November 30 2005

Iain Dowie

Crystal Palace hero Gareth Southgate has hailed Eagles boss Iain Dowie.

Middlesborough skipper Southgate lines up against his old team when Boro face Palace in Wednesday night's Carling Cup fourth round tie.

He played with Dowie for the second half of the 1994/95 season which saw Palace finish fourth bottom in the Premiership and relegated. That year the Eagles reached the FA Cup and League Cup semi-finals.

And Southgate is not surprised Dowie has gone on to become one of the best young managers about.

"Iain was an impressive guy when I played with him," said Southgate. "You could see he had an empathy with people and it has not surprised me he's been as successful as he has.

"He was a good people person and had time for everybody. He would stay out on the training field with us, he was a lot of fun and worked tremendously hard.

"He's an intelligent guy, he came into football late. He's open-minded to things and as a player he got a lot out of himself.

"His view is he wants to improve all the players if he possibly can."

Southgate has fond memories of his time at Selhurst Park, where he broke through the youth ranks to become club captain.

He said: "I had eight fantastic years there, they gave me my opportunity to play professional football and it was a brilliant place to start my career."