Simon Grant

Right Forward - Crewe Alexandra
5 Feb 2029
Monday
Process
Overview Personal Contract News 4 Transfers Relations Events 37 Awards 3 Matches History

Marked for Simon Grant

109 Edition

The Crewe Alexandra Chronicle

28 Aug 2028
From our football correspondent Crisis

The dugout28 Aug 2028

Matúš Holíček keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Crewe Alexandra may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market28 Aug 2028

Scott Malone hands in a written request

“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Crewe Alexandra can pretend not to have heard.

Transfer targets28 Aug 2028

Jimmy-Jay Morgan turns down Crewe Alexandra

The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Chelsea keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.

Match26 Aug 2028

The wait goes on for Crewe Alexandra

4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.

Squad28 Aug 2028

Tempers go at Crewe Alexandra

Jeffrey Schlupp was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.

Squad28 Aug 2028

The step up is real for Simon Grant

At 16 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.

Match26 Aug 2028

3 matches without a goal for Crewe Alexandra

The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.

Transfer targets28 Aug 2028

Door shut on Mattia Maita

Crewe Alexandra asked and Benevento said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Match26 Aug 2028

Crewe Alexandra leaking at the back

4 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.

In brief

Back issues
98 Edition

The Crewe Alexandra Chronicle

12 Jun 2028
From our football correspondent Crisis

Match10 Jun 2028

Crewe Alexandra taken apart

3‑6 to Salford City, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.

Squad12 Jun 2028

The knee: Charles Carter out for 31 days

31 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Crewe Alexandra lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Transfer targets12 Jun 2028

Crewe Alexandra agree $3.5M for Darko Gyabi

The clubs have shaken hands with Hull City; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.

Player ratings12 Jun 2028

Simon Grant, 16, plays like he has been here for years — 9.49

A mark of 9.49 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 16-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.

Squad12 Jun 2028

A day Simon Grant will not forget

3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.

Squad12 Jun 2028

A one-man rearguard from Tom Booth

There were 7 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.

Market12 Jun 2028

Karlos Gregory asks to leave Crewe Alexandra

“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.

Squad12 Jun 2028

Jeffrey Schlupp in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Crewe Alexandra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Match10 Jun 2028

9 goals as Crewe Alexandra and Salford City go for it

Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 9 goals between Crewe Alexandra and Salford City, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.

In brief

55 Edition

The Crewe Alexandra Chronicle

16 Aug 2027
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market16 Aug 2027

Reece Welch is a Crewe Alexandra player

The fee is $1.7M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Bradford City drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

The dugout16 Aug 2027

Dion Rankine: that is not what I was promised

“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Crewe Alexandra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Transfer targets16 Aug 2027

Adam Žulevič will not be coming to Crewe Alexandra

Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Palermo is saying, and nobody at Crewe Alexandra is enjoying the guessing.

Squad16 Aug 2027

Real improvement from Reece Welch at Crewe Alexandra

Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Reece Welch is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.

Squad16 Aug 2027

Words exchanged at Crewe Alexandra

Jeffrey Schlupp and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.

Transfer targets16 Aug 2027

Too dear: Crewe Alexandra walk away from Liam Palmer

$34.0K was the most the club would pay and Sheffield Wednesday were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.

The terraces16 Aug 2027

$1.7M for Reece Welch, and Crewe Alexandra supporters approve

Boards get told what they have done wrong for years and hear nothing on the days they get it right. This is one of those days: Reece Welch from Bradford City for $1.7M, and a ticket office having a very good morning.

Squad16 Aug 2027

A row about effort at Crewe Alexandra

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oriol Romeu was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Transfer targets16 Aug 2027

Crewe Alexandra rebuffed over Leon Klanac

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bayern Munich have kept their man, and Crewe Alexandra go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

In brief

47 Edition

The Crewe Alexandra Chronicle

21 Jun 2027
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad21 Jun 2027

Defences have started doubling up on Charlie McNeill

39 goals and a season average of 7.54 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Squad21 Jun 2027

Tom Booth keeps Crewe Alexandra in it on his own

Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 12 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.

Player ratings21 Jun 2027

Simon Grant scores twice — 9.04

Two goals and a mark of 9.04 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Market21 Jun 2027

Crewe Alexandra get their man

The chase for Ollie Tanner ended with $3.0M changing hands and Cardiff City out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Transfer targets21 Jun 2027

Huddersfield Town tell Crewe Alexandra: Marcus McGuane is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Squad21 Jun 2027

The step up is real for Charlie McNeill

At 23 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.

Match19 Jun 2027

Crewe Alexandra make it 3 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Crewe Alexandra have 3 straight wins of it.

Match19 Jun 2027

Simon Grant among the goals in a wild afternoon

6 goals in one match, Simon Grant on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Crewe Alexandra and Accrington Stanley.

Match19 Jun 2027

Simon Grant the difference as Crewe Alexandra beat Accrington Stanley

Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Simon Grant. 4‑2 against Accrington Stanley, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.

In brief