Stephen Kelly (Irish footballer)

For other people named Stephen Kelly, see Stephen Kelly.

**Stephen Michael David Kelly** (born 6 September 1983) is an Irish former professional footballer who last played for English Championship club Rotherham United. He played as a defender, primarily at right back. He was part of the team that secured the Republic of Ireland's qualification for UEFA Euro 2012.

Kelly began his professional career at Tottenham Hotspur and also played for Southend United, Queens Park Rangers, Watford, Birmingham City, Stoke City, Fulham and Reading before joining Rotherham United in 2015.

## Club career

### Tottenham Hotspur

Kelly was born in Dublin, where he played football for Belvedere before joining Tottenham Hotspur through their youth programme. He was something of an understudy to Stephen Carr (who was subsequently transferred to Newcastle United) and then to Paul Stalteri. He made his Spurs first team debut in 2003 and then went on to make 37 Premier League appearances, scoring two league goals, against Birmingham City and Aston Villa.

### Birmingham City

Birmingham City were believed to be winning the race to sign the defender in January 2006 only for Tottenham to pull the plug on the deal because they had an injury crisis in defence. Kelly did join Birmingham, however, on 28 June 2006 for an initial fee of £750,000, possibly rising to £1.25 million depending on his success with the club.

Kelly was the only outfield player in the 2007–08 Premier League season to play every minute of every game for his club.

#### Stoke City (loan)

On 4 February 2009, Kelly joined Stoke City on loan from Birmingham City until the end of the 2008–09 season. Stoke City had to wait for 36 hours after the January transfer window shut for confirmation of the deal. Kelly made his Stoke debut in their next game, a 2–0 defeat to Sunderland, but picked up a hamstring injury while on international duty which kept him out of Stoke's next fixture.

### Fulham

 File:Kelly.JPG
On 16 June 2009, Kelly signed a three-year contract with Fulham, making him the club's first signing of the 2009 summer window. He said he was delighted to join the Cottagers and was looking forward to representing the club in both the Premier League and Europa League. He helped Fulham reach the 2010 UEFA Europa League Final, playing in their memorable win against Juventus on the way, but he was left out of the squad for the final itself.

### Reading

Kelly joined Reading on 11 January 2013, signing a Template:Frac-year contract. He made his début on 19 January in Reading's 2–1 away win over Newcastle United at St James' Park, made his home début a week later against Sheffield United in a 4–0 FA Cup win, and soon afterwards, stated that "regardless of what happens now and for the rest of the season, coming here is the best decision I've made in football". Kelly started every game in what remained of the season, and the team were relegated to the Championship.

He was allocated squad number 3 for the 2013–14 season. Kelly scored his first goal for Reading on 1 January 2014, a 95th-minute header from Royston Drenthe's free kick that gave his side a draw at home to Nottingham Forest.

Kelly left Reading at the end of the 2014–15 season, despite being offered a new contract by the club.

### Rotherham United

On 19 November 2015, Kelly joined Championship club Rotherham United on a deal until the end of the 2015–16 season. He left the club at the end of the 2016–17 season.

## International career

Kelly won Irish caps at junior levels and became a member of the senior Irish national squad, making his debut versus Chile. He represented the Republic of Ireland Under-16 team at the 2000 UEFA European Under-16 Football Championship and the Under-20 team at the 2003 FIFA World Youth Championship.

On 29 March 2011, Kelly was named as Ireland captain for the friendly against Uruguay at the Aviva Stadium.

He was a squad member at UEFA Euro 2012 but saw no game time. Then, despite injuries to Richard Dunne and Sean St Ledger, manager Giovanni Trapattoni left him on the bench for the 6-1 home defeat to Germany in 2014 World Cup qualifying. Days later, Kelly had a training ground row with assistant manager Marco Tardelli, and was left so upset by the incident that he did not want to board the plane for the game against the Faroe Islands.

## Career statistics

### Club

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### International

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## Honours

**Birmingham City**

* Championship runner-up: 2006–07

**Fulham**

* UEFA Europa League runner-up: 2009–10

**International**

* Nations Cup: 2011

## References

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1. ↑ Cite error: Invalid `<ref>` tag; no text was provided for refs named `Hugman2010/11`
2. ↑ Past Players. Belvedere F.C.. Retrieved on September 6, 2012.
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10. ↑ Kelly signs. Fulham F.C. (16 June 2009). Retrieved on October 23, 2013.
11. ↑ Fulham 4 - 1 Juventus (agg 5 - 4). BBC (18 March 2010). Retrieved on March 20, 2020.
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13. ↑ Kelly signs. Reading F.C (11 January 2013). Retrieved on September 22, 2013.
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15. ↑ Squad numbers submitted. Reading F.C. (25 July 2013). Retrieved on September 22, 2013.
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18. ↑ Kelly puts pen-to-paper with Millers. Rotherham United F.C. (19 November 2015). Retrieved on November 19, 2015.
19. ↑ READ | Eight players released by Millers. Rotherham United Official Site (11 May 2017). Retrieved on May 11, 2017.
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## External links

* Stephen Kelly profile at the Football Association of Ireland website
* Template:UEFA player
* Template:Soccerbase

Template:Republic of Ireland squad UEFA Euro 2012