Stuart Pearce comes out of retirement to play for ‘the worst team in the UK’

Stuart Pearce has come out of retirement at the age
of 53 to play for a non-league side dubbed “the
worst in the UK”.

Gloucestershire-based Longford AFC, whose entire
first team and manager left last summer, play in
the Gloucestershire Northern Senior League
Division Two, and have lost all 19 of their games
this season.

They scored their first goal of the season on 13
January in a 9-1 defeat by Abbeymead Rovers –
with their current goal difference standing at
minus 180.

Pearce, who won 78 England caps and retired from
professional football in 2002, said he “jumped at
the chance” to return to action with the club, in a
deal arranged as part of a Direct Line marketing
campaign.

“Grassroots is essential to the lifeblood of the
game,” said Pearce, who was sacked as manager of
Nottingham Forest a year ago . “I’m looking
forward to working with manager Nick Dawe and
to helping a group of talented young footballers
achieve their dreams and, hopefully transform
both the dressing room confidence and the on-pitch
performance.”

Dawe said Pearce, who will train at the club to
build up match fitness before making a first-team
debut, would give Longford “the best chance
possible to go further than we ever have done
before … A year ago we were playing in front of
one man and his dog and now, we are set to have
hundreds for his debut.”