When I was growing up, John Fashanu was a household name.
After helping Wimbledon’s Crazy Gang to an FA Cup win in 1988, he earned a move to Aston Villa for £1.35 million, before going on to be a media personality. His catchphrase, ‘Awooga’, became known across the country as the host of the Saturday evening show Gladiators when it was massive. He was famous in no uncertain terms, and my Dad always took great delight in telling me that Fashanu had played for Lincoln.
He did, but he played in the awkward time after the 82/83 collapse and before the relegation in 85/86. The final days of Murphy’s first spell felt ominous: a gentle decay of the team he’d built, a board tightening purse strings, a club perhaps torn apart by ghosts of the past, not least those of the 82/83 season.
Still, play for City he did, and I thought I’d put together a little bio of John Fashanu’s Imps career.
We had faced Fashanu prior to him signing for us. He appeared for Norwich City between 1978 and 1983, and scored once, against the Imps, in our 3-1 win in December 1982. That game was fiery, and another future Imp (of sorts), John Deehan, was sent off. However, the big striker had clearly made an impact on Colin Murphy.
He had a loan spell with Miramar Rangers, and another with Crystal Palace, and it was while with the Londoners that City first came knocking. Palace had him but were being asked for £15,000 by Norwich. If they didn’t pay up, then his loan period would be stopped, and we’d swoop in. Back then, a club could only sign a loan player for a maximum of three months, which is none of today’s ‘season-long’ stuff. Palace wanted him, but the transfer wasn’t easy, so Murphy took him on loan.
It was some start for the striker. On his debut, we lost 2-0 to Hull, and in his second game, away at Exeter, he threw an elbow in the face of Jim Hicks off the ball, and was shown a red card. Elbows were a big thing with Fash; he was often caught sticking one in an opponent’s face during a game, and so this was just an early taster of what was to come.
He played twice more after that before serving his ban, and finally got his first Imps goals as we won 3-1 away at Burnley. Robust is a good way to describe his approach, but there’s no doubt he fitted into Murphy’s style, a bustling attacker with real presence up top. The Burnley goal was bittersweet – it gave us a big win before playing top flight side Spurs in the League Cup, but Fash was cup-tied as we beat them 2-1. It was a huge result for City – Archibald, Hoddle and the like went on to win the UEFA Cup.
Still, Murph decided he wanted his man and rang Norwich to tell them he was willing to pay the £15,000. Palace were finally ready as well, having agreed to talk to the Canaries, and they were offering the striker more money. However, Fash confirmed he was surprised by the Imps setup, and was delighted to make the move permanent.
“I simply came here to get away from the trouble between Norwich and Crystal Palace over my transfer,” he confessed to the Echo. “I was surprised and delighted with the club, the setup and the manager.” He also admitted it wasn’t a move his friends were particularly behind “All of my friends have said I am stupid,” he confessed, given he could have got a lot more money from Palace. “The only person who has confidence I am making the right move is Justin.” Justin was his (at the time) more famous brother, the first black £1 million footballer and the first openly gay footballer in England.
Fash had come to Lincoln to progress, and the first signs of that came four days after signing permanently. City thrashed Bristol Rovers 4-1, and Fash grabbed a hattrick. He laid on the fourth for Ross Jack, a player he’d partnered in Norwich reserves, and it seemed as if City had unearthed a diamond.
We may well have done, but the age-old problem of injury suddenly raised its head again. A couple of weeks after destroying the Gas, who were top of the table at the time, Fash was ruled out with ligament damage. In his absence, City won just twice in seven fixtures. When he came back, he was in and out of the side, ending up with 26 outings over the season, and six goals.
Part of the issue was his discipline. While being robust is one thing, he often picked up yellows at a time when they were perhaps a little more challenging to pick up. One against Millwall with three games of the season saw him move towards an automatic ban, one that would drag over into the following season. For that reason alone, he was dropped for the final three matches to ensure a clean start for the 84/85 campaign.
84/85 was not a great season for the Imps, but it certainly worked well for our big striker. He started the first two matches, then found himself hospitalised after a game with Wigan. He’d only just come back from a minor knock, and came off the bench, only to be knocked clean out after 30 seconds of action. The game was hugely controversial – Colin Murphy was asked to leave the dugout (‘not sent off’ he stressed) and we suffered another injury, George Shipley coming off.
To make matters worse, City lost the game on a disputed penalty.
When Fash returned, he caught fire, smashing four goals including outstanding performances as we beat Preston 4-0 and Reading 5-1. We were clawing our way up the table, and went above Preston. Still, they had money to spend, and they decided they wanted to spend it on Fashanu.
A bid came in, £35,000, which would see us doubling our money inside 12 months. It was tough to turn down, and such as Fashanu’s importance to the team, it made front page news in the Echo. Fash had spoken in an Echo interview after the Wigan injury about earning a new contract and wanting to play at a higher level, and while we were above Preston, it’s believed behind the scenes he’d voiced his desire to move on.
Millwall were top of the table and eager to press on to the Second Division, and in December, they decided they wanted Fash to do just that. They had serious intent as well – there were 55,000 reasons why we found their bid hard to refuse, and we didn’t refuse it. Remember, up until recent history, Lincoln City have always been cash-strapped, forced into selling top players. When the bid came in from George Graham’s Lions, Colin Murphy did the deal.
Dennis Houlston, club chairman, had been in Bali, but he flew back to pick up some of the fall out from the deal. Fans always have a hard time accepting a player is to be sold, even one with a modest ten goals in 42 appearances, three of those coming in a single outing.
The move caused a degree on anxiety amongst supporters. Remember, Colin Murphy had almost put us in the Second Division, but the collapse in 82/83, and subsequent poor form had seen gates dwindle. We’d regularly get 5,000 in the early 80s, but by the middle of the decade, we were lucky to scrape more than 2,500. There’s no doubt the club was in decline, and the sale of Fashanu, for many supporters, was a symptom of that decline.
Fash returned with his Millwall side later in the season and turned in a robust display, booked for ‘persistent’ elbowing as the Lions won 1-0. Graham’s Millwall were promoted at the end of the season, finishing as runner up to Bradford City. He also helped his side reach the FA Cup quarter final, a game famous for the wrong reasons – they lost at Luton Town in a game marred by fans who invaded the pitch.
He didn’t last a full season at Millwall. He helped them to promotion, but before the end of 1985/86, he was sold, this time to Second Division outfit Wimbledon. Millwall chairman Alan Thorne, who’d seen Fash net 13 goals in league and cup, was reluctant to sell, but £125,000 was a lot to turn down. He cited the club’s hooligan element, causing a decline in numbers, as a factor in the move.
He was the London club’s record signing, and two months later, Fashanu and Wimbledon were promoted to the First Division. The bustling striker had his wish to play top-flight football. In 1988, the Dons stunned the football world by winning the FA Cup against Liverpool, with Fashanu in the side. He scored their Charity Shield goal the following summer, and in 1989 won two England caps against Chile and Scotland in the Rous Cup. The game against Chile saw another player also make a first start – Paul Gascoigne.
He didn’t add to his caps, and he never lost his edge either. During the 1993-94 season, he was criticized after an aerial clash with Spurs captain Gary Mabbutt left the defender with a broken skull and eye socket. He scored 126 times for Wimbledon before a £1.35 million move to Aston Villa in the summer of 1994. Sadly, he appeared just 13 times for Villa, scoring three goals, before an injury ended his career.
After retiring, Fash transitioned into TV presenting, co-hosting the UK version of Gladiators with Ulrika Jonsson in the 1990s. In 2003, he finished runner-up on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! and later that year hosted Fash’s Football Challenge, a reality show where he managed an amateur football team. He also fronted a show called Man vs. Beast, but it was pulled due to protests from animal rights groups. Fashanu has also hosted Deal or No Deal Nigeria and even released a fitness video, Focus on Fitness with Fash.
Though he’s been busy with TV, Fashanu kept his connection to football, working with the Nigeria Football Association and serving as chairman of Welsh team Barry Town for a year. He even compiled the Fashanu Report on corruption in Nigeria in the 1980s and 1990s. In 2003, he managed his own Sunday league team as part of a TV show called Fash FC.
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