Tributes have been paid to former Sheffield Wednesday, Nottingham Forest and England Under-21 midfielder Chris Bart-Williams, whose death at the age of 49 was announced on Tuesday morning.
A sleek and intelligent central midfielder, Bart-Williams was a popular figure at Hillsborough and the City Ground, shining for the first in their stellar team of the early 1990s under manager Trevor Francis, who died on Monday.
Prior to his death, Bart-Williams lived in the United States, where he ran football training and recruiting courses for American colleges.
“He was a wonderfully gifted player, with a huge personality and a very charismatic guy,” former Wednesday teammate Mark Bright said on Tuesday. Another Wednesday luminary at the time, Chris Waddle, described him as “a good boy and a very talented footballer”.
Terry Howard, a Leyton Orient team-mate alongside whom Bart-Williams made his professional debut, said: “I’ve had the pleasure of following his development through the youth ranks and playing alongside him in the first team. Tremendous talent and a charming, polite and unassuming young man, taken far too soon.
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Born in Freetown, Sierra Leone, Bart-Williams grew up in Haringey, North London, after his family emigrated and his talent secured him a place in the youth of the Orient. He excelled instantly on turning professional, scoring on his debut aged 16 in a 4-0 win over Tranmere in February 1991.
His passing ability and composure as a teenager stood out in the third tier and he was soon destined for greater things. After impressing against Francis on Wednesday in a League Cup tie at the start of the following season, Bart-Williams moved to Hillsborough in November 1991 for £275,000 and quickly made his debut on Wednesday, starting in a 1-1 draw against league champions Arsenal on November 23.
During his spell on Wednesday, where he made 156 appearances and scored 21 goals, he was called up by England Under-19s and Under-21s and featured prominently in the side that finished third in the top flight in 1992 and reached both domestic cup finals the following season, a campaign in which he netted a hat-trick in a 5-2 win over Southampton.
As that impressive Wednesday side began to split, his former manager at Orient Frank Clark, now at Nottingham Forest, signed him for £2.5million in 1995. ‘The Bart-man’ quickly became a fan favorite at the City Ground, playing a part in their run to the UEFA Cup quarter-finals in 1996 and staying with the club as they suffered relegation from the Premier League in 1997 – although he scored the goal that secured their immediate comeback a year later. – and 1999, becoming club captain.
He left Forest at the end of 2001 after 35 goals in 245 appearances, as the club’s financial problems mounted, and moved to Charlton. But he failed to reach the same heights at the Valley, or during a later spell at Ipswich, from 2003 to 2004, and saw his playing career with stints at Apoel in Cyprus and Marsaxlokk in Malta.
After retiring in 2006, he moved to the United States where he coached women’s, men’s and varsity soccer, became owner and general manager of US College Soccer scouting agency CBW Soccer Elite, and ran the Gulliver School boys’ soccer program in Miami.
Playing at a time when sophisticated midfielders were less common and perhaps less valued in English football than they are now, Bart-Williams felt he might have deserved more effort at senior international level.
“Looking back, I probably didn’t have enough opportunities,” he told 4-4-2 magazine in April of this year. “But there was a plethora of midfielders to choose from and I wasn’t necessarily in the spotlight either. I wasn’t seen as a top player and, with no disrespect to Sheffield Wednesday, I didn’t play for Man United, Liverpool or Arsenal. I sometimes felt that counted against me.
However, he remained well regarded throughout the game. Interviewed for the Guardian Weekend magazine’s Questionnaire article in 2001, he was asked the most important lesson life has taught him: “It really is about love, isn’t it?”