for a new club. 

And then came Lazio, spell one of two. Between 1997 and the millennium, Ballotta played the role of the onlooker - and when he did feature in a more notable goalkeeping moment, it was as the side act. Angelo Peruzzi, Italy's starting goalkeeper at EURO '96, made the headlines when Lazio signed him from Juventus for a fee of between 33 and 35 billion Lire, with Ballotta included in the deal and moving the other way to Milan. 

The furthest venture from home of Ballotta's career to date ended in a return to former club Modena, where he achieved promotion, initially on loan, to Serie A in 2002, before another promotion (thanks to a match fixing scandal that relegated Genoa to Serie C1) with Treviso. But it was back at Lazio, where he returned to for the 2005/06 season, that records began to break in his wake.

Peruzzi was still at the club, but due to injury to him and number two Matteo Sereni, Ballotta made eight starts during his second debut campaign for I Biancocelesti. By October, he'd beaten Dino Zoff's record for the oldest goalkeeper to play a top flight match in Italy, aged 41 years and 203 days - beating Zoff by 169 days. 

The long-lasting goalkeeper maintained his place in the Lazio goal thanks to Peruzzi's increasingly frequent injury problems. He kept new signing Fernando Muslera out of the side for the majority of the 2007/2008 season and, in the process, continued to break his own record for being the oldest Serie A goalkeeper.

Marco Ballotta pointing in a black Lazio kit (Goalkeeper.com)

On September 18th, 2007, Ballotta became the oldest goalkeeper to play in the Champions League when he started against Olympiacos, beating the record of former Italian centre back Alessandro Costacurta. Ballotta was 43 years and 168 days old. 

And the Italian's bow out from the professional game saw him break his own record for the final time. Lazio's tie away at Genoa in early May of 2008 resulted in 2-0 win for Ballotta's side, although was relatively inconsequential for their position in the league table. The club's penultimate game of the season was the one in which Ballotta set the record for being not just the oldest Serie A goalkeeper, but oldest Serie A player, of all time, at 44 years and 38 days. 

Interestingly, Ballotta doesn't quite take the title of the oldest Italian footballer of all time. That honour belongs to fellow shot-stopper Andrea Pierobon, who broke the record playing for hometown club Cittadella of Serie B. The BBC ran an article on the goalkeeper, describing how ‘there is no secret to his longevity in the game’.

‘He eats well, sleeps well and goes easy on the alcohol. And he also credits a strange ritual for helping him sustain a career that spans four decades’, noted the outlet when he broke the record in 2014. 

Pierobon himself said “one thing I do before almost each game I play is to sleep with my gloves on the night table beside me. I'm very jealous of my gloves, because they are fundamental for my job, so the night before the game I look at them, put them on, even talk to them. This might seem stupid, but it gives me confidence. I talk to my gloves, I tell them to do their job properly”. 

Little information of real depth is available on Ballotta, or indeed how he sustained such a lengthy run at the top level. He ranks seventh in the oldest player of all time lists - one list Gianluigi Buffon does beat him in - but currently retains the record for being the oldest goalkeeper to have played in one of Europe's top five divisions. The closest runner up is John Burridge, who did outlast Ballotta, but whose final appearance came outside England's Premier League. 

But the story doesn't quite end there. The cherry on top of Ballotta's long career was a return to the bench - aged 57 - in 2021 for local club Castelvetro in the Modena area of Italy. He didn't make it onto the pitch, but it marked what you'd presume to be the final chapter in a record breaking goalkeeping career. 

Now 58 and a half, it seems like Ballotta's playing career has finally reached its end. Although, with Italian goalkeepers, it does seem that age really is just a number. 

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The Week in Goalkeeping 42: Another medal for Martinez, Play-Off heartbreak, World Cup goalkeepers announced, and more

The top goalkeeper news stories from 17th May - 24th May 2026World Cup Winner adds another trophy to his collectionLast Wednesday, Aston Villa travelled to Istanbul for their Europa League final vs Freiburg. Villa were endeavouring to end a long trophy drought against the German side. Unai Emery’s side ultimately dominated the final as they won 3-0, and it was a night to remember for Emiliano Martinez as he added another trophy to his impressive collection. Moments of the month: when Emi Martínez became a Europa League winner 🥹🏆 pic.twitter.com/1ZGYeCWI0d— Goalkeeper.com (@goalkeepercom) May 24, 2026 Before the COVID-19 lockdown, Martinez had been struggling for gametime but only six years later, he has bagged himself a World Cup, two Copa Americas, a Europa League, and two Yashin awards, amongst other honours.. What a fantastic five years for Dibu. Hull make it to the promise land after costly errorOn Saturday, Hull faced Middlesbrough at Wembley with the possibility of returning to the Premier League after 10 years. The Play-Off Final was already a point of great controversy following Southampton's expulsion, and the game didn't look like it would be befitting of the drama of the days leading up to it. The tie was sizzling out in the dying embers as the scoreline read 0-0 with clock ticking towards extra time. "Oli McBurnie, he's got the EYE OF THE TIGER!" 🐯🔥 pic.twitter.com/mbu5sxtTVc— Sky Sports Football (@SkyFootball) May 23, 2026 But, in the 95th minute, Hull were on the attack and a ball, which flew towards Boro goalkeeper Sol Brynn, was flapped at at the mercy of striker Oli McBurnie who pounced and buried the ball into the back of the net. It was an unfortunate error for Brynn with the goal condemning Middlesbrough to another season of Championship football.Teammate Aiden Morris said 'Sol makes that catch nine times out of ten. You go down the other end and we could have scored more goals, or we could have done something to stop the cross. There’s tonnes of things.'Which goalkeepers have made the England World Cup squad?On Friday, Thomas Tuchel announced his England squad for the World Cup. There was a lot of controversy surrounding the outfield omissions, but we were more focused on the three choices between the sticks. Jordan Pickford, Dean Henderson and James Trafford were the three names selected to represent their country in the States - hardly a surprise. Do you think England have one of the world's best goalkeeper departments? Liverpool goalkeeper rumours continue to swirlSunday marked the official end to Andy Robertson and Mohammed Salah’s Liverpool careers, playing their final game at Anfield. However, another departure rumour that continues to swirl is that of Alisson. Juventus are reportedly planning to swoop in for the signature of the Brazilian, who was called up for his nation’s World Cup squad last week. Will Alisson stay at Merseyside for another season, or will he make a return to Italy?Kinsky continues redemption arc as Spurs survive Tottenham Hotspur's final day victory over Everton meant that the North London club had secured another season of Premier League football. One man who has been integral to their survival in the last few games of the campaign in young Antonin Kinsky. Since the well-documented Atletico Madrid debacle, Kinsky has been in solid form, and pulled off another great save on Sunday to maintain the lead. What a save from Kinsky in a crucial game against Everton 😮‍💨🧤 pic.twitter.com/cFAM19gmWQ— Goalkeeper.com (@goalkeepercom) May 24, 2026

Harry Salkeld
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Debate: Will The Removal Of Goalkeepers From Under 7s Football Really Be 'Catastrophic?'

New FA Rules are expunging keepers in favour of technical growth in the first stage of organised youth football.Goalkeeping, like life, is not always a linear pathway. It is such a highly specialised position with a skillset that requires a commitment to isolation in mindset and presence. Some are born to be in nets. Others find out by chance that the different coloured jersey was meant for them. “Amazing to see how much the goalkeeper union has grown over the last few years, record numbers across academies, grassroots and youth pathways are choosing to be goalkeepers in all corners of the globe. Goalkeeping is cool,” Mary Earps posted on her socials last year.  She’s right, but when should a budding goalkeeper first enter the ’cool’ box? The jury remains somewhat out on that, after the Football Association recently announced that goalkeepers would be removed from the earliest stage of organised football next summer.From the beginning of the 2026-27 season, children in the under-7 bracket will adopt a new three-a-side format with smaller pitches and no goalie. All six players are 'active, engaged, outfield players’ where each child has the opportunity to ‘grow their skills and join the attack and defence.’No keepers in U-7s football will be 'catastrophic' https://t.co/ee7f66fEoG— BBC Essex (@BBCEssex) April 13, 2026 According to the FA, the plan is to give everyone more touches of the ball. But it is a decision that has caused some waves in goalkeeping circles. “If a child naturally gravitates toward being a goalkeeper, it’s worth asking why we would take that opportunity away from them,” suggests Rangers’ current Head of Academy Goalkeeping Conor Brennan.“The intention behind rotating positions is understandable, giving players more touches and broader experiences. However, in doing so, we risk losing valuable time in developing the unique psychological attributes required for goalkeeping”, Brennan insists.There is an argument that rotation prevents early typecasting. Youngsters can explore different positions before finding their niche. There are numerous anecdotal stories of an outfielder becoming the accidental goalkeeper in their teens.  One of the true greats, Lev Yashin, once said: 'I wanted to be a forward – I was always dreaming about hitting goals – but gradually I got moved back and back until I became a goalkeeper.' Not a bad career move for a Ballon d’Or winner. A year that was technically lost in development can be alternatively framed as 12 months spent in understanding the game from a different perspective“To assume that you can only build a goalkeeper from seven, or influence a goalkeeper from that age is pretty wild,” claims Dan Tumelty-Bevan, Head of Academy Goalkeeping at Birmingham. “To get seven-year-olds into environments where there’s more capacity to enhance skill movement and development is a positive. I think refining that as you go through the ages will give more opportunity for athletes to be goalkeepers.”Gianluigi Donnarumma began in ‘the gate’ at the age of five, playing around with his elder brother and uncle. 'I was never afraid. Maybe that's why I chose goalkeeping,' he has mused. That's exactly the point that Brennan makes. Being thrown in at the deep end is the way to learn the lone eagle of the game.“Building bravery (such as the willingness to put their body in the way of the ball), experiencing the emotional highs of saving a penalty, and learning to handle the inevitable highs and lows all come with being the last line of defence.”“These experiences are not dependent on formal coaching; they are developed organically through repetition and exposure. By delaying this process, we may unintentionally hinder the development of these crucial traits.”We are always told that children are resilient. So why not test the theory at the earliest opportunity to make a head start on the rest? Pitching youngsters into the hero and villain goalkeeping cycle is something that can appeal to a certain DNA. Dean Henderson recently told Goalkeeper.com that he loved  “breaking hearts” from the very beginning. There must be something in that.The fear expressed out loud by coaches is that youngsters who are predisposed to the art of goalkeeping might be lost to other sports.Idrees Afzal, PhD, is a human performance scientist, analyst, and conditioning coach who has worked at Bradford City, within county cricket circles, and alongside national badminton Federations. He is certain that there is a bigger positive to multi-skilling across disciplines from a skill acquisition angle. “Could it help support certain coordination patterns and movement patterns because players haven't got gloves on at a young age and they start learning new things? That's one take on it”, he says. “The other take is simply how representative will this change be in terms of what a goalkeeper will need to do”? Afzal also touches on the holistic element of goalkeeping development. “Is having the gloves on a haptic - a perception relating to a sense of touch? Do young players need to feel what it's like to actually be in goal during a game? Will there be that same perception and action of things that are going on in the scenario as opposed to not having goalkeepers in U7s? Those would be the two big elements that stand out for me. “It could potentially help with a goalkeeper’s ‘possession skills’. But if that's going to be the case, then it needs to be facilitated by either a coach or a referee in a certain way to allow those adaptive behaviors to take place. If it's just going to be a goalkeeper with no gloves standing near the net, it might defeat the whole purpose.”Afzal speaks a lot about ecological dynamics in relation to the question at hand. The theory emphasises that movement and decision-making emerge from the continuous, dynamic interaction between the individual, the environment, and the task.Image Credit: Fabian Otte LinkedIn“Gaining a variety of physical components in terms of your strength, power, and mobility, is going to be really good for a young person. Having exposure at a young age to different aspects of perception and motor learning with the likes of a golf or tennis ball, for instance, is important.”Brennan isn’t so sure. “Other sports, such as hockey, GAA, futsal, and handball, offer young players the opportunity to specialise as goalkeepers from an earlier age. If a child has a strong desire to play in that role, but feels restricted within football, it is reasonable to question whether they may be drawn toward alternative sports where that identity is encouraged.” On the other hand, Yashin tried the high jump, shot put, discus, took fencing lessons, had a go at boxing, diving, wrestling, skating, basketball, ice hockey and water polo. He didn't even want to be a footballer at one point. There is also simply the question of: does this actually matter, for one year of a child’s football career? Afzal believes so.“It's 12 months. That's a lot of time for the development of a young person's mind. I think it all matters. Any exposure, any experience that young athletes are having is really important”, he opines.In these days of competitive parenting and results matter narratives, it would be easy to make the young goalkeeper feel the weight of that responsibility rather than enjoy it. The 3 v 3 structure is key in imparting technical learning when the young mind is open. There are no official results or tables, ensuring a sense of freedom in a fun environment.Afzal has an interesting thesis on what the authorities are really driving at. “It might be a philosophical mindset. Maybe the FA wants our players to be technically good on the ball. Is that going to develop in a young player’s game if they’ve just got gloves on their hands and they’re just stationary, or just stuck to being in the nets?”Of course, this all could backfire. Children are sure to be watching a magical save during the World Cup and think: “I want to be (insert famous goalkeeper name here) right now.” Is the moment being stolen? The new format is about individual actions and not positions.Tumelty-Bevan insists that the broader view wins the day: “People can be so focused on this idea that everything has to look like a mini version of where it’s going to. It doesn't.” The next generation will tell us something about both sides of this story. Goalkeeping is cool. Maybe hothousing can wait.

Tim Ellis
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Is the Play-Off lottery still fair? Wembley hero Saša Ilić on persistence, promotion and penalty shootouts

Play-Off Final winning goalkeeper Ilić discusses the nature of one of football's most unique matches. It’s 1998, and the greatest Play-Off Final of all time seems like it’s never going to end.Charlton Athletic striker Clive Mendonca has bagged the first ever Play-Off final hat-trick against his boyhood club, Sunderland. His teammate Richard Rufus has scored his first ever senior goal. The only problem is that Addicks goalkeeper Saša Ilić, who had kept nine clean sheets in a row leading up to the final, has also conceded four.Both goalkeepers have had just as little luck in the ensuing penalty shootout. 13 penalties have been taken, and 13 penalties have been scored. So, as Sunderland’s Michael Gray steps forward for yet another do-or-die spot-kick, Ilić decides to take a new approach.He decides to leave it up to chance.“Towards the end of the penalty shootout, you get sort of frustrated,” he tells Goalkeeper.com. “You’re going one way, the ball’s going the other way. It just doesn’t seem like it’s going to come to an end. And I saw this coin on the pitch on the right side of the post.“So I sort of flicked it, and I’m like ‘Okay, because I’m not having any luck saving these penalties, if it’s on heads I’ll dive to my left, if it’s tails I’ll dive to my right.’ Fortunately, it went on heads!”One dive later and Charlton were going to the Premier League.Happy 53rd Birthday to former Charlton Athletic goalkeeper, Mr Sasa Ilic. Have a great day @sashailic1 cafcpic.twitter.com/OjMLgiPjVx— CAFC Facts & Stats (Stuart Court) (@CafcFacts) July 18, 2025 Much like the coin, it was a series of coincidences which meant that Ilić had even made it to Wembley in the first place. As a Serbian-Australian living in the former Yugoslavia during the bloody civil war in 1996, Ilić visited his sisters in London. On the last night before he was due to return to Belgrade, he got chatting to Sheffield United midfielder-turned-marketing-manager Mike Trusson at football-themed restaurant Football Football.Within a few months, Ilić had moved permanently to London and was playing seventh-tier football for Trusson’s former club St. Leonards Stamcroft. A year later, having impressed scouts from a number of teams, he was training at Charlton.“I didn’t really have much money,” he remembers. “My sisters would lend me some money to jump on the train from where they were living in Putney. So I had to commute from Putney all the way to New Eltham, like a two-and-a-half-hour trip. And I did that with a huge smile on my face!”His excellent form in training – coupled with an injury to Mike Salmon – meant that, on February 25th, 1998, Ilić made his Charlton debut in a 2-1 win at Stoke. Exactly three months and 12 clean sheets later, his astonishing rise had taken him all the way to Wembley.“It was like I literally fell from the sky into Charlton,” he says. “I didn’t understand the hype of all of it, because I was just sort of thrown into it. It was a case for me where [the Play-Off Final] was just like any other game, and you approached it like any other game. But on the day we travelled to Wembley, we were greeted by 20,000, 30,000 Sunderland fans.“And we got this huge roar – people showing their middle finger, saying all sorts of profanity towards us. And that’s when it kicked in, the importance of the actual game. And obviously, going to the changing room, walking out on the pitch, it was just like a space shuttle in my eyes.”Three hours later Ilić had gone down in history as the man who decided one of the greatest Play-Off Finals of all time. Fast forward 28 years and, after a long career in England, Ilić now lives in Montenegro with his wife and two sons.The Play-Offs themselves, meanwhile, are now 40 years old, and have arguably never been under more scrutiny. In each of the last two seasons, Championship teams have hit the 90-point mark and still not gone up. In the National League, the ever-more popular '3UP' campaign gathered more steam this season as Rochdale amassed 106 points and still needed to scrape a Play-Off final win on penalties to ascend to League Two.From 2026/27, the Championship Play-Offs will expand from four to six teams. Questions have been asked about whether the Play-Offs remain the fairest way of deciding promotion. Ilić, though – perhaps unsurprisingly – remains resolute that they are.“That’s part and parcel of the excitement about football where you’re giving an underdog a chance to grab that trophy,” he says. “I think that’s what makes football super exciting. If you’ve done well throughout the season and you’ve accumulated 20 or 30 points more, on paper you should be winning these games. “But, you know, if you fail at the last hurdle, you’re not ready for it. You’re not ready for it, because you’re going to have a lot more challenging situations in the Premiership or the league above you, if you can’t handle the Play-Off. So, in some ways, it’s a good way to maybe see mentally where these players are.”Ilić is also an expert on what those games can do for a player’s legacy.“A footballer’s career is quite a short career. I think it’s very difficult, even when you’re a professional footballer, to exceed your level. But these sorts of situations can make a player excel quickly, can give a player a bit more recognition if they do particularly well in this one game. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I don’t know. I just know I’m one of those people that benefitted from that,” he says.“It creates legends, it creates an aura, it creates something for people to talk about.”This year’s Championship Play-Off final has thrown up one of the biggest talking points of all: the ‘spygate’ scandal. But Ilić is not convinced that Southampton should be expelled for their alleged misconduct.“That’s all absurd. I think it’s more paper talk than anything else. If you’ve lost because of a couple of photographs, mate, then… no,” he laughs.In an age when preparations for the Play-Offs are so intense that they can include spying on the other team, it seems unlikely that either Daniel Peretz or Ivor Pandur would have wanted to leave their fate up to the toss of a coin.For Pandur at least, he'll be hoping and praying that his numbers are drawn in this weekend's Play-Off lottery.

Jamie Barton
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"The Standards Don't Change": Dean Kiely on a Career Built on Consistency

Dean Kiely has stood between the sticks - and mentored those who do - at the very top for decades. Adapatability is a virtue - but the standards don't change. November 3rd 2003 It’s a cold autumn night in the West Midlands, and Dean Kiely’s goal is under siege. His Charlton Athletic side have taken the lead through a Matt Holland header, and Birmingham City are launching attack after attack forward in hope of levelling the scores. Kiely makes three sharp saves before the break to maintain the lead. Early in the second half, a floated cross finds World Cup winner Christophe Dugarry’s head just five yards from the Addicks’ goal. The striker makes perfect contact, but Kiely springs into life, clawing the bullet header over the bar. Non-plussed, the Frenchman’s face goes blank before contorting into a rictus of disbelief. That stop would later be named the Premiership’s save of the season in 2003/4, a campaign that would end with the Addicks in seventh place and Kiely being named the club’s Player of the Season for the second time. “When I was at my best, I felt like I played on autopilot,” Kiely tells Goalkeeper.com. “That was one of those days where everything went right. “To see his reaction to it, that’s one of the best feelings you can have as a goalie. To see the disbelief on a striker’s face when you make an incredible save. It’s like you’ve broken their heart.” Kiely’s natural agility and penchant for demoralising opposition goalscorers made the shot-stopper a hero at The Valley. An almost ever-present during Charlton’s seven-year stint in the Premier League in the 2000s, he carved out a career at the very top of the English game after travailing every level of its professional pyramid. “We did some special things. We beat Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea. It’s only when you look back on it, that you realise it’s a golden era for the club, and also a golden era for me professionally.” Born in Manchester to an Irish dad and a mum from the Black country, Kiely would eventually pick up football after his parents moved back to the Midlands, initially training with Birmingham before landing at West Bromwich Albion’s academy. At the age of 14, the Baggies put the youngster forward to attend the FA’s National School at Lilleshall in 1985, training with the top talent in the country for two years. On his 17th birthday, Kiely signed his first professional contract with the reigning FA Cup winners Coventry City. Playing in the reserves and youth teams, he was unable to dethrone club legend Steve Ogruzovic. “He showed me the grind it takes to play at that top level. His standards were incredible. I was never going to break into the first team with Steve there, so I was sent out on loan to Ipswich and then York City.” After a couple of months training with the fourth tier club, Kiely made a permanent switch and took over the number one spot. He would go on to make 215 appearances and keep 83 clean sheets for The Minstermen, securing promotion with a penalty shootout save in the Third Division playoff final at Wembley. 🥳 Happy 53rd Birthday to former Minsterman Dean Kiely.We hope you've had a great day, @deankiely40! 🎂YCFC 🔴🔵 pic.twitter.com/3QWjJdTWOB— York City F(C) (@YorkCityFC) October 10, 2023 “From the moment I broke into the first team, I was playing regular professional football for the next 21 years of my career,” says Kiely. “That’s all I ever wanted to do.” Throughout our conversation, the theme of consistency and a commitment to a steadfast work ethic come up, time and time again. After York barely survived relegation from the third tier in the 1995/6 season, a £125,000 switch to Bury beckoned.“What would Bury want from me?” Kiely says, rhetorically. “I would imagine it would be to train and play at a consistently high standard. To perform, and improve to the best of my ability.” They got that in spades. Kiely became a crucial member of the now defunct club’s modern golden era. Winning the Second Division crown in his first season, and helping the Shakers maintain their status in the second tier in his sophomore campaign, he would go on to keep 18 clean sheets in his final term despite the club’s relegation. The shotstopper missed just one game in his tenure, his only absence due to international commitments with the Republic of Ireland. Prior to the 1999/2000 season, Alan Curbishley and his first-team coach Mervyn Day, a former FA Cup-winning goalkeeper, were scouring the market, looking for a goalie that could propel the Addicks back to the Premier League at the first time of asking. With Kiely between the sticks, Charlton would keep 19 clean sheets as they romped to the First Division title, securing their seat at the top table once again. That would be Irishman's final promotion in a career that saw him successfully climb out of all levels of the professional pyramid. Kiely had that sometimes hit and miss virtue in the modern game: the ability to prove a transfer worthwhile. “I can say this now, having been in recruitment meetings as a coach, I would imagine throughout my career, the coaches are saying, ‘we’re alright at goalie’. The evidence says Dean is available and consistent, so we can look at other positions.“Often, a keeper gets parachuted into those teams that come up and they can’t sustain a run of games. “It was the same at York and at Bury. But obviously, the Premier League has that little bit more gravity to it, because of the standard.” Even with the standard of strikers he references as his most fearsome opponents - “Thierry Henry, Wayne Rooney, Ronaldo” - he more than held his own, helping Charlton to multiple top half finishes and bagging a spot in Mick McCarthy's squad for the 2002 World cup along the way. But how did he adapt his game to meet the grade? “My strengths were always my agility, my speed, how I moved around the goal. Everything else had to come up incrementally. Before every game, I’d cross myself, touch the post and repeat the mantra: be positive, be strong, come for crosses, kick well, clean sheet. “I started working with a sports psychologist working on visual cues and visualisation. Like when I played at Anfield, I would visualise kicking towards the scoreboard in the corner of The Kop. I knew if I nailed a kick towards that scoreboard, I’d be ok.” While he initially worked with Day on his drills, he would eventually settle into a working relationship with Micky Cole, a physio turned de facto goalkeeper coach. They enjoyed a collaborative relationship, using Cole’s expertise in the gym to build a position-specific exercise regime. “We were doing things you see a lot on Instagram now, working with resistance bands and plyometric exercises. I didn’t want to bench press, to be built like Arnold Schwarzenegger, it all had to feed back to on-field performance.“I was fortunate to have both. Mervyn who had been there at the top level, and Coley who was just so enthusiastic about goalkeeping but with that strength and conditioning approach.” Kiely’s openess eased the transition to coaching. After short stays at Portsmouth and Luton, he would return to West Brom, eventually taking up the number two spot behind Scott Carson. In his final year as a pro, outgoing goalkeeper coach Joe Corrigan suggested he take on a player-coach role. While Kiely was initially reluctant, manager Tony Mowbray’s counsel opened his eyes to the possibility. “He said, ‘you don’t realise this, but you’re coaching every day. The way you talk to the young players. The way you interact with the staff is really positive.’“I was inquisitive as a player. I wanted to try things. I’m like that now as a coach. I want to set an environment where you have to deliver, but if there’s something you don’t like we’ll discard it. It was like that when I was working with Scott [Carson]. We’d be out there for another 45 minutes or an hour after everyone’s gone in. What did you like about drill? What didn’t you like? We’d be open and honest, because that’s how you get your evidence.” That approach has seen Kiely forge a decade-long career as a goalkeeper coach at both international and club level. Since 2021, he has been a part of Ireland’s set-up. From 2018 until last summer, he was back in south London, this time working with top shot-stoppers like Dean Henderson under the auspices of managers including Roy Hodgson and Patrick Vieira at Crystal Palace. Even with the changes in the top job creating slightly shifting demands, Kiely says he was largely working towards the same principles in his one-on-one work. Hanging on his every word 🗣️When Dean Kiely talks, you listen 🤲GKUnion | WEAREON | COYBIG pic.twitter.com/7bEd6P4BlZ— Ireland Football ⚽️🇮🇪 (@IrelandFootball) March 26, 2021 “If you compare Roy with Patrick, they both play a 4-3-3, but Roy was more defensive and Patrick was more attacking. That means different demands for the goalkeeper, you might have to make more saves. Ultimately, I’m doing the same things most of the time, but with little tweaks in line with what the manager wants.” Kiely is now at Maccabi Tel Aviv, his first time working outside of the UK. At first, he suggests the demands remain the same, although he catches himself at one point. “You don’t go on a coaching course and have a module on what to do if your number three keeper gets called up for national service,” he says, wryly. “Sometimes you have to get off the training pitch because the air raid siren goes up and missiles are being launched. “But you still have to get the football right.” Even in the face of geopolitical interventions in his routines, the basics that saw Kiely make 757 club appearances, keep 246 clean sheets, win 11 caps for Ireland and become a legend at York, Bury and Charlton remain the same. “I’m a Premier League player and coach, an international player and coach. I’m not going to rock up somewhere and be different. They’re the standards, that’s what I bring. Embrace it. If you don’t like something, let’s change it. But let’s crack on, and embrace it.” 

Tom Ritchie