John Deehan: Dementia

[Flamingo Lane]

John Deehan was a very fine player.  His 40 goals in 110 appearances for Villa was an excellent record, especially at such a young age, and in the then first division.  It is often overlooked that some of our finest performances in that 1976-77 season were with a front three of Gray, Little and Deehan, and of course the greatest performance of all, the 5-1 win v Liverpool, included two goals from John.  I was surprised and disappointed when he was sold, to West Brom of all clubs, where I don't think he did terribly well.  However, he did then go on to do very well at Norwich - 62 goals in 162 games.

I wish him and his family all the very best.

[Small Rodent]

I can't put my sadness into words here. JD was part of the team when I first starting following the Villa, the side immediately preceding that which would go on to conquer Europe. Oh boy 😢

My period of starting to support too. All because aged 10, a Brummie friend in my class in RAF Bruggen, Germany, urged me it was the only team to support. It could have been so different!

He also used to do fake football commentary in an exaggerated brummie accent and got me believing that Brazil had a player called Penis.

I’m still easily led.

[Risso]

I met him once years ago when he was manager of Wigan, nice chap. He also had the dubious honour of being sacked by an old schoolmate of mine at Kettering Town, the same idiot chairman who gave Paul Gascoigne the manager's job.

[Percy McCarthy]

How old was he when he broke into the team? Must have been pretty young as I remember him coming through in the team that always seemed to do well in the Southern Junior Floodlit Cup.

Edit: just checked, still a teenager when he was banging all those goals in for us in 76/77. Amazing.

[dcdavecollett]

Made his debut in 75/76 and scored a few while Brian Little was out injured.

[Martyn Smith]

Strange to think that he was only 21 when he left Villa. I'd always thought he was older, but when you're 10, 21 does seem old...

[Fasth56]

Missed this when it was announced. Really sad news as he was a former classmate.