Ben Killip (born 24 November 1995) is an English professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays as a

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

for club

Hartlepool United Hartlepool United Football Club is a professional association football club based in Hartlepool, County Durham, England. The team competes in League Two, the fourth tier of the English football league system. They were founded in 1908 as Hartle ...

Career

Whilst playing for Norwich City, Killip spent two loan spells at

Lowestoft Town Lowestoft Town Football Club is a semi-professional football club from Lowestoft, Suffolk, England. They are currently members of the and play at Crown Meadow. History The club was established in 1887 as Lowestoft F.C. by a merger of East Suf ...

. He signed for Grimsby Town in July 2017. He was released by Grimsby at the end of the 2017–18 season. Killip signed for

Braintree Town Braintree Town Football Club is a semi-professional football club based in Braintree, Essex, England. They are currently members of and play at Cressing Road. History The club was formed on 24 September 1898 as Manor Works, the works team o ...

on 31 July 2018. He moved to

in May 2019. In the 2019–20 season, Killip struggled for form after making several mistakes and lost the number one spot to

Mitchell Beeney Mitchell Ryan Beeney (born 3 October 1995) is an English professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Dartford. Club career Chelsea In 2007, Beeney joined Chelsea's academy from Gillingham, along with his brother Jordan. After beco ...

, however he soon regained his place in the team. The next season, Killip had a much more successful campaign managing to keep 13 clean sheets in 29 matches. On April 5 2021, in a 2–2 draw with Boreham Wood, Killip injured his elbow and was ruled out for the rest of the

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

season. Killip did, however, make the substitutes bench for the play-offs as the club won promotion to

League Two The English Football League Two (often referred to as League Two for short or Sky Bet League Two for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League Two from 2004 until 2016) is the third and lowest division of the English Football Lea ...

in June 2021. He signed a new contract for Hartlepool at the end of the 2020–21 season. In August 2021, Killip kept a

clean sheet In team sports, a shutout ( US) or clean sheet ( UK) is a game in which one team prevents the other from scoring any points. While possible in most major sports, they are highly improbable in some sports, such as basketball. Shutouts are usuall ...

in Hartlepool's first game back in the

Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...

as Hartlepool beat Crawley Town 1–0. Killip's performance in the

EFL Trophy The English Football League Trophy, known for sponsorship purposes as the Papa Johns Trophy after restaurant chain Papa John's Pizza, is an annual English association football knockout competition open to all clubs in EFL League One and EFL Le ...

semi-final against Rotherham United earned him player of the round. Hartlepool eventually lost 5–4 on

penalties Penalty or The Penalty may refer to: Sports * Penalty (golf) * Penalty (gridiron football) * Penalty (ice hockey) * Penalty (rugby) * Penalty (rugby union) * Penalty kick (association football) * Penalty shoot-out (association football) * Penalty ...

with Killip saving one penalty in the shootout. On 11 May 2022, Killip's contract option was exercised, keeping him at the club until the end of the 2022–23 season.

International career

In September 2018, Killip received his first call up for the England C team for their game against Estonia u23s.

Career statistics

Honours

Hartlepool United *

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team s ...

play-offs:

2021 File:2021 collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: the James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2021; Protesters in Yangon, Myanmar following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, coup d'état; A civil demonstration against the October–November 2021 ...

References

1995 births Living people Footballers from Isleworth English footballers England semi-pro international footballers Association football goalkeepers Chelsea F.C. players Norwich City F.C. players King's Lynn Town F.C. players Lowestoft Town F.C. players Grimsby Town F.C. players Braintree Town F.C. players Hartlepool United F.C. players Northern Premier League players National League (English football) players English Football League players {{England-footy-goalkeeper-stub