Football Motivational Speakers

May marked the end of the football season and depending on who you support a time to celebrate success or maybe face up to relegation. Or as a West Ham fan like me a season of mediocrity.

Whilst the football fixtures will be out relatively soon, if you cannot wait, we work with a number of inspirational football related speakers who share their own lessons and experience from the sport.

Matthew Upson

Matthew Upson is a former Premier League and England International Footballer and a motivational speaker on self-determination, leadership, and teamwork. Matthew is a former England footballer who represented his country at the 2010 World Cup and who played for Arsenal, West Ham, Birmingham, Brighton and Stoke.

He started his career with Luton Town before he joined Premier League club Arsenal for a fee of £2 million in May 1997. He struggled to force his way into the first team at Highbury making 57 appearances in 6 seasons and so spent time on loan at Nottingham Forest, Crystal Palace, and Reading.

Matthew Upson joined Birmingham City in 2003 however following Birmingham’s relegation in 2006 he went on to join West Ham United for £7.5 million in January 2007. He was made captain in 2009 but at the end of the 2010/11 season West Ham were relegated to the Championship so Matt signed a two-year contract with Stoke City in August 2011. He went to on have a spell with Brighton & Hove Albion, Leicester City, and MK Dons before retiring to focus on his coaching and media career.

Kevin Keegan OBE

Kevin Keegan OBE is an inspirational speaker and former England, Liverpool Footballer and Former Manager of England. A career that included time at Liverpool, Hamburg, Southampton and Newcastle as well as the national side, Kevin captaining England for six years until his international retirement after the 1982 World Cup. As a manager, Kevin Keegan was in charge at Newcastle, Fulham, Manchester City, and England

Kevin Keegan is one of the few football speakers that can deliver a truly inspirational and entertaining speech. His speech covers such subjects as-

• Teamwork
• Leadership
• Business Lessons Learnt from Sport
• Overcoming Challenges
• People Management

Clarke Carlisle 

Clarke Carlisle is a former professional football and television presenter who is a keynote speaker on mental health, having suffered from complex depressive disorder throughout his career. Clarke Carlisle played football for QPR, Burnley, Blackpool, and Watford to name a few and won promotions with two clubs and player at Wembley Stadium. After over 500 appearances he retired at the end of the 2013 season

Clarke presented two acclaimed documentaries for the BBC Football’s Suicide Secret and “Is Football Racist?” for the BBC and wrote a book about his career A Footballer’s Life.

What Clarke did not realise was that for the last 13 years of his playing career he had been suffering from Complex Depressive Disorder. It was only after two suicide attempts that he was admitted to psychiatric hospital, where he finally received an accurate diagnosis.

Since then he has set up the Clarke Carlisle Foundation for Dual Diagnosis. Dual Diagnosis is the condition of suffering from a mental illness and a substance abuse problem at the same time, and Clarke and his team are working towards opening a facility to provide treatment for all those who suffer from Dual Diagnosis.

Michael Duberry

Michael Duberry is a former professional footballer and keynote speaker on dealing with change, elite performance, and raising your game.There are very few that get the opportunity to play in the English Premier League. In fact, it is just 0.01% that make it to the upper echelon of English football. The average length of a professional footballer’s career is 8 years. Michaels exceeded that by 12 years!

Michael Duberry made a staggering 500 appearances for clubs and is honoured to include Chelsea, Leeds United, Stoke City, and Reading in that list. Cristiano Ronaldo, Gianfranco Zola, Ruud Gullit, and Thierry Henry are just some of the world-renowned footballers Michael frequently shared the pitch with. Among his many professional accolades, Michael is proud to include: English League Cup winner, European Cup winner, and the European Super Cup.

Ben Lyttleton 

Ben Lyttleton is a keynote speaker on the leadership lessons learnt from football, covering pressure, talent management, leadership and teamwork. Author and football club owner Ben Lyttleton understands what we can learn about the most important aspects of work and life from the world’s most popular sport.

In his book Edge: Leadership Secrets of Football’s Top Thinkers, he interviewed some of football’s top coaches, including Thomas Tuchel and Graham Potter, to learn how they foster talent and build empathy within a team, help talents fulfil their potential, and find power in developing a social purpose.

Fabrice Muamba 

Fabrice Muamba is an inspirational speaker and a former footballer who was forced to retire from the game when he suffered a cardiac arrest on the pitch playing against Tottenham Hotspur in the FA Cup.

In one for the most distressing scenes in the history of football, Fabrice collapsed on the pitch mid-match against Tottenham, and despite his heart stopping for 78 minutes, thanks to the quick response of the medical team and due to his level of fitness, he went on to make a remarkable recovery, finally being discharged from hospital just over a month later.

Fabrice is available for motivational and inspirational speaking opportunities. He talks on-

• Overcoming adversity,
• Health and wellbeing
• Education.

If we can help with any enquiries please contact us on 020 8854 7247 or email enquiries@scampspeakers.co.uk