Steve Macauley is an ex-professional footballer, who played primarily at centre half. He began his career at Manchester City

Manchester City F.C.

Manchester City Football Club is an English Premier League football club based in Manchester. Founded in 1880 as St. Mark's , they became Ardwick Association Football Club in 1887 and Manchester City in 1894...

 as a trainee. After a brief spell at local side Fleetwood

Fleetwood Town F.C.

Fleetwood Town F.C. is an English football club based in Fleetwood, Lancashire. They currently play in the Conference National having been defeated in the Conference National play-off semi-final by AFC Wimbledon in the 2010–11 season.-History:...

, he joined Crewe Alexandra

Crewe Alexandra F.C.

Crewe Alexandra Football Club is an English professional football club based in Crewe, Cheshire. Nicknamed The Railwaymen due to the town's links with the rail industry, they currently play in Football League Two, the fourth tier of English football, and are based at the Alexandra Stadium.The club...

 in March 1992 for a fee of £25,000. He went on to spend ten years at the South Cheshire

Cheshire

Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...

 club under manager Dario Gradi

Dario Gradi

Dario Gradi MBE is an Italian-born English football manager and former player, who was serving as manager of the Crewe Alexandra F.C. Academy. He is a former manager of Crewe Alexandra, with whom he has been associated for almost thirty years.Gradi is notable for his 24-year first spell as manager...

.

Crewe Alexandra (1992-2002)

According to the football website Soccerbase, Macauley played 246 league games for Crewe, plus 16 in the Football League Cup

Football League Cup

The Football League Cup, commonly known as the League Cup or, from current sponsorship, the Carling Cup, is an English association football competition. Like the FA Cup, it is played on a knockout basis...

 and 20 in the FA Cup

FA Cup

The Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly known as the FA Cup, is a knockout cup competition in English football and is the oldest association football competition in the world. The "FA Cup" is run by and named after The Football Association and usually refers to the English men's...

, plus 22 other assorted appearances. He is credited with having played an important role in the club's promotion to the First Division of the Nationwide League in 1997, and subsequent successful battles to stay in the division. His partners in defence included Ashley Westwood

Ashley Westwood

Ashley Michael Westwood is an English footballer who plays as a central defender for Northampton Town on non-contract terms....

, later of Sheffield Wednesday

Sheffield Wednesday F.C.

Sheffield Wednesday Football Club are a football club based in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, who are currently competing in the Football League One in the 2011-12 season, in England. Sheffield Wednesday are one of the oldest professional clubs in the world and the fourth oldest in the...

, and Dave Walton

Dave Walton

David Walton is a retired English footballer who is remember for his exploits at and where he made over 100 league appearances for both clubs.-Club career:...

, later of Derby County

Derby County F.C.

Derby County Football Club is an English football based in Derby. the club play in the Football League Championship and is notable as being one of the twelve founder members of the Football League in 1888 and is, therefore, one of only ten clubs to have competed in every season of the English...

. He also played alongside future Premiership players such as Danny Murphy, Neil Lennon

Neil Lennon

Neil Francis Lennon is a former footballer from Northern Ireland. He is the current manager and former captain of Celtic....

, Rob Hulse

Rob Hulse

Robert William "Rob" Hulse is an English footballer who plays for Queens Park Rangers as a striker.He had primarily spent his career at second tier level, playing there with Crewe Alexandra. West Bromwich Albion, Leeds United, Sheffield United and Derby County...

 and Dean Ashton

Dean Ashton

Dean Ashton is a former English professional footballer. He made over 240 appearances as a forward in the Football League and Premier League for Crewe Alexandra, Norwich City and , and was also capped by England. He was highly praised as a talented centre forward, but had a career frustrated by...

. Although a centre half, he did play a number of games as a forward

Striker

Forwards, also known as strikers, are the players on a team in association football who play nearest to the opposing team's goal, and are therefore principally responsible for scoring goals...

 during a striking injury crisis at the Alex during the mid-90s.

During his spell at Crewe, the club reached the 1992-93

1992-93 in English football

The 1992–1993 season was the 113th season of competitive football in England.-Overview:This season saw the birth of the FA Premier League. This meant a break-up of the 104-year-old Football League that had operated until then with four divisions....

 play-off

Football League Play-Offs

The Football League play-offs are an annual series of football matches to determine some of the promotion places within the Football League. Essentially, each division of the league offers a certain number of automatic promotion places to the top two or three clubs. A further promotion place is...

 final against York

York City F.C.

York City Football Club is an English football club based in York, North Yorkshire. The club participates in the Conference National, the fifth tier of English football. Founded in 1922, they joined the Football League in 1929, and have spent most of their history in the lower divisions...

, only to lose on penalties, before being promoted the following season. As mentioned above, they then rose into what is now the Football League Championship

Football League Championship

The Football League Championship is the highest division of The Football League and second-highest division overall in the English football league system after the Premier League...

 following victory

1997 Football League Second Division play-off Final

The 1997 Football League Second Division play-off Final was a football match played at Wembley Stadium on 25 May 1997, at the end of the 1996–97 season. It was the 11th play-off final in all at the third level of English football...

 at Wembley against Brentford

Brentford F.C.

Brentford Football Club are a professional English football club based in Brentford in the London Borough of Hounslow. They are currently playing in Football League One....

 on 25 May 1997.

Rochdale and Macclesfield (2002-2004)

In the summer of 2002 after an injury-hit final season during which he was loaned to neighbours Macclesfield Town

Macclesfield Town F.C.

Macclesfield Town Football Club is an English football team. The club was formed in 1874 and is based in the town of Macclesfield in Cheshire. The team play its home games at the 6,355 capacity Moss Rose stadium...

, Macauley joined Rochdale

Rochdale A.F.C.

Rochdale Association Football Club is an English professional football club based in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. They play their home matches at Spotland Stadium. Formed in 1907, they were accepted into the Football League in 1921...

 but only made six league appearances. During this spell he had two further loan spells at Macclesfield before joining them on a permanent basis. Many of his old Crewe supporters felt that he was unfairly treated at Rochdale having been such a good professional at Crewe.

Joint testimonials (2003)

He eventually retired from League football at the end of the 2003-04

2003-04 in English football

The 2003-04 season was the 124th season of competitive football in England.-Overview:Arsenal completed the entire campaign without losing a single league game....

 season having had a joint testimonial with fellow former Alex defender Shaun Smith

Shaun Smith (footballer)

Gareth Shaun Smith is an English former footballer. Smith spent the majority of his career at Crewe Alexandra, playing in 399 League games and 400+ overall....

 at Crewe's Alexandra Stadium

Alexandra Stadium

The Alexandra Stadium is a multi-use stadium in Crewe, England. It is currently used mostly for football matches and is the home ground of Crewe Alexandra...

 in 2003 (the game was held over from the previous year). The two players' careers had become linked through their many seasons together in Crewe's defence after both joining during early 1992.

Bamber Bridge (2004-2005)

After leaving Macclesfield in 2003-04, he went on to play for semi-professional Lancashire

Lancashire

Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...

 club Bamber Bridge

Bamber Bridge F.C.

Bamber Bridge F.C. are an English football club based in Bamber Bridge, near Preston, Lancashire. They currently play in the Northern Premier League Division One North and are full members of the Lancashire County Football Association. They play their home games at the QED Stadium in Bamber Bridge...

 in the Northern Premier League

Northern Premier League

The Northern Premier League, is one of the regional English football leagues which sits directly below the Football Conference featuring semi-professional and amateur clubs. Geographically, the league covers all of Northern England, and the northern areas of the Midlands. Originally just one...

. His debut came in a 1-0 away victory over Blyth Spartans

Blyth Spartans A.F.C.

Blyth Spartans A.F.C. are a professional football club who play in the Conference North, and are based in the town of Blyth, Northumberland, England. They are often the most Northerly team in whichever league or cup they are playing in. They are managed by former Spartans player Steve Cuggy.They...

 and his final game for Bamber was the return fixture against the same opposition, Macauley scoring the consolation goal as his team lost 3-1.

After retirement

Macauley qualified as a physiotherapist during his playing career, graduating from the University of Salford

University of Salford

The University of Salford is a campus university based in Salford, Greater Manchester, England with approximately 20,000 registered students. The main campus is about west of Manchester city centre, on the A6, opposite the former home of the physicist, James Prescott Joule and the Working Class...

 in 1999 with a degree in Physiotherapy. He joined Fleetwood as physio and member of the coaching staff in 2005. He left the club at the end of the 2007-08 season to concentrate on his physiotherapy practice, but was re-engaged by Fleetwood as caretaker-manager in September 2008, following the dismissal of manager Tony Greenwood after a poor start to Fleetwood's inaugural Conference North

Conference North

The Conference North also known as Blue Square Bet North for sponsorship reasons, is a division of the Football Conference in England, taking its place immediately below the Conference National. Along with Conference South it is at Step 2 of the National League System and the sixth overall tier of...

 campaign. He returned to the coaching staff following the appointment of Micky Mellon

Micky Mellon

Michael Joseph "Micky" Mellon is a Scottish former professional footballer, though he never played professionally in his native land. He is currently manager of Fleetwood Town.-Playing career:...

as Fleetwood manager.