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Ugo Ehiogu: A sad loss

Roar Pro
22nd April, 2017
3

So, Ugo Ehiogu. I will be honest and admit that I had entirely forgotten about him until his name came sharply back into focus this morning.

I read that he had collapsed at Tottenham’s training ground.

By the time I caught a glimpse of the lunchtime news, he had gone. A suspected heart attack, aged just 44. His name immediately drifting from the present into the past tense. A stark reality that faces us all sooner or later.

Condemned as we are to suffer the cruel fate of being removed from the living ‘is’ to the remembered ‘was’.

Apparently, he was coaching the Tottenham U-23s team. I must confess this was also something that I was unaware of. My recollections of him go back further to his playing days. In my memory at least he is always an Aston Villa player.

That is a team that he made well over 200 appearances for in a nine-year career. There were three Wembley appearances – including League Cup triumphs in 1994 and 1996 as well an FA Cup Final defeat in 2000 (the last final at the old Wembley).

It is easy to forget that he also played for five other clubs in total. Including 100+ games for Middlesbrough, where he collected another League Cup winners medal in 2004. A team that he arrived at for their then record signing of £8,000,000. At Boro he formed an effective central defensive partnership with his old Aston Villa colleague, Gareth Southgate.

The England manager today described his old teammate as “a colossus”. This is an apt description of the strong and imposing Ehiogu. Yet, he wasn’t just all about brute force. He was an educated player with a solid football brain. One that was rated highly enough to win four full England caps and a further 15 at U-21 level.

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In a later era and with more luck with injuries it is not unrealistic to suggest that he could have won more international opportunities. He also held the distinction of being the first black player to lead England at any level when he captained the side against Holland in a U-21 fixture in 1993.

It is a shock when a sportsman dies so suddenly. This is felt even more profoundly when they are as young as Ehiogu was. Let’s remember that it is still less than a decade from when he was playing professionally for Sheffield United.

His death should make us stop and think. None of us possess the ability to seek out and capture the elusive shadow that is immortality. But, today, we should at least recognise and treasure our mortality as something precious.

Like a lit match on a windy day we have no notion as to when it will be snuffed out. Only that it is demise is ultimately inevitable.

Since assuming his coaching role at Spurs in 2014, a long, successful career on the training ground and in the dugout beckoned. It is with great sadness that we must now accept that this will never be fulfilled.

His stewardship at Spurs radiated great promise due to his passion, understanding of the game and an ability to convey those characteristics to the players under his charge.

Ugo was a player possessed of great heart. It is therefore a cruel outcome that it was the big man’s heart that ultimately mutinied against him.

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Perhaps, there was always a weakness there. One that was unbeknownst to himself or us.

However, if it was, then we can still be sure of one thing. Any weakness of the heart lay in the realm of flesh or tissue and not in its spirit.

As those that remember his glory days at Aston Villa, there was never cause to doubt Ehiogu’s commitment or desire.

Sporting lives are brief and our wider life is only marginally less brief. Like some sterile business process flow all of our lives are laid out in three simple and easy to read steps. We are born, we live and then we die. The former and the latter are fixed, unmovable and constant.

The only flexibility exists in respect of the middle. It is how we address this that is paramount and responsibility for it rests squarely on ourselves. Its entirety can be contained within one metaphoric swim lane or a thousand.

Ugo Ehiogu made over 400 League and Cup appearances as a player. He made 20 international appearances including winning four full caps. He was the first black player to captain an England side.

He was a successful coach who also cultivated the time to found his own music record label. Most importantly of all, he was married with two children.

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Ugo certainly delivered on the middle column of life’s process flow. Not a bad effort at all for just 44 years. He deserves to be remembered this weekend – and he will be.

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