Better known for his illustrious stint of bouncing between English football clubs than for his performances on the pitch, meet Declan John. A player, whose birth certificate claims he was born in Wales, on 30 June 1995, who now earns a crust as a left back for St Mirren, proudly wearing the number 24 jersey whilst pretending to defend all that's left of his side's goal. John measures in at a respectable 1.78m (5ft 10in) and tips the scales at a pie shy of 75kg (11st 11lb).
Intriguingly, as per Transfermarkt, our Mr John has a market value floating about the £210k mark. He's doing well, having tied down a contract with St Mirren until 31st May 2027. Quite the journeyman, wouldn't you say?
John's quantified journey began in July 2011 as a lowly trainee at Cardiff City. He then appeared a handful of times over four seasons, submitting the fans to a grand total of 42 league appearances. Someone, though, saw something in him and off he popped to Barnsley on loan in March 2015, gracing their pitch 9 times in the 2014-15 season, before returning to Cardiff.
As if shifting 3 hours north wasn't enough, he then sampled the football delights of Chesterfield in 2016 - a solid six appearances there before doing a round trip back to Cardiff. Given the chance to improve his dialect, he then transferred from Cardiff to Rangers on a loan, making 26 appearances and scoring three times.
Poor Declan was then cunningly snapped up by Swansea City in 2018 for a fee of around £800k. His trophy case remained largely empty, though, with only 11 league appearances to add to it over two seasons. A half-season holiday was spent at Sunderland on loan, before he returned to Swansea. It was then on to Bolton Wanderers for both a loan period and a permanent stay, where 13 league appearances over two seasons seemed to be the flavour of the day.
A brief loan to Salford City in 2023 let him add another pin to his UK football map, before he joined his current club at St Mirren in November 2024.
One hopes that a relocation to Scotland has done the lad some good, given he made 18 appearances and even managed to score twice for St Mirren in the 2024-25 season. Will he be there come 2025-26? Only his agent and his travel planner know for sure.
As a parting note, John had the good form to participate in the League Cup 2025-26 for St Mirren with three starts, one substitute appearance and, perhaps more surprisingly, the Scottish Cup 2024-25 where he managed a start and a substitute appearance. So it appears he's still mobile, if nothing else.
