I wasn't a fan of the man myself when I was younger. I have a bit of a soft spot for Newcastle United and Tiss seemed to have an annoying habit of scoring wonder goals after waltzing through the Toon's defence. But now I only feel admiration for Le Tissier and his goal scoring exploits during his career. I think it is those goals I will start off with here as well. Now we all see those videos on Youtube these days of a footballer and their top ten or so goals. Any footballer who has at least scored ten goals in the Premiership will have a little video dedicated to them, there's even a few for Shola Ameobi. Yes, really! But you will not find any better compilations than the ones dedicated to Le Tissier. Here is an example -
Did the guy ever score any tap ins? Who in their right mind would even try some of these shots!? Schmeichel was considered by many to be the best goalkeeper in the world at the time and Le Tissier just made him look like an amateur.
Yet a lot of people outside of the UK have never heard of Matt Le Tissier. If Messi or Rooney scored the type of goals that Le Tissier did they would be seen in every corner of the globe and talked about incessantly. There are two reasons for this. Firstly, Le Tissier was fiercely loyal towards Southampton. They were the only team for Le Tissier who turned down advances from Spurs, Chelsea and even Milan. You have to admire him for that and the Southampton fans certainly do. He scored 162 goals in 443 matches for Southampton, quite a record for a midfielder. He was the first midfielder to scorer 100 goals in the Premier League and had an amazing penalty record. 48 successfully converted spot kicks out of 49 is not something to be sniffed at. Sadly Southampton were usually stuck at the lower end of the league and Le Tissier did not get the coverage he deserved and no trophies ever came his way.
The second reason is his international career. Surely such a player would be a leading player for England and soon become a global star. But for some reason he only accumulated 8 England caps. During the build up to the 98 World Cup Glenn Hoddle gave players a chance to stake a claim for themselves in a England B game against Russia B. Le Tissier on form netted a superb hat trick (check out his second goal!) yes was not picked for the final squad. Southampton fans have never really forgiven Hoddle. And who knows what would have happened if we had Le Tissier taking a penalty during the shoot out losses during Euro 96 or the aforementioned 98 World Cup.
A true legend of the 90's and I think this little bit nicely sums up Le Tissier. Barcelona and Spain playmaker Xavi recently commented that Le Tissier was his idol when he was a child. If a player as good as Xavi is amazed by the skills of Le Tissier then I think that says everything we need to know about the Channel Islander.
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