Kevin Campbell (footballer)

Kevin Joseph Campbell (born 4 February 1970) is an English former professional footballer who played as a striker from 1988 until 2007, most notably in the Premier League for Arsenal, Nottingham Forest, Everton and West Bromwich Albion.

He has also played in the Turkish top flight for Trabzonspor and in the Football League for Leyton Orient, Leicester City and Cardiff City.

Club career

Arsenal

Campbell began his career as a trainee with Arsenal, joining the club on schoolboy forms in 1985. He had a prolific run in the club's youth team (with whom he won the FA Youth Cup and scored 59 goals in a season), but despite making his first-team debut against Everton on 7 May 1988, the forward positions were usually taken by Paul Merson and Alan Smith.

Campbell came to prominence during a loan spell at Leyton Orient in 1989, when he scored 9 goals in 16 games; Orient manager Frank Clark wanted to make the move permanent but Arsenal refused to sell. After a poor start to the 1989-90 season he was again loaned out, this time to Leicester City. However, the following season (1990-91) he established himself in the Arsenal team, scoring eight times in ten matches during the run-in to the club's First Division title win.