Barnsley’s German goalkeeper made professional debut in Premier League at 27!

Danny Wilson’s team were a long way from being the bookies’ favourites to escape English football’s second tier in the summer of 1996, yet a group of solid professionals rather than household names delivered both good football and the runners-up spot.

In doing so, they helped restore pride and hope in a part of the country that had been economically and socially decimated by the pit closures of the 1980s.

However, one of the lesser-known back stories associated with their top-flight adventure is equally remarkable.

Looking to strengthen his squad for the Premier League and provide competition for No 1 David Watson, Wilson delved into the European market to sign German goalkeeper Lars Leese.

On paper, recruiting a 6ft 5in second-choice stopper from a club the size of Bayer Leverkusen for £250,000 appears reasonable business.

Except, in reality, Leese was Leverkusen’s third-choice goalkeeper, and had not even made it as far as the substitutes’ bench during 1996-97.

Indeed, despite being 27 when he signed for the Tykes, he had never played a single minute of professional football prior to his debut – in the Premier League.

Leese had been playing part-time in the fifth tier of German football while working as a computer software buyer less than 18 months prior to his arrival in South Yorkshire.

Fast-forward to November 22, 1997 and he was making a number of important saves on his way to a clean sheet as the Tykes recorded the most impressive of their 10 league victories that season, a 1-0 win over Liverpool in front of 41,011 people at Anfield.

Leese’s meteoric rise will probably not be seen again so how did it happen?

The move to Barnsley was brokered by one of his former coaches, ex-England and Arsenal forward Tony Woodcock, who was working as a German television pundit after two successful spells with FC Koln.

Woodcock had initially recommended Leese to then-Middlesbrough manager Viv Anderson and the Teessiders wanted to sign him as a result of a successful trial.

Leverkusen, however, refused to allow Leese to leave midway through the season but further down the line, Anderson mentioned Leese to Wilson, who got in touch with Woodcock.

Woodcock arranged a trial at Barnsley, then negotiated a deal for his former goalkeeper that would see him double his salary.

The transfer was agreed without the Tykes ever having seen Leese play and based on the fact that they thought he was something that he was not.

“I’ve told them that you’re second-choice goalkeeper at Leverkusen, not third,” Woodcock is quoted as saying in Leese’s biography, just before the pair entered a meeting with Wilson and Barnsley chairman John Dennis to discuss terms.

The Reds might not have been getting quite the calibre of player that they were expecting, but there was a neat symmetry between their purchase of a man who had never had a taste of professional football before and the journey that they were about to embark on.

Goalkeeper and club were heading into the unknown together.

Leese’s debut came in Barnsley’s fourth league outing of the season when he arrived as a first-half substitute for the injured Watson in a home game against Bolton Wanderers.

It was the big opportunity he had been waiting for.

“I said to myself ‘A capacity stadium, you’re going to be a goalkeeper for a professional team – it’s the moment you’ve been dreaming about your whole life. You should be pleased’,” he recalled.

“But of course I wasn’t pleased. I had stage fright. I was bricking it. I couldn’t even get my bootlaces tied.”

Despite his nerves, Leese completed the rest of the match without conceding and Barnsley won 2-1.

He went on to make nine more appearances in all competitions that season, including the memorable triumph at Anfield, but despite him producing some impressive performances, he was never really a good fit at Oakwell.

The hardest thing for Leese to deal with was the fact that he felt like an outsider.

He found that there was a divide between the English and foreign players, something he feels was in part due to jealousy. “I can even understand the envy of the Englishmen,” he said. “The promotion was their doing, and all of a sudden you have guys coming from all over the place and fighting them for their places. Then you had the fact that we foreigners were much better paid.

“But isn’t everyone responsible for his own contract? Why didn’t they go straight to the chairman? Instead, they just went to the toilet and complained about us.”

Barnsley were relegated at the end of the season and the fate which befell Leese was arguably even worse.

He appeared in 10 more games during 1998-99 before being released upon the expiry of his contract and plunged back into obscurity, playing out the final years of his career back in the lower reaches of German football.

Upon retiring at 32 – the age which most goalkeepers feel they are in their prime – he took up a job “flogging pencils”.

A meteoric rise – and fall.

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