Sports SpeakersNeil ‘Razor’ Ruddock is one of football’s largest characters and a leading football after-dinner speaker.
Born in Wandsworth, London, Ruddock made his debut at Millwall in 1985 aged 16.
He transferred to Tottenham Hotspur in April 1986 for £50,000.00, making his debut in a 1-0 victory against Charlton.
After 9 league appearances and 1 goal for Spurs, he transferred back to Millwall in 1988 for £300,000.00.
1989, Razor moved to Southampton for 3 years, where he played 107 games and produced 9 goals.
Neil Ruddock moved back to Spurs in May 1992 when Terry Venables signed him for a fee of £750, 000. After one year, Graeme Souness signed the hard man to Liverpool in the summer of 1993 for £2.5 million.
He made his Liverpool debut against Sheffield Wednesday at Anfield and set up one of the goals in a 2-0 win for Nigel Clough, and followed that up in his third game by scoring his first goal against Swindon Town.
His best moment from the 1993-94 season was scoring an equaliser in the 3-3 draw with Manchester United at Anfield, with a thumping header past Peter Schmeichel.
In fact, he did not know he’d scored. After the game, it transpired Ruddock was suffering from concussion and only realised afterwards what that goal had meant.
Neil had his longest run at Liverpool, where he made 115 appearances and scored 11 goals between 1993 and 1998.
After short spells at QPR, Crystal Palace and West Ham, Neil finished his career as player/coach at Swindon.
During his career he won a single cap for England, playing in a friendly against Nigeria in 1994.
He also had four caps for the England Under-21 squad and one for the England B team.
Since his retirement from football, Neil ‘Razor’ Ruddock has gone on to take part in a number of prime-time television shows including I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, Celebrity Big Brother, A League of Their Own and many more.
More recently, Neil was a member of Harry’s Heroes on ITV. In this series, Harry Redknapp took on the challenge to get some unfit England football legends back in shape to take on old rivals Germany. Other legends on the show included Paul Merson, David Seaman, Ray Parlour, Lee Sharpe and Matt Le Tissier.
As an after-dinner speaker, Razor Ruddock is one of the most popular football speakers on the circuit.
