As the Bees start their Conference home campaign for 2014/15 at the Hive against Bristol Rovers on Tuesday, it seemed a good time to look back on the career of a player who played for both clubs.
In 2009, Giuliano Grazioli decide to retire from playing as a result of an eye injury. He had been one of the most successful players to have worn the black and amber in recent years. Grazioli had scored 5 goals in 11 matches for Dover Athletic that season after joining them from Braintree. Barnet Mad takes a look back at his career.
On Saturday, 3rd May 2008, Barnet played away at Rotherham United in the last league game of the season and in the 79th minute, Giuliano Grazioli came on as a substitute for his last appearance in a Barnet shirt. It was his tenth appearance as a substitute this season. He made just three starts; at home to Macclesfield and away to Grimsby Town in the league and at home to Burton Albion in the FA Cup. He didn't score this season and the closest he came was in the home game on Boxing Day against Dagenham & Redbridge, when he came on as a late substitute and hit the post. All this doesn't sound very wonderful, but Graz was a true Barnet legend.
Graz was a local lad, born in Finchley in 1975, educated at Finchley Catholic High School and he began his career with non-league Wembley before moving to Peterborough United in October 1995, making his league debut at Swindon on his 21st birthday. Shortly after that he went on loan to Yeovil Town where he became an instant him, scoring 16 goals in just 13 games while at Huish Park. Yeovil fans loved him as his explosive scoring rate made hive a quick favourite with the fans. However, he returned to London Road, but in October 1996 he had a one month loan spell at Woking. As at Yeovil, Graz had a fine spell at Woking and was very popular with the Cards' fans, who would have liked him to stay at Kingfield. A broken ankle in a reserve match kept Graz out of football for 14 months.
He returned again to Peterborough, but was unable to gain a regular first team place and he was loaned out again a year later, in early 1988, this time for nearly 6 months to Stevenage Borough, then managed by Paul Fairclough. He scored 10 goals for Borough, including his famous goal in the 3rd round of the FA Cup at Broadhall Way, when Stevenage held Newcastle United to a 1-1 draw, cancelling out Alan Shearer's goal for the visitors. However, an injury, unluckily, kept him out of the replay at St. James' Park.
At Peterborough, Graz still struggled to break through into the first team, though in his early days at London Road, he didn't do that badly on the few occasions that he did make the first team. In his first two seasons, he scored 2 goals in 2 starts, with 8 further appearances as a substitute. By September 1998, Peterborough, and former Barnet, manager, Barry Fry was ready to sell Graz to Barnet, a move he was keen on, being a local lad and he would still be remaining in the 3rd division. What followed, however, is the stuff of legend. As fate would have it, the weekend before his scheduled move to Underhill, Barnet entertained Peterborough and Graz was actually in the Posh line up. The 90 minutes of the game that Saturday delayed Graz' move to Barnet for nearly 5 years!!!The Bees went down to their heaviest ever league defeat, losing 9-1, with Grazioli scoring 5 and Barnet finishing with 9 players after John Ford and Warren Goodhind were sent off. Even Barnet's goal was an own goal, scored by ex-bee, Mick Bodley. Needless to say, Grazioli's transfer was scrapped.
In the Peterborough side that day was Jimmy Quinn, who, as manager of Swindon Town, was to take him to the County Ground in the summer of 1999 after he had been released by Peterborough, despite finishing the previous season as their top scorer. In all, he made 25 first team starts for Peterborough, with a further 19 as substitute, scoring 17 goals, a good return at this level.
He spent three years at Swindon, but his time there was troubled by injuries, breaking his foot in his first season there but scoring 5 goals in the last six games of the season. He was a crowd favourite at Swindon, but further injuries and a not a quite big enough return in the shape of goals lead to him being released in 2002. This was despite finishing the 2001-02 season as the Robins' top scorer. He made 49 starts for Swindon and a further 38 appearances as substitute and scored a creditable 18 goals.
In the summer of 2002, he signed for Bristol Rovers and became a gashead!! He started the season in terrific form, scoring 8 goals in the first 13 games for Rovers, but again a series of niggling injuries disrupted his time at the Memorial Ground and he was dropped after Christmas. Graz's desire for the game fell to an all time low at Bristol Rovers after losing his place in the side and, again despite finishing leading scorer, he was allowed to go being used as the makeweight in the signing of Barnet's leading scorer, Junior Agogo, with The Bees collecting a cool £110,000 as well as the player who was to prove one of the club's most astute signings in recent years. He scored 12 goals in that one season at Bristol Rovers, making 32 starts and another 6 as substitute. Graz jumped at the chance of joining his home time club with all his family and friends living in Finchley.
In the next part of this article, we shall look at Grazioli's first season at Barnet. See ya then!!