Andy Gray

Oggy Red

Signed to replace Andy Reid.

People judging him solely on goals scored are always going to speak badly of him - but that wasn't his major role in the team.
He was brought in as a forward to hold up the ball and in that respect his play was decent enough.


Soon after he signed, his wife was diagnosed with a life threatening illness.
She wasn't in a local hospital, but one 250 miles away.

I don't know how he coped with such a situation - total nightmare.
No wonder he appeared distracted and unsettled at times.

Addickted2TheReds

I remember him celebrating for Burnley like a complete fool infront of the Covered End and we signed him pretty soon after right?

kentaddick

paid way, wayyyy too much for varney, but a decent player. Was one of the first to be shown the door by parky though which tells its own story.

Oggy Red

kentaddick said:

paid way, wayyyy too much for varney, but a decent player. Was one of the first to be shown the door by parky though which tells its own story.

He was sold for £1 million to Derby County.

The Board needed the money. I wouldn't call that being shown the door by Parky!

kentaddick

Oggy Red said:

kentaddick said:

paid way, wayyyy too much for varney, but a decent player. Was one of the first to be shown the door by parky though which tells its own story.

He was sold for £1 million to Derby County.

The Board needed the money. I wouldn't call that being shown the door by Parky!

my memory was he was shifted out on loan and then bought, but i see the deal was agreed and then we loaned him to save wages. my mistake

Oggy Red

kentaddick said:

Oggy Red said:

kentaddick said:

paid way, wayyyy too much for varney, but a decent player. Was one of the first to be shown the door by parky though which tells its own story.

He was sold for £1 million to Derby County.

The Board needed the money. I wouldn't call that being shown the door by Parky!

my memory was he was shifted out on loan and then bought, but i see the deal was agreed and then we loaned him to save wages. my mistake

As his transfer was around the end of November, the emergency loan system was used in order to get round the transfer window rules, before the 1st January when the deal officially became permanent.

ForeverAddickted

Remember Varney going on a barren run before we played Burnley... He went round the Goalkeeper, could have shot yet pretty much waited for the opposition Defender to get back and stop him so he wouldnt be laughed at for missing a sitter, which would have been impossible to miss as he could have gone down on his hands and knees and headed it across the line!!

iaitch

I thought Varney was sold to raise the money to pay off Pardew?

Big William

Pretty sure what iaitch wrote is the truth...I think Pardew got a million up front when he left, always makes me think (seriously) that we were so desparate to get him in 2006 we practically let him write his own contract. If you had played Varney as a winger he might have been OK, but he never cut it for me as a goalscorer. One of those that seemed intimidated by playing for CAFC, it was a big jump for him at the time.

LenGlover

iaitch said:

I thought Varney was sold to raise the money to pay off Pardew?

This

MrOneLung

thought Varney was a much better wide man than out and out striker.

Seemed to give his all, which is ok by me.

iaitch

When we sacked Pardew wasn't there a clause in his contract that said we had to pay up in 7 days, so we sold Varney.

Ormiston_Addick

I'd take Varney over that utter chunt Marcus Bent any day of the week.

At least Varney worked his balls off - Bent barely broke sweat in all his time here, makes me feel ill that he was ever at the club.

Gray was a decent player, just poor timing all round.

guinnessaddick

Varney was sold to raise money for Pardew to depart. He went on loan to Derby, with the agreement that they would buy him. This was done just before they sacked Paul Jewell, had Nigel Clough been in charge, he would never had signed him.