Vital Leeds WITW: Tomas Brolin

Brolin arrived at Leeds United in a £4.5million transfer from A.C. Parma in 1995, a fee that these days would make Leeds fans worldwide cry, if it wasn’t for the likes of more recent purchases that may, or may not include Seth Johnson.

The Swedish hotshot had built up some reputation for himself courtesy of a number of exciting performances for his national side during the 1994 World Cup held in the United States of America. Scoring 3 goals as the Swede’s went on to finish 3rd in the tournament (good job they weren’t in the final, what a yawn-fest that was!) meant that he found himself in the ‘World Cup All Star Team’ alongside great names such as Romario, Hristo Stoichchkov, Paolo Maldina and not forgetting the superstar goalkeeper, Belgian Michel Preud'homme.

Unfortunately for Leeds, between the World Cup and his eventual transfer it appears that Brolin may have taken to eating a considerable amount more than your average footballer and as he arrived at Elland Road, it soon became apparent that he may just have had a slight weight problem.

Tomas or “Tubby” as he was known only managed 19 games for Leeds United over the next two seasons, somehow managing 4 goals for the club. It however appeared that his days at Elland Road were somewhat numbered, it’s all well and good being slightly overweight, but the former “All Star Team” member was somewhat taking the proverbial.

The next two years for Brolin weren’t much better, as Leeds looked to do something with him other than giving him a similar treatment to that of a sick race-horse. 14 further games were graced by the presence of the front-man in spells for FC Zurich and Parma (3, and 11 games respectively) where he managed a whopping total of 0, yes 0 goals.

Leeds did the best thing for all concerned and the contract between club and player was terminated “by mutual consent” and Tomas was sent bouncing away to find himself a new employer. By the time Brolin retired, following a spell playing for Crystal Palace in 1998 it had been 4 years since he had managed a league goal.

Post Football Career
Upon retirement, Tomas did keep an interest in football, doing what all football-crazy people do when they are perhaps the wrong side of the ideal body mass index, he played in goal. Hudiksvalls A.B.K. a Swedish non-league side had none other than Brolin’s brother, Brolin (Håkan) on the books.

It is in his native homeland of Sweden that Brolin is quite clearly most famous (lets face it we don’t exactly love him do we Leeds fans?) Brolin has been accredited to being a successful poker player, developing a mouthpiece for vacuum cleaners (WHAT?) and has released a song.

The song is the most interesting, ”Alla Vi” has a video that consists of Brolin, Mattias Frisk and tennis player Bjorn Borg, some Swedish women in bikini’s, a limo and a swimming pool!



So there you have it, Tomas Brolin’s Leeds links in a nutshell. Based on how he looks in that video, I would be somewhat confident he won’t be finding employment at Thorp Arch in the future as a fitness coach any time soon.

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