HE’S ONLY 23, but Kieron St Aimie has already had 14 spells at 13 clubs.
If I tell you he’s a cousin and close family friend of much-travelled fellow strikers Richard Pacquette and Jefferson Louis, you won’t be shocked, I’m sure.
Automatically, you assume there’s an issue; an attitude that makes him fall out with managers, perhaps? Or a Big-Time Charlie who thinks he’s better than he is?
As the Londoner himself says: “People look at the list of clubs on my Wikipedia entry and start to think ‘There must be something wrong with this guy, must be a bad egg.”
I know that’s not the case with Big Jeff, now at Newport in his second spell playing for Justin Edinburgh, and although I don’t know him personally, people tell me Pacquette’s a good guy to have around, too.
Twenty minutes spent in St Aimie’s company this week tells me you shouldn’t judge this book by the number of club crests on its cover.
His latest manager, AFC Telford United’s Andy Sinton, pursued him throughout the summer, attracted by the fact the free agent scored twice against the Bucks last term for Tamworth. He’s been “delighted” by what he’s found.
And Maidenhead United boss Johnson Hippolyte – who has managed St Aimie, Pacquette and Louis – speaks of a “bright, lovely lad” who played for him for the best part of two seasons up to March 2011.
Stigma
“Kieron still calls me every week,” says Hippolyte. “He’s one of those who rings and says ‘Gaffer, have you got five minutes? Then 45 minutes later he’s still talking!”
St Aimie kicked off his career at Queens Park Rangers, one of Sinton’s former clubs, and as a first-year pro was loaned to Oxford United.
Released from Loftus Road in January 2008, he signed permanently for Barnet, then managed by England C chief Paul Fairclough.
By February 2009, however, he was disillusioned by his limited opportunities at Underhill and wanted to taste more first-team action, as he had on loan with Grays, Stevenage and Lewes.
And this is where the ‘More Clubs Than Rory McIlroy’ stigma starts to attach itself.
“I just wanted to play football and concentrate on my game,” says St Aimie. “The only problem was, I didn’t have an agent at the time to guide me, and I didn’t know I wasn’t able to sign for another club in the League or Conference Premier outside the transfer window.
“I signed for Thurrock, played two games, scored one and set another up, but the message came from the board that the manager, Hakan Hayrettin, had to cut the budget and I was sacrificed.
“I said to him at the time, ‘This is going to look bad on me because I’ve dropped from League Two to Conference South, played two games and I’m off – people won’t know about the budget cut.”
From there, St Aimie dropped even further to one of my old clubs, Southern League Hitchin Town, before joining Hippolyte at York Road.
Winner
In late 2010-11, he played for Lewes, AFC Hornchurch and Kettering, whose then-manager Marcus Law was impressed enough to take him back into full-time football with Tamworth, where he spent the whole of last term, scoring seven times.
He’s already more than halfway towards that total having netted in four successive games during the Bucks’ impressive start to the Blue Square Bet Premier campaign, including the winner at Luton when I watched him last month.
“There’s still more to come fitness wise,” says Sinton, “but Kieron’s got great ability. With the willingness to work that he’s already shown me, I’m sure there’ll be many more goals, too.”
St Aimie candidly admits: “I know I’ve had too many clubs – one, two, maybe three. But it’s all been about the legal side, FA rules or because I’ve been on short-term deals or non-contract.
“People can get an impression of you from a list of clubs on the internet, but don’t know the real story until they actually talk to you.
“It’s been an uphill struggle, but thankfully Andy listened to me and now I’m listening to him. If you can’t learn from an ex-England international, who can you learn from?”
As Hippolyte says, a bright lad. And judging by the way they’e started, St Aimie and Telford have a bright future.
Asda La-Vesta Boys, It’s Been Fun!
WARDROBE banter is as crucial to a dressing room spirit as designer labels are to your average footballer, though it appears Mark Stimson’s Stevenage side of 2006-07 were only stylish on the pitch.
I spoke to Adam Miller this week, and although gutted by his premature retirement through injury at Cambridge United, we had a laugh reminiscing about his career.
It included playing against each other in the Ryman Premier at FA Trophy kings Canvey Island, his scintillating spell at Aldershot that led to a move to QPR, and his 22-month stint at Broadhall Way.
Boro had won the FA Trophy and were flying high in the Blue Square Premier when Stimson left for Gillingham, taking his old Park Lane team-mate with him, in late 2007.
Miller says his time in Hertfordshire was the best of his career, explaining: “The lads got on so well, even the players on the bench didn’t have a bad word about the people in front of them or the management.
“We’d have random nights out, like when Jon Nurse had a baby, for example. We were on the way back from up north and he said ‘Anyone fancy a beer to wet the baby’s head?’
“Before we knew it, 15 of us were in Asda near the ground, raiding the George clothing rails for a five pound pair of jeans, a dodgy polo shirt and some bad shoes – just to get in a nightclub!”
Lime Fine With Me
TALKING of clothing, chairman Dale Vince’s decision to change Forest Green Rovers‘ colours from black and white stripes to luminous lime green upset a few, but it’s a bright move for me.
They may look like they should be working on a railway track or stewarding the crowd.
But the black names and numbers on the back of their shirts are the clearest I’ve seen in a long time, making David Hockaday’s tiki-taka team easy on the eye in more ways than one.
