Craig Bellamy
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Craig Bellamy (born July 13, 1979 in Cardiff) is a Welsh international football player.
He currently plays for Celtic F.C. in the Scottish Premierleague, on loan from Newcastle United, whom he joined in the summer of 2001 for £6,000,000. His previous clubs had been Norwich City (1997-2000) and Coventry City (2000-2001).
His Welsh international record (as of April 2004) is 23 caps and 6 goals. He scored on his Newcastle debut, in their 4-0 defeat of Belgian side Lokeren. Probably his most important moment for Newcastle United was scoring 2 goals (including the winner) in the 3-2 win over Feyenoord which took them through to the second group stage. Unfortunately in the next match (a 4-1 defeat to Inter Milan) he was sent off for kicking out at an Inter defender, which resulted in a 3-match ban. His aggression seems to be one of his bad points, in March 2003 he was alleged to have racially attacked someone at a nightclub in Cardiff.
More recently, he had a very public falling-out with Newcastle manager Graeme Souness. On 23 January 2005, Bellamy was omitted from the team for a Premiership match with Arsenal. Before the match, Souness said that Bellamy had a hamstring problem, but contradicted himself in a post-match interview, claiming that Bellamy was benched for being unprepared to play as a right-side midfielder. Minutes later, Bellamy gave an interview of his own saying that he was prepared to play in any position. He admitted that he had threatened to fake injury ahead of the Arsenal match, and in a later interview accused Souness of lying about him. Two days after the match, the club fined Bellamy two weeks' wages (about £80,000), and he was loaned to Celtic F.C. for the remainder of the season after he rejected a move to Birmingham City.
| Preceded by: Steven Gerrard | PFA Young Player of the Year 2002 | Succeeded by: Jermaine Jenas |