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Brilliant piece of work by Mark Duffy


Ex-Mansfield Town star Lindon Meikle on a career of cup runs, promotions...and mathematics
By Mark Duffy -  Published 24th Jul 2024, 

There aren’t too many secondary school maths teachers that can boast about being an FA Cup hero and non-league football legend, but Lindon Meikle certainly can.
At the age of 36, Meikle has had an impressive career in football that’s included league titles, stunning cup runs and being adored by the fans of the clubs he’s played for.
And whilst he now devotes more time to Pythagoras Theorum than getting his angles right for putting a cross into the penalty area, his love for football is still as evident as it was when his career began as a teenager with Vernon Colts in Nottingham.
“My brother was at Eastwood Town,” he says, referring to Deon, who also had a successful career in the non-league game.
“Actually, I wasn’t really sure who he played for or at what step, but my dad told me he was going down to watch him one night and that I was going too.
“To cut a long story short,Paul Cox was there managing the academy at the time and before I knew it I’d signed up and was playing for their youth and reserve sides, and that’s where it all began.
”Before long, Cox had taken over from Bryan Chambers as Eastwood boss and having been impressed by the young winger he’d signed for the academy, got him more and more involved in the first team, giving him his debut at 16-years-old, and Meikle’s stature only grew as a result.
He said: “I was part of the youth setup with players like Colin Daniel and Ben Hutchinson, then part of the first team that won promotion to step three – that being before Robert Yong bought the club and began to give it some serious financial backing.”

Yong’s influence would spark a period of remarkable success for the Badgers, and although a few years later his departure from Eastwood began a spiral that saw the club ultimately fold, the ride was a fun-packed one for Meikle and his team-mates.
Another title win and promotion to what was then the Conference North followed, while in the same season Eastwood reached the FA Cup third round, with Meikle the star of the show in a huge upset in round two.
“We hosted Wycombe Wanderers, who were top of the third tier and the only unbeaten side in the country,” he said.
“It was a packed house at Eastwood on a misty day and it was perfect. About 20 minutes in I got some space and bent an effort into he corner from about 25 yards out, then Peter Knox scored a second late on and we’d done an amazing job to knock Wycombe out.
“We could have faced anyone in the third round, but it ended up being Kettering Town away at their old Rockingham Road ground. We lost 2-1 and they went on to play Fulham, but it was an unbelievable experience.
”After a good couple of years in the Conference North, Eastwood were denied the chance to compete in the play-offs due to ground grading issues, which subsequently began a decline that saw Meikle and many other key players ultimately leave the club, as well as boss Cox who was appointed as Mansfield Town’s new manager.
And it wasn’t long before Meikle joined him.
He said: “I’d actually had contact from Mansfield before Coxy went there, but when he was appointed it just seemed like the right move and the right time to go into full-time football.
“I was working in a clothes store so the transition was easy enough in that sense, although it took a little bit of time to adjust to training every day but it was what I wanted to do.
”Meikle’s career at Mansfield was a good one. They lost in the Conference National play-offs in his first season, but then won the title the following year to earn promotion to League Two.
Another good FA Cup run saw them face Liverpool at home in front of the TV cameras in the FA Cup third round in 2013, Mansfield performing well in a 2-1 defeat.
And all of those experiences helped make Meikle a popular figure in Mansfield and beyond.
“I still get people come up to me now when I’m in Mansfield or Nottingham and talk about the promotion year and the FA Cup run, so that’s really good,” he said.
“We were unlucky against Liverpool. I felt we really should have drawn and Luis Suarez’s winner was handball, but it was amazing to come up against the quality we did that day. The hype and build-up was the main thing I remember – during the game we were just focused on the job and didn’t really ‘hear’ the full house as such, it went by so quickly.
“I enjoyed it at Mansfield but when we got into League Two I didn’t get as much game time as I felt I deserved given the players we brought in, and even though they offered me a new deal after three years I felt I wanted to try and get football elsewhere as I’d worked so hard to get to being full-time and I was keen to stay at that kind of level.

”A move to York City followed, as did regular football until manager Nigel Worthington left his post and Meikle fell out of favour with his replacement. "It was one of those things – a few of us didn’t get much of a chance with the new manager, but their form declined a lot after that, so there you go,” he said.
"I went to Macclesfield Town after that and John Askey was a really good manager but after initially getting games, some key players who had been out injured started to return and I didn’t play as much, which again is football really.
"They wanted me to stay but I felt I needed to get back to enjoying things again and perhaps go back to my roots, so I took the chance to go to Alfreton Town for a few months and that was really enjoyable.
"Paul Cox was then manager at Barrow and offered me the chance to work with him again, which was good as it was full-time football. I’d got used to travelling a lot and they actually trained in Rochdale which wasn’t as far as Barrow itself.
"I played a bit but was on the bench a lot and it made me think I just wanted drop out of full-time football again as I was then starting to get sick of the travelling when not playing as much and I needed to get my love for the game back.”
A close friend of Meikle’s, striker Aaron O’Connor, was plying his trade at Kettering Town, which led to Meikle getting involved with the Northamptonshire club.
He firmly settled with the Poppies, enjoying three seasons there and becoming a fans’ favourite – also continuing his transition into a versatile midfield player as opposed to his younger days on the wing.
He said: “It was the longest I’d been anywhere since Mansfield and like when I was there, we got to the play-offs in the first season and promoted in the second. "There was a real togetherness there throughout and I really enjoyed being part of it.”
A subsequent move to Tamworth was hampered by the Covid-19 pandemic, but Meikle then enjoyed more success with Buxton as he was part of their promotion-winning side to the National League North.
He said: “The facilities at Buxton had improved massively since I’d last played there and the squad was really strong, so that was a great time. In the end though, the manager changed and again things didn’t work out so I went back to Tamworth but I picked up a few injuries, and given how well they were doing, I struggled to get back in the team even though the manager wanted to keep me."

Which brings Meikle to his current club, Ilkeston Town. An initial loan move was a success, and a permanent deal then followed this summer meaning that Meikle is now just five miles down the road from where it all began. Not only that, but he’s back working under Ian Deakin, a team-mate of his from his Eastwood days. He said: “The fans at Ilkeston really took to me which was nice and wanted me to come back, so I was happy to sign again.
"It’s a brilliant setup here and I really think we’ve got a great chance of promotion as the squad is really strong.”

His football life is now shadowed by being a PE and maths teacher at Ellis Guilford School in Basford, a full-time move to maths now on the cards as Meikle continues to build a life away from football.
He said: “Going from full-time football back to part-time highlighted the need for me to have something to fall back on, and I’d been doing my teaching qualifications in the background over a few years. I’ve been teaching for the last seven years now.
"I’m a qualified personal trainer too, so I’m glad to have so many options available to me when I finally stop playing.” 



 

Last edited by Matchman (26/7/2024 7:04 AM)