Portsmouth News 24/7Writer: paultsmouth 
Date:Saturday January 29 2011
Time: 7:41PM
UK time is: 03:00:17
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Utaka, last of the golden era
He leaves to return to France, Montpellier to be precise, he knows French football well and faired better in the land of the Gaul and garlic, on his day he was unplayable, trouble is that day was once a season, he was in a red hot streak by his standards though, 2 goals in 2 games.
John will remembered as a man with great talent and little application, his demeanour was more West Indian than African, a lot of the time he seemed just disinterested, when he shone though, he shone brightly, Newcastle at St.James' comes to mind, also against Sunderland last season in the cup. He preferred to play up top rather than on the wing, but his lack of running curtailed that option very often.
He scored 7 league goals in 3 seasons, quite a poor return after seeming to be a superb signing after about 3 months into his stay, Pompey have alledgedly trousered £500k for the transfer, this and the savings on his earnings of about 30k a week looks to be the reason he was sold, hopefully now Pompey can push through a couple of new signings themselves.
As has been quoted on the forum though, he represents the last of the "moneybags Pompey" era, that is both a shame, yet a line drawn underneath our Walter Mitty period.
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Your Comments
Who is in then? Our squad is uper thin, can't see this going through without one or two reinforcements
paultsmouth
deleted my article and left paul's up and running - so long john, cannot say i am sorry to see you leave tho...
pompeyrug
We will miss him on the pitch but not in our hearts. The biggest waste of £7 million our club has ever spent. Does this mean we are almost defintley getting Norris?
PompeyJake
That's what I'm hoping Jake, be good sign if so.
paultsmouth
2 goals in 2 games i said on the new live txt commentry that there must have been scouts on the s/stand seats..good riddence i say
plymouth graham
If he had lived up to his potential, pay packet, and price....oh what could have been......but I'm left feeling "good riddance to bad rubbish" ......harsh but true ! PUP
BarneyArmy
My mates from Montpellier- les muckers ( pronounced muq ueeeerr zzzz) are very disappointed by this but they are saying it's €500 not £500. Dont suppose Pompey mind cos whatever the fee, getting him off the books is worth a cool £.72M saving.
russellm
thats per annum so about £.28M on the remainder of the season.
russellm
thats per annum so about £.28M on the remainder of the season.
russellm
No manager got the best out of him. I remember the Bolton goal and the pass to Kanu for Cup glory, the rest was a real disapponitment for a footballer with great pace. "Enigma" doesnt cut it! He should have been able to run Npower league defenders ragged and scare teams into being honest, but even the crowd seemed unable to take him to heart. I think we should have shown the Bolton goal on the screens in the warm up for home matches this season, psycological warfare perhaps? Never been encouraged by us to take people on, just sighed that he didnt run back to tackle, a failure all round.
Terraceman
What is sure is Webber is a month away so Pompey need Kitson to get over his depression and get on with things now.
russellm
i dunno, obvious overall he's been pretty aweful but i think we'll miss him for the rest of this season for sure, dare i say he's probably been one of our best performers this season.. hmm might be too far lol
pompeym@
waste of space, lots of use of the english vocablurary to describe the ridiculas waste of human tissue that is chukwudi utaka. think ivica mornar was better and i would rather have a one legged dario silva than that muppet. Great goal against bolton tho. redbullcrapp to blame for the lazy bastad
Super Bock 1898
Its a pity that times are so hard for Pompey that we have mixed feelings about losing Uslaka, simply because our squad is so paper thin! C'mon Kitson, we need you to step up to the mark now!
tracyc
The Bolton goal......Wow!!! as for the rest..........................
pentonpompey
Utaka, last of the golden era, not quite. Long live the king
MickTait
I'm not sure why I'm bothering, but some of these comments are embarrasing beyond believe.
It seems that to be a fans favourite you need to run around, and it doesn't matter about ability.
Some do give Utaka credit that he has the ability by made no effort. GET REAL!
He is a sprinter. Does a 100m runner run marathons in training or on race day? Play balls that he could reach and he would, and with a better conversion rate that many we have seen down the years.
I am sad that he has gone, playing more central he could have carried the front line by scoring more than his fair share and we never did see him and Kitson through the middle.
SensibleSoccer
I don't know why you bothered either ;-) £7M in cost, £.5M in wages for a striker......I think it's fair to expect goals from a striker ?? maybe he was played out of position alot, but only because the major descriptor in his job title wasn't being fulfilled!! and we all agree the guy can run (well, one way anyway!)
BarneyArmy
I'll remember for the Bolton goal & obviouusly for the cross that led to the FA Cup winning goal. Sadly his highs are far out numbered by the lows but there we go. He moves on, we move on.
storagematt
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