WHY THE WORD “CURRENT” IS IMPORTANT WHERE “TJ” IS CONCERNED

By Kevin Redsull
As a journalist I know full well how these things can happen but, as a matter of record, the stories in this week’s “East Kent Mercury” and “Dover Express” about Thomas “TJ” Bramble both contain one significant error.
In our press release Bramble, the Gillingham FC Youth player now on loan at the Charles Ground, was correctly described as the “second-ever CURRENT full international to have played for Deal”, following in the footsteps of Eddie Melekian who made three appearances for the Hoops in the 1964-65 season while he was a member of the Iraq international squad.
But in the story which appears in both newspapers the word “current” has been edited out, thus stating that Bramble, who has already made one appearance for Antigua and Barbuda, is the second-ever full international to have played for Deal, which is incorrect. At least four other full internationals have played for Deal during the club’s history, but in each case their international careers had either not started or had finished when they were playing for the Hoops, so they weren’t “current” internationals. The most famous of the group is Steve Lovell, who won six caps for Wales between 1981-86 and who 14 years later was a member of the Deal side who won the FA Vase in 2000.
Former Southampton and Manchester United winger Danny Wallace, who won one England cap in 1986, made several appearances for the Hoops as a youngster while two former Republic of Ireland internationals, Freddie Kearns and Bill Gorman, both played for Deal after their Ireland careers had ended. Once again the club are grateful to Hoops’ historian Eric Diver for supplying much of this information.