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Posted by: BOF
on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 06:00 PM
BOF continues the player profiles, this time looking at the man with possibly the biggest neck in football if you go by this picture....
MARK DELANEY
Born - 13th May 1976 in Haverfordwest (Wales)
Height - 1.88m (6ft 2in)
Weight - 73Kg
Nationality - Welsh
Position - Right back / Centre back
Squad # - 2
International Caps - 24
International Goals - 0
Signed by Villa
Date - 9th March 1999
From Cardiff City
Cost - £250,000
Previous seasons
Carmarthen 08/97 - 06/98 - data N/A
Cardiff City 06/98 - 03/99 - 35 apps, 1 goal
Villa as of 19/03/04 - 143 apps (16 as sub), 1 goal
Biog
Mark was a low profile signing by John Gregory towards the tail end of the 98/99 season for relative buttons (a quarter mil). But this signing was to become one of, if not the most astute signing's he made. Mark was signed in March and made his debut that April, and from that moment he immediately became a regular in the Villa side, easily making the step up from Division 3 football to Premiership standard. He is now one of Villa's most established players in the first 11 and is being courted by some of the bigger clubs in the division as they try to shore up their own leaky defences.
Mark is primarily a defending half back. He is a great defender as he proved by switching effortlessly to centre back for his national team. With Mark at the back you have no worries about being left exposed on the righthand side. He is hard in the tackle, he is quick and always gives 100%. In fact some would say one of his faults is that sometimes he gives 110% and ends up injured. Every team has a 'sick note', a player who seems to spend an inordinate amount of time on the recovery table, and unfortunately for Mark, he seems to be Villa's. And it is not hard to see why when you see him play. When he is in the Villa team they are a more sturdy unit. When he is missing we count the days to his return. And he is a Holte favourite - a sure sign that his effort is never in question.
One of the weaker areas of his game is going forward. He seems to have to be dragged down the pitch by the winger, and although he finds himself in positions to put a cross in, and has got some assists to his name, he doesn't have the amount of assists that he maybe should have, and certainly in his earlier days at the club he wouldn't volunteer for the ball, leaving it more to the winger. I have to say that there are signs that this side of his game is improving now though, so maybe in time he will become the complete wingback. Somehow I think his heart is in defending though, and I am quite happy with that, because with the likes of Solano on the wing, I would rather have a solid defender behind him.
You know what you're getting from Mark every match and managers like that, and he is not one of the players I would look to replace if I had a few million to spend on the team.
Villa have Wales' 2 right-backs (along with Rob Edwards) battling for position at our club, and maybe Mark's defending abililty might mean that he comes inside for Villa too in the future, but at the moment Villa can lay claim to one of the best defending half-backs in the league.
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