Where Are They Now – Paul McGregor

Peverell Green explores Argyle’s more recent history in his ‘Where Are They Now’ series with a look at the career of maverick striker Paul McGregor.

PAUL McGREGOR – Born 17th December 1974 Liverpool, England.

Paul started his football career on 13th December 1991 with Notts Forest in their youth team, working his way through the ranks until he made the first team.
Although never a regular, only making seven first team starts he did make a further thirty appearances as a substitute.

During the 1995-96 season English teams hadn’t fared too well in Europe, with Blackburn, Everton, Liverpool, Leeds and Manchester United already eliminated, Forest remained the only English club left in the EUFA Cup, they had already beaten Malmo and Auxerre and faced Lyon for a place in the quarter final.
They weren’t playing that well and Paul was brought on by manager Frank Clark for the second half.
Forest were awarded a penalty and the normally reliable Stuart Pearce took it, the Lyon goalie saved the spot kick but couldn’t hold on to the ball and after a bit of a scramble Paul scored the rebound putting Forest through to the next round.

After scoring against Man. Utd the following Saturday it looked as if he had a bright future ahead of him. Unfortunately injuries began to take their toll on him with his football mainly being restricted to the reserve team.
In 1998 he went on loan to Carlisle where he made ten appearances and scored three goals, the following season he went on loan to Preston for a month and made three appearances.
Paul also had an interest in music and combined his football at Forest with being the lead singer in an Indie band called Merc.

In June 1999 Argyle manager Kevin Hodges signed Paul on a free transfer.
He made his debut on 7th August in a 2-1 defeat at Southend with Adam Barrett scoring the Argyle goal. Paul scored his first goal for the club in a 1-0 away win at Hull.
In November he scored a hat trick in a 4-1 home win over Barnet with Ian Stonebridge getting the other goal. He followed this up with another hat trick in March in a 4-0 away win at Devon rivals Torquay, so impressive was his performance that day the sponsors awarded him the ‘Man of the Match’ award, Argyle’s other goal came from Craig Taylor.

By the end of the season he had scored a total of 16 goals earning him both the leading goalscorer for the season and also the ‘Player of the Year’ award.
The following season goals were more difficult to come by and he only scored eight goals, six in the league and two in the cup. His last goal was scored on March 13th in a 1-1 draw at Home Park, coincidently just like his first goal, his last one also came against Hull.
He played his last game in a 1-0 home win over Exeter in April with David Friio scoring the Argyle winner.
Once again injuries played a part in Paul’s career and the now Argyle manager, Paul Sturrock, decided not to keep him on.
While at the club he made 90 appearances and scored 24 goals.

As soon as Northampton knew he was available they signed Paul on, although he was with them for two seasons which were disrupted by injury and he was only able to make 71 appearances, with 13 of them as substitute, he did score seven goals.
Paul made his last appearance as a substitute in a 2-0 defeat at Oldham.
Early in June 2003 he decided not to risk his long term health and decided to retire from professional football.
Wherever Paul played he always appeared not to give 100% effort all the time, he was either brilliant or mediocre, if he could only have remained injury free and committed he could have been an outstanding player.

After leaving Northampton Paul spent some time coaching Chilwell Vipers a Nottingham youth team.
In 2006 Paul, now nicknamed ‘Honey’ formed a band with his brother Ben (MCG) and a friend Paul Simmons (Simmons), I’m not sure why they had to have other names, but anyway they decided to call the group Ulterior with Paul its lead singer.

In 2007 the three members of the group became four when Karl Januskevicius, a synthesiser player who went by the name of Motorcycle Boy joined them.
They moved to London and made numerous live warehouse performances; they released a debut single ‘Weapons in tow’ and achieved a cult underground following.
At the 2008 Shockwaves NME awards they were asked to support The Horrors at the London Astoria.
They followed this up by releasing a 15′ EP and a limited edition 12′ record that they made available in three different colours.
Early in 2009 Ulterior toured Europe with The Sisters of Mercy.
On the eve of the tour Januskevicius, who had by now moved onto bass guitar, quit the band giving ill health and personal problems for leaving. He was replaced by Michael Ellis (Mikey).

By all accounts Ulterior was relatively successful, receiving favourable reviews in NME, Stool Pigeon, Vice Magazine and Artrocker.
Paul achieved a fair amount of success at both his chosen careers but I wonder just how successful he could have been if he had put all his energies into just one.