Charlton Athletic secured £150k bargain but Aston Villa situation was surprising | OneFootball

Mark Kinsella couldn't quite kick on after leaving the Addicks

Charlton Athletic and their supporters have endured quite the journey of ups and downs within the past 30 years, with the peak of such times undoubtedly being an unbroken seven-year stint in the Premier League.

These days, you would be extremely hard-pressed to find many outside of the Valley who would imagine a return to the top-flight of English football is likely in the near future.

That said, there have been some great strides of progress in recent times in SE7, mainly under the management of Nathan Jones, who has been able to take the Reds from mid-table obscurity in League One to the Championship, where they will subsequently hope to push themselves up the standings, especially with some added, and smart recruitment.

It has been 20 years since the beginning of the club's last season in the Premier League, and 28 since they earned their place in the top-flight for the first time since 1990 in the historic play-off success over Sunderland at the old Wembley Stadium, in a final best known for Clive Mendonca's goalscoring heroics against his boyhood club.

However, in the years building up to their success in North London, Alan Curbishley, who is now a legendary figure for his exploits, was able to meticulously put together a hard-working and exciting side capable of yielding such rewards.

One man at the heartbeat of his side was Mark Kinsella, although after leaving the capital club, the Irishman didn't exactly continue his positive trajectory.

Alan Curbishley struck Charlton Athletic transfer gold with £150,000 Mark Kinsella deal

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The Dubliner had previously spent several years on the books of Colchester United, having moved to Layer Road as a 17-year-old making his way into the game, albeit some of his period with the Essex club was also spent in the non-league game.

After earning cult status with the U's, Kinsella was firmly on the radar of several clubs higher up the pyramid, with the most notable being Charlton, although, as the former midfielder would admit, his move to The Valley in 1996 for a reported £150,000 was far from straightforward.

After impressing in a pre-season period with the Addicks, Colchester's financial demands saw the deal placed on hold, with Gillingham also expressing an interest in his services.

"I got a phonecall from Curbs and he said, 'Listen, a deal can't be done. Colchester want all the money [up front]'. It was £150,000. 'Colchester wanted it all and now we can't do it," Kinsella told Off The Ball.

"What happened then was that they had sold Lee Bowyer to Leeds for £2.75 million so then Colchester thought, 'well, you can give us £150,000' and Charlton said they hadn't got it because they were paying debts etc and can only do £25,000 every four months or so. The deal was off and I had to go back to [Colchester], having not trained with the lads for three weeks."

"The gaffer got a phonecall and said, 'Gillingham want to speak to you' and I said 'OK'. So I drove down to Gillingham with my agent and Charlton's president and Gillingham's vice-chairman was at some meeting in London," he added.

"So Tony (Pulis) showed me around and I had a chat with him. My agent just said to Tony, 'Can we make one phonecall? Just one phonecall and then we'll sign the paper.'

"My agent rang the president up at Charlton and said, 'Listen, he's going to sign for Gillingham in the next 20 minutes' and [the president] said, 'Forget about it, just drive down the M2 and we'll sign you'."

It proved to be a bargain transfer for Charlton, though, as Kinsella went on to make over 200 appearances for the club, offering plenty of goals from midfield in place of Bowyer, which included 12 goals in his first two seasons.

As well as captaining the side to promotion glory in 1998 and 2000, the 48-time Ireland international was a mainstay in the club's early Premier League years, but a 17-game injury-hit campaign in 2001/02 was the start of an unfortunate downward curve.

Aston Villa failed to make £1m Charlton Athletic deal for Mark Kinsella worth it

Despite those troubles, Kinsella, who featured in Ireland's 2002 World Cup squad under Mick McCarthy, would move to Aston Villa for £1m in August 2002, although the B6 club failed to reunite him with Addicks ace, Matt Holland.

After making his debut under Graham Taylor against Tottenham Hotspur, the then-30-year-old made the fair share of his 19 appearances that particular season in the first half of the campaign, but rarely featured again under Taylor or his compatriot, David O'Leary, who was appointed in May 2003.

Regardless of such limited action, Kinsella stayed in the West Midlands and joined West Bromwich Albion, helping the Baggies return to the Premier League in just 18 appearances, before rounding off his 522-game career at Walsall for a three-season period.

Ironically, much like his playing career, Kinsella's most notable spells afterward came at The Valley, although on two counts he was dismissed alongside both Alan Pardew and Phil Parkinson, before attempting to further make his own way into the managerial game, which also saw him return to Colchester for a brief period as assistant.

However, it is fair to say that his most successful playing days came in South London, and that Charlton were the major beneficiaries of two transfer deals.