Boro’ were quick into the transfer market in January 2022; Laurie Walker becoming our fifth signing within the first six days. You could only guess how much boss Paul Tisdale had been chomping at the bit to stamp his mark on the squad just over a month into the role. And the priority must’ve been goalkeepers too; Walker joining Christy Pym as one of two stoppers in through the door at the start of 2022.
Walker, not unlike some of our other new arrivals at the time, had been managed by Tisdale before. In this case, it was at MK Dons where the pair first met (albeit briefly). Quite what the plan was for the stopper on his arrival at the Lamex would soon be discovered. Would he be taking over the number one jersey on a long term basis? Would he immediately take up that coveted spot between the sticks? Or did Tisdale see him as a left-field answer to our chronic shortage of goals at the other end? We’ll report back…
Laurie Walker: Before Boro’
MK Dons was actually Walker’s first club; starting out there as a youth in 2006. He left them, however, in 2009 at the end of his scholarship and joined Cambridge United. At the Us, the goalkeeper made his senior debut – but it was arguably the only major highlight in his one season at the Abbey Stadium. In summer 2010, he went to Morecambe; again, it wasn’t the springboard to his career. So, Kettering Town would be his next port of call.
With the Poppies, Walker featured heavily as he started to forge a career in non-league. But, again, the stopper was soon on the move. Brackley Town and Hemel Hempstead Town were teams he turned out for between leaving the Poppies in 2012 and rejoining the Dons in 2019; both of whom signed him twice. And it was at the latter where he made the bulk of his senior appearances, with more than 180 to his name when he left a second time in 2019.
Back at the Dons, first team opportunities weren’t on the horizon. Instead, it was out on loan that Walker found his game time. There was a spell at Chelmsford City, before two stints with Oldham Athletic. Last but not least was a temporary stay at Aldershot Town before Christmas 2021. After taking his tally of first team appearances into double figures at the Rec in a pretty short space of time, he returned to the Dons in order to make a permanent switch to Boro’.
