Theo Walcott was born on 16th March 1989 in Stanmore, Greater London, England. He
grew up in Compton, a small village in Newbury, and began off his football career playing
for the local club, AFC Newbury. Walcott represented AFC Newbury for just one season
and amazingly managed to score over a hundred goals, after which he switched clubs twice
by first moving to Swindon Town and then later to Southampton.
In the 2004-05 season, Walcott performed splendidly well for the Southampton youth side
allowing it to progress to the finals of the FA Youth Cup. Alongside playing for the youth
team, Walcott became the youngest player to take part as a reserve for the Southampton
senior side in a game against Watford, at the the age of 15 years and 175 days.
Southampton got relegated at the end of the 2004-05 season and thus he could not play in
the Premier League. Walcott made his debut for the Southampton first team in the Football
League Championship on 6th August 2005 against Wolverhampton Wanderers, when he
came on as a substitute. His performances quickly earned him a place in the starting
line-up and just a couple of months later on 18th October 2005, he started for the side for
the first time against Leeds United, and scored his first career goal for it in the same game.
He scored twice more the following week and as a result rapidly gained fame and caught
the attention of the top English Premier League sides.
Walcott was eventually transferred to Arsenal on 20th January 2006 for a fee of £12
