Mark George Perry (born 7 February 1971) is a Scottish retired

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 played professionally as a defender for

Dundee United Dundee United Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the city of Dundee. The club name is usually abbreviated to Dundee United. Formed in 1909, originally as Dundee Hibernian, the club changed to the present name in 1 ...

Aberdeen Aberdeen (; sco, Aiberdeen ; gd, Obar Dheathain ; la, Aberdonia) is a city in North East Scotland, and is the third most populous city in the country. Aberdeen is one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas (as Aberdeen City), and ...

, Ross County and

Peterhead Peterhead (; gd, Ceann Phàdraig, sco, Peterheid ) is a town in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. It is Aberdeenshire's biggest settlement (the city of Aberdeen itself not being a part of the district), with a population of 18,537 at the 2011 Census. ...

in the

Scottish Football League The Scottish Football League (SFL) was a league featuring professional and semi-professional football clubs mostly from Scotland.One club, Berwick Rangers, is based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which is located approximately 4 km south ...

and

Scottish Premier League The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the top level league competition for professional football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football' ...

, as well as for

Cove Rangers Cove Rangers Football Club is a senior Scottish football club currently playing in the Scottish Championship. They are based in the Cove Bay area of Aberdeen and play their football at Balmoral Stadium, having left their former home at Allan ...

and

Keith Keith may refer to: People and fictional characters * Keith (given name), includes a list of people and fictional characters * Keith (surname) * Keith (singer), American singer James Keefer (born 1949) * Baron Keith, a line of Scottish barons ...

at Highland League level.

Playing career

Born in

, Mark Perry began his senior career with

in the

Highland Football League The Scottish Highland Football League (SHFL, commonly known as the Highland League) is a senior football league based in the north of Scotland. The league sits at level 5 on the Scottish football league system The Scottish football league syst ...

. In August 1988,

Scottish Football League Premier Division The Scottish Football League Premier Division was, from 1975 until 1998, the top division of the Scottish Football League and the entire Scottish football league system. It lay above the Scottish Football League First, Second and (from 1994) Th ...

club

signed him for a £3000 transfer fee. After spending four seasons playing in the youth and reserve teams and being transfer listed in April 1992, he made his competitive first team debut in a Premier Division match against

in December 1992. He played regularly through the rest of the 1992-93 season, but less often over the following two seasons and was again transfer listed in 1994. From 1995 onwards he became more established in the team, helping the club to promotion from the First Division in 1996 after being relegated a year earlier. He also played for Dundee United in the

1997 Scottish League Cup Final The 1997 Scottish League Cup Final was played on 30 November 1997, at Ibrox Stadium in Glasgow and was the final of the 52nd Scottish League Cup competition. The final was contested by Celtic and Dundee United. Celtic won the match 3–0 thanks ...

defeat against

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language * Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Fo ...

. Having made over 150 appearances for United, Perry left the club on a free transfer in May 1998 following the expiry of his contract. Perry then moved to his home-town club Aberdeen, spending the next two seasons there and picking up another League Cup runners-up medal against Celtic, in the 2000 Final. With the club unwilling to offer Perry a new contract, he had a trial with English club

Notts County Notts County Football Club is a professional association football club based in Nottingham, England. The team participate in the National League (division), National League, the fifth tier of the English football league system. Founded on the 2 ...

at the beginning of the 2000–01 season, only for it to be cut short due to injury problems at Aberdeen. He joined Ross County later in 2000 and subsequently moved to Third Division club

in February 2003. He returned to the Highland League with

in 2007 and retired in 2009 but later made a playing comeback with his first club, Cove Rangers, in 2013.

After football

After retiring from professional football, Perry worked as a library custodian at the

University of Aberdeen The University of Aberdeen ( sco, University o' 'Aiberdeen; abbreviated as ''Aberd.'' in List of post-nominal letters (United Kingdom), post-nominals; gd, Oilthigh Obar Dheathain) is a public university, public research university in Aberdeen, Sc ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Perry, Mark 1971 births Footballers from Aberdeen Living people Scottish footballers Dundee United F.C. players Aberdeen F.C. players Ross County F.C. players Peterhead F.C. players Scottish Premier League players Scottish Football League players Association football defenders Cove Rangers F.C. players Keith F.C. players Highland Football League players