Former Bohemians striker Paddy Madden insists that his first priority is to be playing regular first team football again after dropping two divisions to join Scunthorpe United from Yeovil Town. He joins on a two-and-a-half year contract after the paperwork was completed yesterday on a move valued at roughly €350,000.
The 23-year-old striker made his senior international debut last August after a fairytale second half to last season during which he scored 22 goals for Yeovil who he helped into the Championship for the very first time.
This year, though, he fell out badly with manager Gary Johnson after failing to hit the ground running at the higher level and the Dubliner says he is glad to be given the chance to start rebuilding at a club that, he believes, can make huge strides over the next few seasons.
“I don’t think I got a fair crack of the whip at Yeovil this season for whatever reason and I think I deserved more respect after the part I played in getting them up,” he said yesterday.
“The gaffer (who described him last year as ‘the bargain of the year’) said last week that I wasn’t able for the Championship but he never gave me a proper chance to prove myself in the division. I just want to forget about that now, though, and concentrate on the opportunity I’ve got at Scunthorpe.”
Madden believes the move will pay dividends. “I could have gone back to League One,” he insists, “but I spoke to the Chairman (Peter Swann) and manager (Russ Wilcox) here and was impressed what they were saying.
“They’re ambitious people with big plans for the club; there’ll be a brand new stadium ready for the start of the 2015-16 season and it was something that I wanted to be part of. It’s not long since they were in Championship and there’s a real belief that they can get back there over the next couple of years.”
Scunthorpe are currently top of League Two by two points and in a strong position to push on and win promotion but Madden accepts that he may have to be patient. “I’ll have to get my head down, work hard and show what I can do. That’s not a problem.”
