Grant McCann

Grant McCann

Personal information
Full name	Grant Samuel McCann
Date of birth	14 April 1980 (1980-04-14)
Place of birth	Belfast, Northern Ireland
Height	1.73 m (5 ft 8 in)
Playing position	Midfielder
Club information
Current club	Peterborough United
Number	11
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1998–2003	West Ham United	4	(0)
1999	→ Livingston (loan)	4	(0)
2000	→ Notts County (loan)	2	(0)
2000–2001	→ Cheltenham Town (loan)	30	(3)
2002	→ Cheltenham Town (loan)	8	(0)
2003–2007	Cheltenham Town	158	(31)
2006–2007	→ Barnsley (loan)	7	(1)
2007–2008	Barnsley	34	(3)
2008–2010	Scunthorpe United	102	(18)
2010–	Peterborough United	58	(17)
National team‡
2001–	Northern Ireland	36	(4)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 20:54, 19 November 2011 (UTC). † Appearances (Goals). ‡ National team caps and goals correct as of 12:18, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Grant Samuel McCann (born 14 April 1980 in Belfast) is a Northern Irish international footballer who currently plays for Peterborough United who play in The Championship in England where he is the captain.

Club career

McCann, a midfielder, who played for Lisburn Youth team, the same club as Keith Gillespie and Jonny Evans, started his professional career at West Ham United and is a product of Academy of Football. He made is debut on 19 May 2001 in a 2–1 away defeat to Middlesbrough.

Finding it hard to break into the West Ham first team McCann had loan spells at Livingston and Notts County before moving to Cheltenham Town, in another loan deal, in 2000.

After another loan deal took him back to Cheltenham in 2002, the move was made permanent during the January 2003 transfer window when he moved from West Ham for £50,000, a record transfer fee for Cheltenham Town. McCann went on to make 155 league appearances for the Gloucestershire club. He had made only four substitute appearances for The Hammers.

He joined Barnsley on loan deadline day, 23 November 2006, in a contract that expired on 1 January 2007. On his debut against Ipswich Town he scored a 92nd minute winner in Simon Davey's first ever game as caretaker boss. The two clubs agreed a fee of £100,000 and McCann moved to Barnsley permanently on 2 January 2007. At the time this was a record fee for an outbound player from Cheltenham.

In January 2008, McCann left Barnsley to sign for Championship rivals Scunthorpe United for an undisclosed fee.

Peterborough United

On 24 May 2010, Peterborough United announced that they had beaten off competition from a host of Championship clubs to secure the services of McCann on a three-year contract. On 1 August, McCann was named the captain for the 2010–11 League One season, taking the role from George Boyd. He has continued to hold this position for the 2011-12 season. After 2010–2011 season end with Peterbrough winning the play offs to the Championship, Grant McCann became the top assist with 21 last season.

McCann has the rare achievement of being promoted via the playoffs with 3 different clubs at 3 different Stadiums - with Cheltenham Town at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff, with Scunthorpe United at Wembley Stadium, London and with Peterborough United at Old Trafford, Manchester.

The first game of the 2011-12 season was against Crystal Palace at home posh went behind but McCann scored to put them level and then Ball scored to get 3 points for posh. On the 20 August 2011 Lee Tomlin ran clean through and was brought down by Tommy Smith, the ref pointed to the spot and sent Smith off, McCann stepped up and sloted the ball into the back of the net to make it 5-1 to Posh the game finished with the score at 7-1.

Personal

McCann and his wife, Kelly, have two sons called Jesse and Bayley.^{[citation needed]} The elder, Bayley, was a mascot with his father for the playoff final between Peterborough United and Huddersfield Town at Old Trafford on May 29th 2011.^{[citation needed]}

International career

He made his debut for the Northern Ireland national team on 6 October 2001 in a 1–0 away win against Malta. He opened his goalscoring account for Northern Ireland by scoring the last goal, a header, in the 4–1 away win against Liechtenstein on 24 March 2007.

International goals

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1	24 March 2007	Rheinpark, Vaduz	Liechtenstein	4–1	4–1	UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying
2	15 October 2008	Windsor Park, Belfast	San Marino	2–0	4–0	2010 FIFA World Cup qualification
3	11 February 2009	Stadio Olimpico, Serravalle	San Marino	2–0	3–0	2010 FIFA World Cup qualification
4	12 August 2009	Windsor Park, Belfast	Israel	1–0	1–1	Friendly match

Honours

• 2005–06: League Two Play Off Winner (promotion to League One) – Cheltenham Town
• 2008–09: League One Play Off Winner (promotion to The Championship) – Scunthorpe United
• 2010–11: League One Play Off Winner (promotion to The Championship) – Peterborough United

External links

• Grant McCann player profile at scunthorpe-united.co.uk
• Grant McCann player profile at barnsleyfc.co.uk
• Grant McCann career stats at Soccerbase