Chris Wood has gone from Barnsley loan flop to outscoring Marcus Rashford and Ollie Watkins in feelgood story of 2024
LET’S just call him Saint Christopher, the patron saint of footballing travellers.
A journeyman, targetman, everyman hero, who is living proof good things can come to those who have a loan spell at Barnsley terminated after seven matches and no goals.
The Indian summer of Chris Wood’s career has been the feelgood story of 2024.
Nottingham Forest are Wood’s FIFTEENTH club and, at the age of 33, the big Kiwi unit is on course to lead them into the Champions League.
At a time when old-school centre-forwards are officially recognised as an endangered species by the World Wildlife Fund, Wood is leading the revival like an uncharacteristically randy panda.
And despite decent spells at Leeds and Burnley, nobody saw this coming.
Newcastle’s Saudi owners were ridiculed for panic buying when they shelled out £25million on a 30-year-old Wood three years ago.
And the Toon Army smirked when Forest spent £15m on his signing 18 months ago — right up until Boxing Day last year when Wood turned up at St James’ Park and netted a hat-trick, which included two deliciously cool finishes.
On Sunday, Wood netted Forest’s opener in a 2-0 win at Everton with a rinky-dink chip which sent Nuno Espirito Santo’s side second in the table and belied his unfair caricature as a limited carthorse.
Toffees boss Sean Dyche, who oversaw Wood’s previous best spell at Burnley, declared him the difference between the two sides.
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Wood has also played for West Brom, Brighton, Birmingham, Bristol City, Millwall, Leicester and Ipswich, as well as three clubs in his New Zealand homeland.
He was on the books of the Baggies for four years but in that time managed more loan spells — five — than goals for his parent club — two.
That loan at Oakwell with the Tykes, an agreement ripped up by mutual consent, was an early setback from which Wood rebounded pretty well.
Throughout the majority of his career he was seen as a decent Championship striker, winning promotion with Leicester and scoring 27 goals in a second-tier season with Leeds.
But for Wood to have netted 21 times in the Premier League since Boxing Day 2023 — more than Kai Havertz or Ollie Watkins, more than twice as many as Marcus Rashford — is extraordinary and heartening.
Wood narrowly missed out on the Premier League’s greatest miracle when he was sold by Leicester to Leeds the summer before their 2015-16 title triumph.
Back then, Jamie Vardy’s rise, from playing at Stocksbridge Park Steels with an offender’s tag on his ankle, was the Hollywood storyline.
But if Nuno’s Forest make the Champions League — as looks increasingly possible after a fifth straight win — theirs would be English football’s unlikeliest story since the Foxes topped the pile.
Wandering gun-for-hire strikers are a great footballing breed.
Peter Withe, one of that tribe’s finest, won Aston Villa the European Cup while playing for the tenth of his 13 clubs.
Wood is far from being the most nomadic of all. Trevor Benjamin represented 29 clubs from the Premier League to the Northern League Division Two over a 16-year career.
Meanwhile, the legendary non-league highwayman Jefferson Louis has changed clubs 51 TIMES and is still going strong for Southern League Thame United, aged 45.
But Wood is now the standard-bearer for these merry travellers — and that’s without even mentioning the air miles clocked up in an 80-cap international career for New Zealand.
He spends international breaks on the opposite side of the world, scoring shedloads of goals in routine, savage beatings of Pacific Islanders from Samoa, Tahiti and Vanuatu.
At a time when old-school centre-forwards are officially recognised as an endangered species by the World Wildlife Fund, Wood is leading the revival like an uncharacteristically randy panda.
Dave Kidd
His is not the only heartwarming personal story at the City Ground — Nuno was seen as a busted flush after a miserable spell at Tottenham, yet Forest now sit 13 points above his former employers.
Ryan Yates did the loan rounds from Barrow to Scunthorpe before playing a lead role in his hometown club’s journey to the brink of history.
Callum Hudson-Odoi, Morgan Gibbs-White and Anthony Elanga were all struggling to fully emerge in the Premier League before they put down roots with the Tricky Trees.
And Serbian hardnut Nikola Milenkovic is Nemanja Vidic reincarnate.
Those who can remember Brian Clough leading Forest to back-to-back European Cups will relish his old club’s revival.
Indeed, Nottingham boasts as many European Cups as London, Paris and Rome combined.
This is a great club and, at the forefront, is a man on a most round-the-houses mission.
Real ‘East’ End star
IT WAS heartening to see the warm reception given by West Ham fans to Ludo Miklosko on Sunday, after their 63-year-old former keeper announced he has withdrawn from further cancer treatment.
There were very few foreign footballers in the English game when Czech Miklosko signed for the Hammers in 1990 — and even fewer from behind the old Iron Curtain.
But during eight years as a player, and a further stint as a Hammers goalkeeping coach, big Ludo became the very definition of a cult hero.
He also managed to inspire one of the most geographically challenged terrace chants of all time: “My name is Ludo Miklosko, I come from near Moscow.”
Miklosko’s native town of Prostejov is closer to East London than to the Russian capital.
Sale away
THE transfer window opens this week and the questions are endless.
Will Manchester City sign a Rodri replacement? Will Arsenal get a proper centre-forward?
Will anyone in their right minds join Southampton, on course for the worst season in Premier League history?
But whatever happens don’t believe the old chestnut that there are no good long-term signings to be made mid-season.
Liverpool bought Luis Suarez and Virgil van Dijk in the New Year sales, while Sir Alex Ferguson signed Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra in the same January week.
Dart Madd
FURY among Tottenham fans on social media that James Maddison went to the darts at Ally Pally after the 2-2 home draw with Wolves.
How dare their leading Premier League goalscorer go out and have some fun?
Because, as we all know, the best way to get over a frustrating day at the office is to sit alone in a darkened room and never, under any circumstances, go out somewhere and enjoy yourself.
Go ‘All in
THERE was a 20-man brawl in the tunnel at half-time during Newcastle’s 3-0 thumping of Aston Villa last week.
And I don’t know about you but I was staggered to hear that Toon manager Eddie Howe’s No 2 Jason Tindall was red-carded for being at the centre of it all.
Good luck finding character witnesses if there is an FA hearing.
A VERY Happy New Year to you all!
Here’s to 2025, to triumphs Down Under in The Ashes and for the Lions, to Ryder Cup glory for Europe in the States, to England qualifying for the World Cup in style under Thomas Tuchel — and to a stunning collapse for Liverpool in the title race.