Heiðar Helguson

Heiðar Helguson - Quick Facts

Profile Overview of Heiðar Helguson

Heiðar Helguson (born 22 August 1977) is an Icelandic former professional footballer who played as a striker.

This profile of Heiðar Helguson covers Early Career and Breakthrough, Lillestrøm, Watford, Fulham and Bolton Wanderers.

Heiðar started his career in the Icelandic league system, with UMFS Dalvík and Þróttur. Following a one-season spell in Norway with Lillestrøm, Heiðar moved to England to play for Watford in 1999, with Lillestrøm receiving a transfer fee of £1.5 million. The English media anglicised his name to Heidar when he joined Watford – it is by this given name that he is commonly known in England.

Although Watford were relegated from the Premier League during his first season at the club, Heiðar was a prolific goalscorer, finishing as the team's top scorer in the 1999–2000, 2002–03 and 2004–05 seasons, before being sold to Fulham in 2005. He played Premier League for them between 2005 and 2007, and Bolton until 2009, before transferring to Championship side QPR in 2009. After a return to Watford on loan in the 2009–10 season, Heiðar played regularly for QPR in 2010–11, as they secured promotion to the Premier League as champions. In QPR's first Premier League season since 1995–96, Heiðar finished as the team's top scorer, helping them to secure Premier League survival on the last day of the 2011–12 season. He later joined Cardiff City.

Heiðar played and scored for his country at under-19 and under-21 levels, before making his debut for the senior team in 1999. He earned 55 caps for the Iceland national team, scoring 13 goals, before retiring from international football in 2011.

Early Career and Breakthrough of Heiðar Helguson

Heiðar was born in Akureyri, in northern Iceland. He joined his first club, UMFS Dalvík, at the age of eight in 1985. He spent a further eight years in the club's development squads, progressing through the different youth team age brackets (Under-10s, Under-12s, Under-15s, etc.) and debuting for the club's reserves whilst he was still only 13. He was handed his first team debut in 1993 when he was 15 years old. He scored five goals in 11 league appearances before his performances earned him a transfer to Þróttur in 1994, aged 16.

In three seasons, Heiðar scored 31 goals in 54 league appearances for Þróttur, his performances generating interest from several European clubs.

Lillestrøm of Heiðar Helguson

Heiðar arrived at Lillestrøm in the autumn of 1998. He made his first team debut in October, curiously wearing number 1 on his shirt. The next season Heiðar became one of the great surprises in Norwegian football when he scored sixteen league goals. In his debut season for Lillestrøm, he had managed only two goals. Heiðar was a popular player, and even had his own fan-club named "The Helgusonsons".

Watford

Heiðar was signed by Watford manager Graham Taylor midway through the 1999–2000 season for a club record £1.5m. Brought in to boost the struggling club's striking department, Heiðar had a good debut at home to Liverpool, where he played well. Heiðar scored in his first game. He later picked up the display of the season award for this goal-scoring debut. He scored five more times that season. His goals were not enough to keep Watford up, and the Hertfordshire club were relegated after only one year in the Premier League.

Back in the First Division, Heiðar was part of a Watford team that was undefeated for the first 15 games of the season, topping the league. But when the team's form slumped in late 2000, Heiðar suffered a crisis of confidence – one of several during his first few years at Watford – and was well below his best for a large amount of that campaign. At the end of the season, Taylor retired and was replaced by Gianluca Vialli, who used Heiðar as a wing back.

With Ray Lewington in charge for the 2002–03 season, Heiðar showed a marked improvement. Although still prone to injury (he did not start the season until late September), he finished the season Watford's top goal scorer with 13, including goals in Watford's run to the FA Cup semi-Finals. In 2003–04, injury kept Heiðar out of most of the first half of the season. On his return, he put in some notable performances, the most notable being his leading of the line against Chelsea in the FA Cup.

2004–05 was Heiðar's best season in a Watford shirt. Relatively free of injury, he scored 20 goals and picked up the Goal of the Season, Display of the Season and Player of the Season awards at the end of season awards ceremony. Inevitably, his goal tally brought about interest from Premier League clubs and, with Watford needing money, the offer from Fulham was accepted.

Fulham

Heiðar signed for Fulham on 27 June 2005 and was largely confined to the bench at the beginning of the campaign. He scored his first goal for Fulham in the 5–4 League Cup victory over Lincoln. The front pair of Heiðar and Brian McBride caused trouble to the best defences in the Premier League. Heiðar scored against Chelsea (penalty), Aston Villa (penalty), West Ham (open play – left foot) and Manchester United (open play – header), a double in a 6–1 win over West Brom, Bolton Wanderers (header as a result of a free kick) and against Middlesbrough (penalty). For the start of the 2006–07 season, he was moved from No. 10 to No. 9 at Fulham.

Bolton Wanderers

On 20 July 2007, it was announced that Heiðar was leaving Fulham to join Bolton Wanderers for an undisclosed fee, as part of manager Sammy Lee's squad restructuring. Heiðar reportedly signed a three-year contract with the Trotters, having been forced to consider his options following the signings of David Healy and Diomansy Kamara.

He made his Bolton debut as a substitute for the injured Kevin Davies on 11 August 2007 with Wanderers already trailing to Newcastle United. Four days later, he returned to Fulham for the first time since leaving and got on the scoresheet in a 2–1 Bolton defeat.

It was the end of January 2008 by the time Heiðar got any more playing time; his return was welcome, with Bolton desperately short of firepower, having sold Nicolas Anelka to Chelsea earlier on that month. His first appearance back in the team was a goalless draw against old club Fulham, where he came off the substitutes bench for the last eight minutes of the game. He scored his first goal for Bolton since coming back from injury four days later against Reading in a 2–0 win.

Bolton confirmed in May 2008 that they had sent Heiðar over to Belgium for more surgery to have him back for pre-season training.

Queens Park Rangers

On 20 November, it was announced that Heiðar had joined Queens Park Rangers on an emergency loan until the end of January 2009. But the loan did not go through until the following Friday.

Source: adapted from Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hei%C3%B0ar_Helguson), text available under CC BY-SA 4.0.