Old Boy Memories: On This Day 2016 – Remember? Mowbray’s Sky Blues Sign Darius!

Darius Alexis Henderson to give him his full birth title came to the Sky Blues in 2016 with a fairly exotic name and a plethora of experiences around the English leagues. A bit of a journeyman footballer the tall target man started as a youngster with Doncaster Rovers before Reading picked him up professionally in 1999. After a short loan spell with Brighton Darius moved on to Gillingham in 2004 where injury hampered progress and he had some loan games with Swindon Town. He then spent three seasons at Watford where, in over a century of games, he experienced success as part of their Championship winning squad who got to play in the Premier League in 2006-07.  After signing for £2m for Sheffield United in 2008 further moves followed, with various degrees of productiveness, notably Millwall (2011), Nottingham Forest (2013), Leyton Orient (2014) and Scunthorpe United (2015).

The veteran 34 year old came to the Ricoh in February 2016, signed by Sky Blues ‘gaffer’ Tony Mowbray, with hopes that his muscular style of play would get us some goals in the second half of the season in what ‘Mogga’ referred to as City’s ‘Plan B’. He made his debut in a Sunday game, two days after signing, in  a 1-1 draw at Port Vale. In the event, the six footer made only five CCFC first team appearances, all in league games, and all off the bench and did not manage to net once for CCFC!

In August 2016 he moved on to Mansfield Town where he spent the first half of the season before moving to Eastleigh Town to finish off the 2016-17 season. At the last count Darius had played more than 500 professional games and scored more than 130 goals, sadly none for the Sky Blues!