Playing Career
Clarke began his professional career in the Football League Fourth Division at Peterborough United in the 1981-82 season, scoring 18 goals in 84 games over the next three seasons (having a loan spell at Gillingham during his final season at London Road) before he signed for their Fourth Division rivals Tranmere Rovers. Along with fellow striker John Clayton, he formed one of the deadliest strike-forces in the Football League by scoring 22 goals that season, but the 1984-85 campaign ended in disappointment as Tranmere just missed out on promotion. He was then transferred to Third Division Bournemouth and scored 26 goals, though again his goals were not enough to win his club promotion.
In the summer of 1986, Clarke made the big move of his career in a transfer to First Division club Southampton, and he was an instant success in his first campaign as a top division striker with 20 league goals. He enjoyed another successful campaign a year later by scoring 16 goals, but a sudden loss of form in 1988-89 restricted him to nine First Division games (in which he failed to score). He was loaned back to Bournemouth (by then in the Second Division) during that campaign and scored twice in four games before a permanent exit from The Dell in March 1989, saw him resume his First Division career with Queens Park Rangers (QPR). He scored five goals in 12 games as QPR finished ninth, but his goalscoring rate slowed in 1989-90 as he managed just six goals in 34 games in a season where QPR finished lower and underwent a mid season managerial change when Trevor Francis was succeeded by Don Howe.
He was transferred to Portsmouth in June 1990, where he remained until the end of his playing career three years later. During his time at Fratton Park he was in the side that reached the FA Cup semi-finals in 1992, only being eliminated by Liverpool after a replay and penalties, and narrowly missed out on promotion to the Premier League a year later. He retired at the end of the 1992-93 season due to a knee injury.
Read more about this topic: Colin Clarke (footballer Born 1962)
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