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Marcus Maddison's career went on to take a turn for the worse

Birmingham City and Sunderland are two clubs who certainly had their fair share of struggles in the 2010s, but are now looking upwards.

Under Knighthead Capital Management's ownership, Blues have exciting plans to move into a new 62,000-seater stadium by 2031, having returned to the Championship as recently as 2025 under Chris Davies after a solitary, yet record-breaking campaign in League One.

When they reach the Premier League, which is where the Black Cats currently find themselves, remains to be seen, but it was previously well-documented that the Wearside outfit spent four years in the third tier between 2018 and 2022 after a catastrophic double-relegation.

Due to their current trajectories, player turnover at St. Andrew's @ Knighthead Park and the Stadium of Light has been high in recent times, although supporters of the two clubs will agree that, a matter of years ago, they certainly dodged a major transfer bullet.

Marcus Maddison gained plenty of attention for stellar Peterborough United exploits

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In recent times, some of the EFL's most high-profile stars have been associated with Peterborough United - most notably England international striker, Ivan Toney.

Featuring for Posh in a similar era, of course, was erratic playmaker, Marcus Maddison, who joined from Gateshead in 2014 after an impressive year on Tyneside.

A run of eight goals and four assists in his first 29 League One appearances was just a glimmer of what the Durham native went on to produce at the Weston Homes Stadium.

The most impressive of his seasons at the club was undoubtedly the 2017/18 campaign, during which he posted 12 goals and 22 assists in 53 appearances, somehow not winning the division's Player of the Year award.

Birmingham City showcased serious interest in Marcus Maddison transfer

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Racking up 154 goal contributions - of which his 92 assists were 18 greater than any other player in the country's top four leagues between 2014 and 2019 - further backed up that Maddison was at the peak of his powers in the third tier, and a Championship move seemed inevitable.

Even though Blues' stagnation in the division was well-documented, that didn't stop Pep Clotet from courting the attacking midfielder's signature with such conviction as his contract in Cambridgeshire wound down.

Although Birmingham have close ties with Posh's director of football, Barry Fry, it was later revealed by Darragh McAnthony how the West Midlands side failed on two counts to secure a deal.

"Birmingham had been on to Barry. Birmingham offered Barry close to the £1.5m, it was £1m plus another £500,000 in add-ons and all the bits and pieces," he said.

"But the problem with that deal is that they didn’t want to start paying until the summer. We went back to Birmingham and said ‘that doesn’t work for us, we need something now.’ We had our own business to do and with Financial Fair Play we needed that cap room.

"Then, Birmingham came back with a second offer (on January 18) and we felt at that stage he’d definitely go there because Marcus told me himself he’d definitely go to Birmingham. But then it came down to money and he didn’t want to go there. His agents dragged it out, he dragged it out and it wasn’t happening."

Sunderland also dodged Marcus Maddison bullet ahead of downward spiral

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It emerged that a £2.5m price-tag was placed on Maddison's services in 2019, with Sunderland also one of several clubs entering the mix for a deal despite their League One status at the time, with them and Peterborough both going for promotion.

The aforementioned MacAnthony later claimed that the Black Cats never expressed concrete interest in poaching the midfielder, and whilst speculation continued to rear its head, Maddison also quashed such links by responding to a fan in a Q&A, stating that his only links with Sunderland came years before.

Despite scoring nine times in 22 final league games for Peterborough, the second half of the 2019/20 campaign was where Maddison's downward spiral began, as he failed to make any kind of impact at Hull City under former boss, Grant McCann, as the Tigers plummeted into League One, whilst the club also opted against a permanent deal.

His 20 final professional appearances then came for Charlton Athletic and Bolton Wanderers in 2020/21, before he was in the headlines yet again two years later for all the wrong reasons.

Marcus Maddison was later jailed for shock attack

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After later turning out for Spalding United and Darlington on the non-league circuit, news broke in August 2023 that Maddison was to be imprisoned for a total of 20 months.

In September 2022, the now 32-year-old was accused of causing grievous bodily harm to a 60-year-old woman on a night in Darlington town centre, which he later admitted to at Teesside Crown Court.

After being released from prison, Maddison took to Instagram to issue a lengthy statement including his version of the events, in which he said "(I) have paid for it heavily with the loss of my job, home & freedom."