Manchester United´s Lethal Striker

Andy Cole

Hail­ing from Not­ting­ham, Andy Cole began his fas­cin­at­ing career with Arsenal where he made only one league appear­ance. After a brief loan spell with neigh­bour­ing Ful­ham, the prom­ising youth player was even­tu­ally trans­ferred to Second Divi­sion Bris­tol City for a fee of £500,000 in the sum­mer of 1992. The free flow­ing Cole emerged as a lethal fin­isher at Ashton Gate and went on to net 20 goals in 41 league games for The Robins.

Greatly impressed by the fruit­ful striker, New­castle United gaf­fer Kevin Kee­gan brought Andy Cole to St James Park for a trans­fer fee of £1.75 mil­lion in Feb­ru­ary 1993. In Janu­ary 1995, he was sold to Manchester United for  £7 mil­lion and made his league debut in a 1–0 win against Black­burn Rovers at Old Traf­ford the same month. One of the finest for­wards of the 1990s, Cole made 93 goals in 193 league matches for Manchester United and gained five Premier League titles, two FA Cups and the Cham­pi­ons League with the The Reds. The Manchester United goal poacher extraordin­aire finally moved to Black­burn for £8 mil­lion in Decem­ber 2001 before he signed for Manchester City on a free trans­fer in July 2005. A much trav­elled player, Cole later appeared for Ports­mouth, Birm­ing­ham City, Sun­der­land and Burn­ley, before he ended his foot­balling days with homet­own club Not­ting­ham Forest at the age of 37. Capped 15 times by Eng­land, Andy Cole was an indus­tri­ous player whose phys­ical strength gave him the abil­ity to beat oppos­ing defend­ers with real ease.

The Offi­cial Illus­trated His­tory of Manchester United