Stephen Kelly

:"This is about Irish soccer player; for the American priest and activist, see Stephen Kelly (SJ)"Football player infobox
playername = Stephen Kelly


fullname = Stephen Michael Kelly
height = height|ft=6|in=0
dateofbirth = birth date and age|1983|9|6
cityofbirth = Dublin
countryofbirth = Ireland
currentclub = Birmingham City
clubnumber = 2
position = Full back
youthyears =
youthclubs =
years = 2000–2006
2003
2003
2003
2006–
clubs = Tottenham Hotspur
→ Southend United (loan)
→ Queens Park Rangers (loan)
→ Watford (loan)
Birmingham City
caps(goals) = 37 (2)
10 (0)
07 (0)
13 (0)
78 (0)
nationalyears = 2003–2005
2006–
nationalteam = Republic of Ireland U21
Republic of Ireland
nationalcaps(goals) = 17 (0)
12 (0)
pcupdate = 18:24, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
ntupdate = 19:00, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Stephen Michael Kelly (Irish name: " Stiofán Mícheál Ó Ceallaigh") (born September 6, 1983 in Finglas, Dublin) is an Irish professional footballer who plays at full back (usually right full back) for Birmingham City. He is a full international for the Republic of Ireland.

Club career

Tottenham Hotspur

Kelly joined Tottenham Hotspur through their youth programme. He was something of an understudy to Stephen Carr (who was subsequently transferred to Newcastle United) and then to Paul Stalteri. He made his Spurs first team debut in 2003 and then went on to make nearly fifty Premiership appearances and scoring two league goals.

Birmingham City

Birmingham City were believed to be winning the race to sign the defender in January 2006 only for Tottenham to pull the plug on the deal because they had an injury crisis in defence. Kelly did join Birmingham, however, on 28 June 2006 for an initial fee of £750,000 although it could rise to £1.25 million depending on his success with Birmingham City.cite news
title = Kelly completes Birmingham switch
url = http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/b/birmingham_city/5064692.stm
publisher = BBC Sport
date = 2006-06-28
accessdate = 2007-03-04]

Stephen Kelly was the only outfield player in the 2007–08 Premier League season to have played every minute of every game for his club. [cite news
url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/may/14/premierleague1 |title=Opta stats: The Premier League season in numbers |date=2008-05-14 |work=guardian.co.uk |publisher=Guardian Media Group |accessdate=2008-05-19]

International career

Kelly has won Irish caps at junior levels and is now a member in the Irish full team squad making his debut versus Chile. He represented Republic of Ireland Under-20 team at the 2003 FIFA World Youth Championship.

Notes

External links

*soccerbase|id=34486|name=Stephen Kelly