Remember Jon Dahl Tomasson? The young Danish striker was tipped to be the next big thing; brought into the club from Heerenveen by Kenny Dalglish to partner Alan Shearer up front when Sir Les of Ferdinand was sold.
Tomasson got off to a flying start in pre-season, bagging goals for fun in a pre-season tournament in Ireland, but never found anything like that kind of form when the season started. Brought in as an attacking midfielder, Tomasson was thrown in as a striker due to Shearer picking up an injury. After making 23 appearances for the Toon and only bagging three goals, he was sold back to the Eredivisie, joining Feyenoord.
Back in the Netherlands, he was deployed in his more comfortable attacking midfielder role and quickly started to fulfill his potential. Netting 55 goals in his four-year spell, he caught the eye of AC Milan, making the switch in the 2002/03 season, and going on to make 76 appearances, scoring 22 times. Tomasson helped Milan pick up several trophies during his spell there, including the UEFA Champions League.
He also had an impressive international career, bagging 51 goals from 121 caps for Denmark.
Newcastle fans wondered what went wrong for Tomasson at St James Park given the promise he showed when he first arrived and then the form he showed when he moved on. But history will show that the Dalglish era was the beginning of the end of Newcastle as a Premier League force and Kenny was “Brucing” players before it was cool.
Now 45 it is looking like Tomasson is joining Blackburn Rovers as manager following Tony Mowbray’s departure. Sky Sports saying that he’s just awaiting a work permit before being formally announced. Tomasson is coming off the back of a title-winning spell managing Malmo of Sweden.
Best of luck to JDT, we hope your second spell in England is better than your first.
Bang on, we all knew he was a talent, he was Joelinton’d played out if position and given the biggest pair of boots to fill. It was never gonna end well