Frannie Collin

DOB: 20th April 1987

Position: Striker

Season of first appearance: 2017/18

Season of last appearance: 2018/19

Full Appearances: 73

Substitute: 5

Goals: 29

Also played for:

Gillingham, Dover Athletic, Tonbridge Angels, Maidstone United, Herne Bay, Leatherhead, Hastings United, Hythe Town, Ashford United, Faversham Town.

Player Profile:

A former England Schoolboy under 18 international. After having trials with various clubs during his youth, including Crystal Palace and Aston Villa, he signed professionally for Gillingham in 2005. He marked his first-team debut with a goal in a 2-0 win over Crawley Town in the Football League Trophy on 18.10.05.

First-team opportunities at Gillingham were limited, however, and most of Frannie’s appearances came as a substitute. He was released by Gillingham in May 2007 and was signed by former Gills boss Andy Hessenthaler at Dover Athletic.

Frannie had a successful spell at Crabble, helping them to win back-to-back promotions in 2007-08 and 2008-09. Having scored 49 goals in 97 matches, he left Dover at the end of 2009-10 to join Tonbridge Angels.

In his first season with Tonbridge, Frannie bagged 21 goals in all competitions as they won promotion via the Isthmian Premier play-offs. He was named Tonbridge’s player of the year in 2011-12, winning the Golden Boot for the Conference South in the same season with 29 league goals.

In the summer of 2013, Frannie signed for Maidstone United, who had just been promoted to the Isthmian League Premier Division.

He scored both goals as they beat Football League Stevenage 2-1 in an FA Cup First Round replay at home in 2014-15. In total, he scored more than 50 goals from 122 appearances for Maidstone.

In January 2016, Frannie joined Isthmian Premier side Leatherhead initially on loan before making the move permanent. The Stones had also loaned him to Herne Bay earlier in 2015-16.

Frannie played for Hastings United of Isthmian Division One South in 2016-17 and became the first player to score 30 goals in a season for them for 17 years as United, who reached the play-offs, notched 128 goals from 46 league games.

Frannie joined Margate for 2017-18 to be reunited with his former Maidstone team-mate and former assistant manager at Hastings and Leatherhead, Steve Watt, who was now Margate manager. Having scored twice in the 3-3 Thanet Cup match at Ramsgate on 4.8.17, he scored the winner in the first league match of the season, a 1-0 win at Thurrock on 12.8.17. This was followed with a hat-trick in a 5-0 win against Worthing at Bognor Regis on 9.9.17.

Frannie ended the season with 20 goals from 44 appearances (plus one sub appearance).

He stayed at Hartsdown for 2018-19 and scored in the opening league game, a 5-2 home win over Corinthian Casuals on 11.8.18. He scored twice in a 3-0 win at Brightlingsea Regent a week later but, overall, found goals harder to come by with only eight during the season. He had a long spell out of the team after sustaining an injury at Lewes on 23.1.19.

Frannie’s last appearance for the club was in the final match of the season at Harlow on 27.4.19. He finished the season with nine goals from 29 appearances, plus four as sub.

He then joined Hythe Town of the Isthmian South East Division. Talking to Kent Online about why he chose to join Hythe over Ashford, he said: “I spoke to Tom [Warrilow, Ashford manager at the time] as soon as the season finished but the problem was that the injury I had in the last few months of the season was an impact injury from the pitch that we trained on.

"I just didn’t want to do another year on 3G and it’s quite a firm surface at Ashford so I didn’t want it to affect the amount of games I could get out on the pitch.

"Especially knowing Tom [who managed Collin at Tonbridge], I didn’t want to sign a deal and get myself injured a month into the season and be in a similar situation. That had a bearing on it as well."

Frannie went on to become player/coach at Hythe and stayed with them until January 2022 when he signed for fellow Isthmian South East side Ashford. However, he returned to Hythe in June 2022.

He signed for SCEFL side Faversham Town in the summer of 2024.

Frannie was a plasterer during his time at Margate.