Kevin Kilmore (born 11 November 1959) is an English former

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who scored 81 goals from 334 appearances in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, it is the oldest football league in the world, and was the top-level football league in England from ...

playing for Scunthorpe United,

Grimsby Town Grimsby Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Cleethorpes, North East Lincolnshire, England, that competes in , the fourth level of the English football league system. Nicknamed "the Mariners", the club was f ...

, Rotherham United and Lincoln City. He played as a forward or

midfielder In the sport of association football, a midfielder takes an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield position primarily in the middle of the pitch. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in t ...

. He also played in Belgium for K.F.C. Verbroedering Geel, but never appeared in the league, and

non-League football Non-League football describes association football, football leagues played outside the top leagues of a country. Usually, it describes leagues which are not fully professional. The term is primarily used for football in England, where it is ...

for Gainsborough Trinity.

Life and career

Kilmore was born in

Scunthorpe Scunthorpe () is an industrial town in Lincolnshire, England, and the county's third most populous settlement after Lincoln, England, Lincoln and Grimsby, with a population of 81,286 in 2021. It is the administrative centre and largest settleme ...

, Lincolnshire, where he played for Crosby Colts before joining his local

Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional association football, football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, it is the oldest football league in Association football around the world, the w ...

club, Scunthorpe United, as an apprentice. He made his debut for Scunthorpe at the age of 17, in February 1977, and played regularly for the first team thereafter. In the 1977–78 season, he was capped three times for the England youth team and scored once, in a

friendly match An exhibition game (also known as a friendly, scrimmage, demonstration, training match, pre-season game, warmup match, or preparation match, depending at least in part on the sport) is a sport, sporting event whose prize money and impact on th ...

against Hungary youth. He played in every game for Scunthorpe during 1978–79 and scored 17 goals, a return which made him the club's top scorer. Just after the start of the next season, Kilmore was sold to

, newly promoted to the Third Division, for a £60,000 fee, a record fee for both clubs. He and strike partner Kevin Drinkell contributed 31 goals as Grimsby won the division to earn a second successive promotion: in a ''Grimsby Telegraph'' retrospective of the 1979–80 season, Kilmore was described as "one of the best penalty box players the club has ever seen". Grimsby came close to an unprecedented third consecutive promotion in 1980–81, eventually finishing seventh in the Second Division. In January 1983, Kilmore broke his jaw in a car crash. He left the club at the end of that season, to follow manager George Kerr to Rotherham United, newly relegated to the Third Division. He spent two seasons with Rotherham: in his first, he scored 21 goals in all competitions, but only 7 the following year. In the 1985 close season, Kilmore moved to Belgium, where he joined Second Division club K.F.C. Verbroedering Geel on a

semi-professional Semi-professional sports are sports in which athletes are not participating on a full-time basis, but still receive some payment. Semi-professionals are not amateur because they receive regular payment from their team, but generally at a cons ...

basis. He played twice as a substitute in cup matches, but never appeared in the league, and returned to England with Lincoln City in January 1986. His four goals failed to save Lincoln from relegation to the Fourth Division, and he left the club at the end of the 1986–87 season, when Lincoln became the first club to suffer automatic relegation from the Football League into the

Football Conference The National League of English Football Clubs is a professional Association football, football league in England that consists of 72 teams, divided equally between the National League (division), National League North and National League South ...

. After he retired from football, Kilmore and wife Christine kept

pub A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the late 17th century, to differentiate private ho ...

s in Scunthorpe. Latterly, he's taken over the Pack Horse in

Louth, Lincolnshire Louth () is a market town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in the East Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England.OS Explorer map 283:Louth and Mablethorpe: (1:25 000): Louth serves as an important town for a large rural area of east ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kilmore, Kevin 1959 births Living people Footballers from Scunthorpe English men's footballers Men's association football forwards Scunthorpe United F.C. players Grimsby Town F.C. players Rotherham United F.C. players Lincoln City F.C. players Gainsborough Trinity F.C. players English Football League players English expatriate sportspeople in Belgium English expatriate men's footballers