Richard Dunne ended up playing 604 senior matches in English football and while only the first 72 were for Everton, now 25 years on from his debut, the Irishman insists he counts his blessings for the time he did have at Goodison Park rather than his subsequent spells away.
Over five years before home-grown hero Wayne Rooney burst onto the scene at Everton, Dunne was another teenage ‘man-child’ thrust into the first team spotlight at a tender age.
Despite his early start in the Blues side, the now 42-year-old, has been away from the club that launched his career for more than two decades having joined Manchester City for £3.5million in October 2000.
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It was at Maine Road where he was reunited with Joe Royle, the manager who handed him his debut and he went on to serve them for almost nine years before subsequent spells at Aston Villa and Queens Park Rangers.
There will always be a place in Dunne’s heart for Everton though and speaking courtesy of freebets.com, he told the ECHO: “When you make the breakthrough at a club, you want to finish your career there and do everything you can to make a success of it but at the time it just wasn’t possible.
“I don’t regret it because I moved on at a time that was right for me and for the club but in terms of looking back at my career, I loved my time at Everton.
“I loved growing up there and loved playing in the first team. It’s something that I reflect upon with a sense of pride rather than any regrets.
“I was lucky enough to get the games that I did get. When it comes to an end, it comes to an end, and you have to look forward and move on.”
Back in 1995, the year of their last FA Cup triumph, the Blues struck a sponsorship deal with Dunne’s local club Hope Farm which resulted in them adopting the name Hope Farm Everton for the next four years.
The agreement also gave the Premier League side first pick of the Dublin outfit’s most-promising youngsters but Dunne was the only one to make the grade.
He recalled: “My uncle Jimmy Cousins was the scout for Everton in Ireland. He was sending a few of my team-mates over and I don’t think he was too sure about sending me because of the family connections.
“Eventually he did and it worked out well. I suppose even when you go over on trial, you look at it more as an experience rather than this is your new life.
“The thought of playing in the Premier League still doesn’t become real but to be asked to go back and to sign was amazing.
“It’s difficult I suppose to leave home at 16 and start afresh, meeting new friends, new people and a new style of football.
“It was made easier by the family who took me in to start with, but also by the club.
“They were very accommodating in terms of making sure I got home on a regular basis, making sure I was looked after and even things like giving me a few extra quid to pay my phone bill at the end of each month.
“It was tough but exciting and obviously worth it at the end.”
Dunne became the sixth-youngest player in Everton history when picked by Joe Royle (who at the time was still the youngest) for the first time aged 17 years and 106 days for an FA Cup third round tie at home to Swindon Town on January 5, 1997.
It’s perhaps telling how some youngsters now get their chance earlier that the pair have since slipped to five and 15 respectively on the all-time list, but Dunne remembers how his manager made everything easy for him.
He said: “Even the way Joe dealt with handing me my debut was brilliant.
“He was very calming and there was no stress. He told me ‘look, you’re going to play tomorrow, don’t worry about it. I’ve already rang your mam and dad and they’re on the flight and on the way over.’
“I was just like ‘alright, yeah, cool.’
“I was able to take it in my stride rather than worry and panic about what was going to happen next.
“Joe for me was brilliant. He just put me at ease straight away.”
Although he’d already sampled a taste of the big time, Dunne was still eligible to play in both legs of the final in Everton’s 1998 FA Youth Cup triumph against Blackburn Rovers.
Alongside him were the likes of Leon Osman, Tony Hibbert and Franny Jeffers plus others who would go on to enjoy careers in the lower divisions while the opposition boasted David Dunn.
A 3-1 victory at Ewood Park put the Blues in command and they lifted the trophy after a 2-2 draw at Goodison.
Dunne said: “We had a WhatsApp group back when it was the 20 th anniversary (in 2018) but I haven’t seen some of them for a while now.
“I saw Phil Jevons a couple of years back when I was at Everton’s training ground but everyone goes their separate ways and does different things but a lot of them are now coaching at the club’s academy and it’s good that they stay involved in the game.”
One of the biggest things that Dunne takes from his time on Merseyside is turning out at the Blues’ famous old ground and while he admits he’ll be sorry to see it go, he believes the time is right for the club to look to the future with the planned move to a new stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock in 2024.
He said: “The atmosphere at Goodison Park is unique. I remember playing in Merseyside Derbies there and you couldn’t replicate that anywhere else, it was amazing.
“The fear is that you lose that moving into a new, modern stadium but for Everton to move forward that’s a necessity now.
“Once you get over the fact that Goodison is going to be gone, there is an excitement over moving to the new stadium and hopefully attracting bigger and better players and looking forward to a new era for Everton where they’re hopefully qualifying for Europe on a regular basis and challenging for trophies.
“If the stadium brings that for them then it will be a huge success.”
