Wayne Neville Anthony Routledge (born 7 January 1985) is an English professional footballer who last played as a winger for EFL Championship club Swansea City. He has represented England at under-16, under-19 and under-21 level.
Routledge was born in Sidcup, London and attended Archbishop Lanfranc School in Croydon.
Routledge began his career at Crystal Palace, making his starting debut against Wolverhampton Wanderers at the age of 17 in September 2002, and scoring after just one minute on the field. He made his Palace debut in October 2001 in a 1–0 home defeat by West Bromwich Albion, aged only 16. He was England's second ever player to score at the new Wembley Stadium.
He was an important member of the team which won promotion to the Premiership via the play-offs in 2003–04, and he was ever present as Palace battled for their Premiership place in 2004–05 and, although they just failed to avoid the drop, Routledge proved to be an exciting talent on the wing and up front, chipping in with an impressive 8 assists. He was not to leave the top flight, though. After rejecting a contract with the club that developed him as a youngster in January, Tottenham Hotspur signed him on 1 July 2005. The clubs could not come to an agreement over a fee for Routledge so the transfer went to a tribunal. There it was agreed that Palace would receive an initial £1.25m, rising to £2m depending upon appearances in future.
English Football League Cup 2012-2013 Swansea | English Championship 2010-2011 QPR | English Championship 2009-2010 Newcastle |
2001-2005 |
2005-2008 |
2008-2009 |
2009-2010 |
2010-2011 |
2011-2021 |