Shane Kevin Ferguson (born 12 July 1991) is a Northern Irish 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 for

Rotherham United Rotherham United Football Club, nicknamed The Millers, is a professional football club based in Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England, which compete in the . The club's colours were initially yellow and black, but changed to red and white around 1 ...

and the

Northern Ireland national team The Northern Ireland national football team represents Northern Ireland in international association football. From 1882 to 1920, all of Ireland was represented by a single side, the Ireland national football team, organised by the Irish Foo ...

. He previously played for

Newcastle United Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Newcastle upon Tyne, that plays in the Premier League – the top flight of English football. The club was founded in 1892 by the merger of Newcastle East End ...

in the

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

, where he had two spells on loan to

Birmingham City Birmingham City Football Club is a professional football club based in Birmingham, England. Formed in 1875 as Small Heath Alliance, it was renamed Small Heath in 1888, Birmingham in 1905, and Birmingham City in 1943. Since 2011, the first te ...

of the English

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, as well as Rangers of the

Scottish Championship The Scottish Championship, known as the cinch Championship for sponsorship reasons, is the second tier of the Scottish Professional Football League, the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland Scotland (, ...

and

Scottish Professional Football League The Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) is the national men's association football league in Scotland. The league was formed in June 2013 following a merger between the Scottish Premier League and the Scottish Football League. As ...

and

Millwall Millwall is a district on the western and southern side of the Isle of Dogs, in east London, England, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It lies to the immediate south of Canary Wharf and Limehouse, north of Greenwich and Deptford, east ...

of the

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. He is capable of playing anywhere on the left flank as a full back or winger.

Early life

Born in

Derry Derry, officially Londonderry (), is the second-largest city in Northern Ireland and the fifth-largest city on the island of Ireland. The name ''Derry'' is an anglicisation of the Old Irish name (modern Irish: ) meaning 'oak grove'. The ...

, Ferguson began playing youth football for his hometown club, Maiden City, and

Gaelic football Gaelic football ( ga, Peil Ghaelach; short name '), commonly known as simply Gaelic, GAA or Football is an Irish team sport. It is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score by kic ...

for

Derry GAA The Derry County Board of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) ( ga, Cumann Lúthchleas Gael Coiste Chontae Dhoire) or Derry GAA is one of the 32 county boards of the GAA in Ireland. It is responsible for Gaelic games in County Londonderry ...

. After finishing his

GCSE The General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) is an academic qualification in a particular subject, taken in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. State schools in Scotland use the Scottish Qualifications Certificate instead. Private sc ...

s at St Mary's High School, he moved to England where he was offered a scholarship at the Newcastle United Academy.

Club career

Newcastle United

Ferguson joined the

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in July 2007. In June 2009, he signed a new three-year contract. Ferguson made his first team debut at left back on 25 August 2010, in a

League Cup In several sports, most prominently association football, a league cup or secondary cup generally signifies a cup competition for which entry is restricted only to teams in a particular league. The first national association football tournament t ...

tie away at

Accrington Stanley Accrington Stanley Football Club is a professional association football club based in Accrington, Lancashire, England. The club competes in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They have spent their complete history ...

. He then played in the next round of the League Cup, on 22 September, away at

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and he assisted in the first goal in the 4–3 win. He made his

debut on 5 January 2011 against

West Ham United West Ham United Football Club is an English professional football club that plays its home matches in Stratford, East London. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club plays at the London Stadium, hav ...

as a second-half substitute. He made his first Premier League start against

Wolverhampton Wanderers Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club (), commonly known as Wolves, is a professional football club based in Wolverhampton, England, which compete in the . The club has played at Molineux Stadium since moving from Dudley Road in 1889. The club's ...

on 2 April 2011. Ferguson signed a new five-year contract on 27 May 2011, having made a good impression in the final part of the season. A lengthy lay off due to a pre-season ankle ligament injury sustained against

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. The River Skerne flows through the town; it is a tributary of the River Tees. The Tees itself flows south of the town. In the 19th century, Darlington underwen ...

meant the young full back was unable to travel with the first team to a pre-season tournament in the United States. After appearing in the League Cup second round against

Nottingham Forest Nottingham Forest Football Club is an association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. Nottingham Forest was founded in 1865 and have been playing their home games at the City Ground, on the banks of the River Tren ...

, he made his first Premier League appearance on 10 December 2011, as a late substitute for

Davide Santon Davide Santon (; born 2 January 1991) is an Italian former professional footballer who played as a left wing-back. A former Inter Milan youth product, Santon began his professional club career with Inter in 2008, and remained with the club unt ...

. In the early months of the 2012–13 season Ferguson assisted a number of goals for strikers

Demba Ba Demba Ba (born 25 May 1985) is a former professional footballer. He serves as the chairman of National Independent Soccer Association side ASC San Diego. He made his first-team debut with French team Rouen in 2005 before moving to Mouscron an ...

and

Papiss Cissé Papiss Demba Cissé (; born 3 June 1985) is a Senegalese professional footballer who plays as a forward for Ligue 2 club Amiens. He formerly played for the Senegal national football team. Formerly of SC Freiburg, he once held the record of most ...

and produced some quality crosses from the left wing.

Loans to Birmingham City, Rangers and Millwall

Millwall Vs Swindon Town (22069702789) (cropped)

In late February 2013, Ferguson joined

club

on loan until 1 April. He scored his first goal for the club, and his first senior competitive goal, with a free kick from just outside the penalty area, to complete Birmingham's 4–0 away win against

Crystal Palace Crystal Palace may refer to: Places Canada * Crystal Palace Complex (Dieppe), a former amusement park now a shopping complex in Dieppe, New Brunswick * Crystal Palace Barracks, London, Ontario * Crystal Palace (Montreal), an exhibition building * ...

on 29 March. His loan was extended until the end of the season, and he made 11 appearances before returning to Newcastle. In July 2013, Ferguson rejoined Birmingham on loan for the season. He played regularly at the start of the season, but fell out of favour, and appeared only three times in the last three months of the season after the arrival of

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

Jordon Ibe Jordon Ashley Femi Ibe ( ; born 8 December 1995) is an English professional footballer who plays as a winger. After coming up through the youth system of Wycombe Wanderers, for whom he made his debut in the Football League as a 15-year-old, Ibe ...

on loan. Having made no first-team appearances in the first half of 2014–15, he was one of five Newcastle players to join

club Rangers on loan on 2 February 2015. He was still recovering from a knee ligament injury, and only regained fitness in time to make two appearances: as a second-half substitute in the first leg of the

play-off final The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...

and as a starter in the second, as Rangers lost out to

Motherwell Motherwell ( sco, Mitherwall, gd, Tobar na Màthar) is a town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Historically in the parish of Dalziel and part of Lanarks ...

. Ferguson joined

on loan on 7 August 2015 on a 92-day loan from parent club Newcastle. His debut came a day later in a 2–1 away win against

Shrewsbury Town Shrewsbury Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England. The team competes in League One, the third tier of English football. The club plays its home games at the New Meadow, having mo ...

. On 1 September, Ferguson's loan spell at the club was extended until 9 January 2016. Ferguson scored his first Millwall goal in November 2015 against

Colchester United Colchester United Football Club is a professional association football club based in the city of Colchester, Essex, England. The team competes in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1937, the club spent its earl ...

. He made 24 appearances and scored 2 goals for Millwall before returning to Newcastle in January 2016.

Millwall

On 26 January 2016, Ferguson signed an eighteen-month contract with Millwall for an undisclosed fee. In May 2021, he was released from the club.

Rotherham United

On 20 July 2021, Ferguson signed a two-year contract (with the option of a third year) with

. He made his debut in the first game of the 2021–22 season against

Plymouth Argyle Plymouth Argyle Football Club is a professional football club based in the city of Plymouth, Devon, England. As of the 2021–22 season, the team are competing in League One, the third tier of English football. They have played at Home Park, ...

on 7 August 2021, coming on as a second-half substitute.

International career

Ferguson has been

capped In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the ea ...

for the Northern Ireland national team at various youth levels. He made his

senior Senior (shortened as Sr.) means "the elder" in Latin and is often used as a suffix for the elder of two or more people in the same family with the same given name, usually a parent or grandparent. It may also refer to: * Senior (name), a surname ...

debut when he came on as a substitute in a 3–0 friendly defeat to

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on 6 June 2009. He was called up for the 2011 U21 European Championship qualifier against Germany on 13 November but did not leave the bench. Simultaneously, he had also been a regular in the U-19 squad in their bid to qualify for the 2010 European Championships and helped them to a place in the

elite round In political and sociological theory, the elite (french: élite, from la, eligere, to select or to sort out) are a small group of powerful people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in a group. D ...

. He played all three matches of that round, but Northern Ireland failed to win any of the games and finished at the bottom of their group. In May 2011 it was reported that Northern Ireland manager Nigel Worthington believed that Ferguson would switch his allegiance to the Republic of Ireland after he failed to reply to telephone calls. In the months that followed, Ferguson did not comment on his future at international level. However, under-21 coach

Steve Beaglehole Steven Beaglehole (born 17 October 1960) is an English football coach who is currently working at Leicester City with youth squads. He managed Doncaster Rovers from 1991 to 1993. Playing career Beaglehole's playing career included appearance ...

later stated that he believed Ferguson never attempted to switch allegiances despite failing to respond to Worthington's calls as he had started in all the 2013 European Championship qualifiers from September onwards. In November, Ferguson ended the speculation by publicly committing his international future to Northern Ireland. On 20 February 2012 Ferguson was included in Michael O'Neill's first squad following his appointment as the Northern Ireland manager. Ferguson scored his first goal for Northern Ireland in an international friendly versus

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

on 15 August 2012. A year later, he produced what O'Neill called "90 minutes of the really highest quality" as Northern Ireland beat

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in a 2014 World Cup qualifier.

Career statistics

Club

International

:''Scores and results list Northern Ireland's goal tally first''

Honours

Millwall *

EFL League One play-offs The EFL League One play-offs are a series of play-off matches contested by the association football teams finishing from third to sixth in the EFL League One table and are part of the English Football League play-offs. , the play-offs comprise tw ...

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Rotherham United *

League One The English Football League One (often referred to as League One for short or Sky Bet League One for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League One from 2004 until 2016) is the second-highest division of the English Football Leag ...

runner-up: 2021–22 *

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 ...

: 2021–22

References

External links

Shane Ferguson profile
at

Irish Football Association The Irish Football Association (IFA) is the governing body for association football in Northern Ireland. It organised the Ireland national football team from 1880 to 1950, which after 1954, became the Northern Ireland national football team. ...

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferguson, Shane 1991 births Living people Sportspeople from Derry (city) Association footballers from Northern Ireland Association football wingers Newcastle United F.C. players Birmingham City F.C. players Rangers F.C. players Millwall F.C. players Rotherham United F.C. players Premier League players English Football League players Northern Ireland youth international footballers Northern Ireland under-21 international footballers Northern Ireland B international footballers Northern Ireland international footballers UEFA Euro 2016 players Gaelic footballers who switched code