From Eagles to Seagulls

New Bray Wanderers goalkeeper Matthew Gregg began his footballing career as a trainee with Torquay on the south coast of England, not far from his home town, Cheltenham, and made his senior debut there at only 17 (they drew 1-1 against Wigan) but, in a development that has plagued him several times since, he was unable to hold a first team position against the then Torquay senior keepers, Ashley Bayes and Ray Newland.

The following season, 1996/97, he was again only called on once, this time in the last match of the season at Doncaster. But the next year, he was to be the first choice keeper for the Gulls, and started well, with 4 clean sheets from 19 League appearances. However, a disastrous back-to-back brace of defeats, conceding seven, left him out of favour for most of the rest of that season. He did feature in the Division 3 playoff at Wembley against Colchester, losing by a penalty – and a dubious one at that. Observers rated him higher than the stats suggested, agile, attentive and gaining experience all the time.

Again at the start of 1998/99, he started as first choice, and in eleven games kept two clean sheets. That October, in a Worthington Cup match against Crystal Palace, he impressed Palace manager Terry Venables so much that he was soon transferred to the First Division side for a fee of £400,000 sterling – but once more his view of the net was blocked by incumbent keepers, this time Fraser Digby and Kevin Miller.

Digby was in good form that year and, there being little prospect of a game for the young southerner, Gregg was loaned to Swansea City: he played five league matches in his month there, and kept two clean sheets. He was recalled when Digby was injured, but still didn’t make an appearance.

It was almost a year later, in April 2000, that he finally made his debut for the Eagles, against Fulham at Craven Cottage, and went on to finish the season – 6 league games in all. But then, of course, Palace went on to sign former Bradford netminder Matt Clarke as well as the Latvian Alexander Kolinko, and Matt found himself dropped down the pecking order again.

In September of this year, he was sent on loan to Exeter City – where he would at least have the prospect of getting a game – but after just a month there, he found he was in demand from elsewhere: from the Irish Seagulls. He had visited Ireland before, and is still friendly with Don O’Riordan, his first manager at Plainmoor. The standard of the Irish game is impressive, he says, and he’s looking forward to getting his game with the Wanderers.

By Mícheál Ó hUanacháin and Brian de Salvo

First published in Seagull Scene, 30 October 2001