Former Wolves striker Ade Akinbiyi takes on mentor role

And that means that it’s now halfway through his life, back in the 1999/2000 season, that he spent his one year at Wolves.

It was quite an assignment walking into Molineux for Akinbiyi back then.

Wanted: A striker to lead the line and come up with a bagful of goals. Oh yes, and to become a hero amongst the fanbase as well. As we’ve just lost two of those. Over to you, Ade!

Steve Bull, he of the 306 goals, had retired in the summer. The new and talented kid on the block, Robbie Keane, had just been sold to Premier League Coventry such was the precocious level of his ability that had seen him plunder 29 goals from 88 games, and having only just turned 19.

Bull and Keane gone. Those were mighty big boots to fill. Think following Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United. Steve Jobs at Apple. George Lazenby taking over from Sean Connery as James Bond.

For the amiable Akinbiyi, then 24, it was a pressure to relish. Even with the club record £3.5million fee hanging around his broad shoulders.

“Yes, it’s fair to say there was a pressure in all that, but it’s one I did relish,” he recalls.

“Steve Bull, even now, is one of the greatest ever to have played for Wolves.

“I would love to have played with him, but when there was talk of following in his footsteps, I told them that was never going to happen!

“And Robbie Keane was still young, but everyone could see all of his quality.

“So, there was pressure, definitely, but you just have to enjoy it and get on with it and see what you can do.”

What was also pivotal for Akinbiyi in joining Wolves was that he already knew two of the coaching staff, John Ward and Terry Connor, from his time with Bristol City.

And that certainly helped with the decision from Colin Lee to make his move for the striker. Whom, had actually played for Bristol City at Ashton Gate when Wolves won 6-1 in Lee’s first game in caretaker charge. Wolfie and the Three Little Pigs and all that.

Perhaps, unsurprisingly, that’s not a game Akinbiyi remembers. Turning out for Lee, Ward and Connor, however, was a far more positive experience.

“Wolves in itself is a massive club and so definitely appealed to me but also knowing that John and Terry were there made the decision even easier,” he says.

“I really enjoyed playing for them at Bristol City, and Terry would often stay behind with me for extra training and to work on my finishing.

“I’d be wanting to come in on my days off to work even more!

“It went really well for me at Bristol City and so to then get the move to Wolves, to work with those guys again and Colin Lee, there was no hesitation.”

Different influences such as those will always play a part in a footballer’s career and, for Akinbiyi, it all started at a much younger age whilst growing up in Hackney.

With his power and speed from a young age, it was athletics, in sprinting, in which he caught the eye, but one of his primary school teachers encouraged him to try football.

Excelling as a striker in the school team soon took him to district level and from there it all took off.

He also played for the much-famed junior Sunday League team Senrab, based at Forest Gate in London, whose alumni of those who went on to make the grade professionally is like a who’s who of the region’s footballing talent.

Sol Campbell, John Terry, Alan Curbishley, Ledley King, Ray Wilkins, Lee Bowyer, Ugo Ehiogu, Bobby Zamora and Ezri Konsa were among the many to have turned out for Senrab, and Akinbiyi actually played in the same team as Muzzy Izzet, who he would later link up with again at Leicester City.

“We always had a really good team but at the time I was just young and enjoying my football, and didn’t really know what all the scouting side of the game actually meant,” Akinbiyi recalls.

“The coaches would say that a lot of scouts were coming to watch us, and that teams wanted me to go on trial, but I wasn’t really bothered and just wanted to go out and play football.”

Eventually, however, opportunity knocked, with both Arsenal and Norwich in pursuit of Akinbiyi’s services.

Whilst staying in London to try his luck with the Gunners appealed, it was Akinbiyi’s mother who preferred him to join the Canaries, to take him away from the capital and its associated risks and temptations.

“It was tough at first, to move away from home and travel to and from Norwich on the train, but it was another good experience to have, especially at a young age,” he acknowledges.

The beauty of Norwich was also that it helped Akinbiyi enjoy a first taste of senior football, just after turning 19.

And what a first taste it was. In the UEFA Cup, against German giants Bayern Munich, Lothar Matthaus and company.

Norwich had incredibly won the first leg 2-1 in the Olympic Stadium – Jeremy Goss’s superb volley remains in the memory bank to this day – and followed it up with a 1-1 draw at Carrow Road to progress to the last 16 where they were narrowly beaten by Inter Milan.

It was in the second leg against Bayern that Akinbiyi came off the bench to replace Darren Eadie in the 77thminute to make his first team debut, up top alongside Chris Sutton.

“Again, when I look back that was something I didn’t think too much of at the time,” says Akinbiyi.

“It was my debut and I was nervous, and it was Bayern Munich in European competition, which is incredible really, but I was just concentrating on doing my best if the chance came.

“If I think about it now, and it was my son making his debut in that sort of game, I’d be going crazy jumping up and down in the stands!”

Akinbiyi also enjoyed his first exposure of the Premier League whilst with Norwich, top-flight experience he would later add to with Leicester, Crystal Palace and Sheffield United.

Loan spells with Hereford and Brighton helped hone his talents before hitting the goal trail after moving permanently to Gillingham, and then Bristol City, prior to joining Wolves back in September 1999.

He settled in well, and, right about now 25 years ago, was in the middle of a run of eight goals in eight games including a hat trick against Grimsby and scoring home and away in 1-1 draws in Black Country derbies against West Bromwich Albion.

A burgeoning but sadly all-too-brief partnership with George Ndah raised hopes among the Molineux faithful, before Ndah suffered a long-term injury in the away derby at the Hawthorns, and Akinbiyi also linked well later with Michael Branch, including a Friday night 4-1 victory against Wolves’ next opponents Manchester City.

“I felt I was able to settle in quickly but that was because I enjoyed working for Colin and there was a really good bunch of lads there at the time,” says Akinbiyi.

“With Matt Murray and George Ndah, Steve Sedgley, Simon Osborn and others – so many great lads and it was a lot of fun.

“With George, I thought we had the makings of a really good partnership but unfortunately didn’t end up playing that much together which was a shame.

“I managed to score in both of the local derbies, which is nice as fans always tend to remember those games.

“It’s nice to play in the big games like that, and even more pleasing to get a goal or two.

“But I have always said this, when people ask me what the highlights were of my career, whether at Wolves or anywhere else, I never really have an answer.

“I can’t pick anything out because I just loved playing football, and I loved playing for all the teams that I did.

“It was a privilege to have a career in football, I loved every minute, and just being able to have that career was a highlight in itself.”

Akinbiyi notched 16 goals that season, a more than decent return, although he admits he’d like to have plundered more. But for Wolves, it was one of those all too familiar near-misses that littered the 14 successive seasons in the second tier.

A seventh placed finish, missing out on the play-offs by just two points to Bolton, against whom they had been beaten in a controversial encounter in the penultimate fixture of the season.

For Akinbiyi, it felt like the start of something. He had become a very popular figure among team-mates and supporters alike. His indefatigable work ethic, his eye for the goal, his power and presence, all had combined to suggest that, over time, he definitely had the potential to follow Bull and Keane into terrace hero status.

Only it wasn’t to be. Infact, he wouldn’t even be around to even try.

Whilst on the following pre-season tour of Ireland, Akinbiyi was called by Lee whilst in the team hotel to say the club had accepted an improved bid of £5million from Leicester, then in the Premier League. Having been the club’s record signing, he wasn’t far off becoming Wolves’ record sale, behind only Keane who had headed to the top flight for £6million with Coventry 12 months earlier.

It was one of those strange and difficult situations. Of course, a return to the Premier League appealed, but so too did the chance to build on such a promising first season at Wolves with a fierce determination that he still had plenty more to offer. Eventually the deal went through, but the ramifications lingered on for quite some time. It was a time when Wolves were needing to cut their cloth amid considerable weekly losses, but when CEO Jez Moxey later insisted on a phone-in on BBC WM that Lee had agreed to Akinbiyi’s sale, the manager himself phoned in to dispute that version of events. Not long afterwards, in the wake of local derby defeat to Birmingham, and with Wolves perilously close to the relegation zone, Lee was relieved of his duties.

“At the time I would probably say that even though it was the Premier League, I didn’t really want to go,” Akinbiyi recalls.

“I really felt that I was going to continue to progress at Wolves, but when the club wants to cash in, it becomes difficult.

“I thought it was a bit early, I would have liked to have had at least another season, but it was difficult to say no.

“I’d been playing with some really good players, I’d really enjoyed it, and thought that together we could have gone on to great things.

“But that’s football, if you have to move on you have to move on, and that’s how it happened.”

For Akinbiyi, even though the move to Leicester didn’t go as well as he might have hoped, he still reached double figures in his first season, including scoring in wins over Liverpool at home and in the FA Cup away at Aston Villa.

He would also find the net with so many more big clubs during the remainder of his career, including Palace, Stoke, Burnley and Sheffield United, before heading out to America for a short stint with Houston Dynamo and a stint as player coach with Colwyn Bay supporting close friend Frank Sinclair who was managing the Welsh club at the time.

When the time came to hang up his boots, it was into the world of consultancy which Akinbiyi next ventured.

Chiefly that involves mentoring and helping young players to go on and achieve their potential, although such is Akinbiyi’s influence and wise counsel that many of those working relationships then stand the test of time as those players grow older.

One of those is with former Wolves defender Dominic Iorfa, who made a hugely impressive breakthrough at Molineux as a young defender, and is now with Sheffield Wednesday and closing in on 300 senior career appearances.

Helping those aiming to cross the threshold from academy to professional level is a powerful motivation for Akinbiyi, who can lean on the many learnings from his own career to help pass on advice and guidance. There isn’t much in football that he didn’t experience.

“One of the reasons that I do what I do is that I want to give back and help players on their journeys,” he explains.

“The game is very different now, young players don’t have to clean boots and do all the jobs that we used to, and they play on incredible pitches which are far better than in my day.

“When you watch academy football you see some players that think they have already made it, but, when I am working with them, it is about keeping them level and not getting carried away.

“You have to help them through injuries and other setbacks and, for me, it’s not just about football.

“The one thing I always say when I speak to parents is that the young players need to have something else behind them, not just their hopes for a professional career.

“Football might be fun now, but education is so important, for that day when it all comes to an end, or you pick up a serious injury.

“It is a position which I really enjoy, trying to help prepare and inspire young players, and it keeps me motivated to try and do the very best for those that I work with.”

Akinbiyi, who also picked up a solitary cap for Nigeria, the homeland of his parents, is passing through his half century still clearly relishing having an influence in the sport in which he made his name, and one for which he will remain eternally grateful.

“I am proud of all the clubs I represented and the achievements I enjoyed when I was playing,” he reflects.

“I played in every league – the Premier League, Championship, League One and League Two – as well as in Europe.

“Looking back, to get the opportunity to do something you love, and get paid for it at the same time, is incredible.”