John Brown Clark (born 22 September 1964) is a Scottish former

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 lea ...

. He is best known for his achievements in a lengthy playing career with

Dundee United Dundee United Football Club is a Scotland, Scottish professional association football, football club based in the city of Dundee. Formed in 1909, originally as Dundee Hibernian, the club changed to the present name in 1923. United are nickname ...

. He top scored for them in the run to the 1987 UEFA Cup Final in which he scored in the defeat in the final. Among his four goals in that run was one against

FC Barcelona Futbol Club Barcelona (), commonly known as FC Barcelona and colloquially as Barça (), is a professional Football club (association football), football club based in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, that competes in La Liga, the top flight of ...

Camp Nou Camp Nou (), meaning ''New Field'' and often referred to in English as the Nou Camp, is a stadium in Barcelona and the home of La Liga club FC Barcelona since its opening in 1957. It is currently undergoing renovation, and with a planned increa ...

in the quarter-final. He also played for

Stoke City Stoke City Football Club is a professional association football club based in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. The team competes in the , the second level of the English football league system. Founded as Stoke Ramblers in 1863, the cl ...

Falkirk Falkirk ( ; ; ) is a town in the Central Lowlands of Scotland, historically within the county of Stirlingshire. It lies in the Forth Valley, northwest of Edinburgh and northeast of Glasgow. Falkirk had a resident population of 32,422 at the ...

Dunfermline Athletic Dunfermline Athletic Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the city of Dunfermline, Fife. Founded in 1885, the club currently compete in the after winning the 2022–23 Scottish League One title. Dunfermline play at ...

, Ross County,

Ayr United Ayr United Football Club are a football club in Ayr, Scotland, who play in the , the second tier of the Scottish Professional Football League. Formed in 1910 by the merger of Ayr Parkhouse and Ayr F.C., their nickname is The Honest Men, fro ...

and

Berwick Rangers Berwick Rangers Football Club is a football team based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed in England, who play in the Scottish football system. Founded in 1881, they currently play in the , the fifth tier of Scottish football, despite being ba ...

Career

Dundee United

Clark was born in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

and joined

in 1976 and began to play for the reserves as a forward where he scored over 100 goals. He made his debut in the 1982–83 season. His best season was 1986–87 where he featured prominently at

centre half In the sport of association football, a defender is an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categ ...

. He was their top scorer on the way to the 1987 UEFA Cup Final with a goal against each of Universitatea Craiova,

Hajduk Split Hrvatski Nogometni klub Hajduk Split, commonly referred to as Hajduk Split (), is a Croatian professional football club based in Split, that competes in the Croatian First League, the top tier in Croatian football. Since 1979, the club's home ...

and

at the

. He also scored in the second leg of the final at

Tannadice Park Tannadice Park, officially known as The CalForth Construction Arena for sponsorship reasons, is a football stadium in Dundee, Scotland. It is the home ground of Dundee United F.C., who have played at Tannadice since the club was founded as Du ...

as United lost 2–1 to

IFK Göteborg Idrottsföreningen Kamraterna Göteborg (officially IFK Göteborg Fotboll), commonly known as IFK Göteborg, IFK (especially locally) or Blåvitt, is a Swedish professional Football team, football club based in Gothenburg. Founded in 1904, it ...

. That same season United also lost the 1987 Scottish Cup Final to St Mirren as they also did the season after to Celtic. Clark remained a regular in the Tannadice defence for the late 1980s and early 1990s making 330 appearances scoring 37 goals.

Stoke City

He moved to English club

in January 1994. Clark started his Stoke against

Barnsley Barnsley () is a market town in South Yorkshire, England. It is the main settlement of the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley and the fourth largest settlement in South Yorkshire. The town's population was 71,422 in 2021, while the wider boroug ...

in a 3–0 defeat. He ended the 1993–94 season with 12 appearances. In 1994–95 Clark played in six matches and scored his only goal for Stoke which came in a 2–0 victory over

Cesena Cesena (; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy; and - with Forlì - is the capital of the Province of Forlì-Cesena. Served by Autostrada A14 (Italy), Autostrada A14, and located near the Apennine M ...

in the

Anglo-Italian Cup The Anglo-Italian Cup (, also known as the Anglo-Italian Inter-League Clubs Competition and from 1976 to 1986 as the Alitalia Challenge Cup, Talbot Challenge Cup or Gigi Peronace Memorial) was a European football competition. The competition was ...

. When

Lou Macari Luigi Macari (born 7 June 1949) is a Scottish former footballer and manager. He began his playing career at Celtic where he was one of the Quality Street Gang, the outstanding reserve team that emerged in the late 1960s that also included Kenn ...

replaced Joe Jordan as manager in September 1994 Clark returned to Scotland.

Later career

Clark next joined

before transferring part way through his second season to

Dunfermline Dunfermline (; , ) is a city, parish, and former royal burgh in Fife, Scotland, from the northern shore of the Firth of Forth. Dunfermline was the de facto capital of the Kingdom of Scotland between the 11th and 15th centuries. The earliest ...

. He had short spells also playing for

, Ross County and

. He became Assistant Manager at Berwick. Clark then dropped out of senior football with

Gala Fairydean Gala Fairydean Rovers Football Club are a Scottish association football club based in the town of Galashiels in the Scottish Borders. The club competes in the , after joining from the East of Scotland Football League in 2013. At the same time t ...

where he became player-manager. He became manager of Whitehill Welfare in 2004.

Career statistics

*Sourced from :A. The "Other" column constitutes appearances and goals in the

and

UEFA Cup The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

Honours

; Dundee United *

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,1986–87, 1987–88, 1990–91 *

runner-up: 1986–87

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, John 1964 births Living people Footballers from Edinburgh Scottish men's footballers Scottish Football League players English Football League players Dundee United F.C. players Stoke City F.C. players Falkirk F.C. players Dunfermline Athletic F.C. players Ross County F.C. players Berwick Rangers F.C. players Gala Fairydean Rovers F.C. players Ayr United F.C. players Scottish football managers Men's association football central defenders Gala Fairydean Rovers F.C. managers