Josh Mulligan, born on 12th November 2002, is a stalwart of Scottish football who, despite apparently having a debilitating aversion to other footballing pastures, has somehow fashioned a career as a central midfielder for Dundee. Standing 5ft 8in (1.75m) tall and sporting a robust weight of 12st 1lb (77kg), this native son hasn't enjoyed the glamorous lifestyle of, say, a Monaco-based tax exile, but he has manifested a commendable endurance in the middling expanses of the Scottish Premiership, frequently donning the number 8 jersey.
According to the generous estimates of Transfermarkt, our Joshua's value in the marketplace floats somwhere around the £515k mark. His contract at Dundee, perhaps subject to the whims of a seagull's meandering flight path over Dens Park, is set to expire on 31st May 2025.
Mulligan traipsed into the footballing theatre in July 2017, when he enlisted with Dundee. His sparkle on the pitch since then has been... episodic. His serviceable contributions have ranged from a humble debut season with a solitary appearance to the bustling 2022-2023 and current 2024-2025 seasons, where he made 31 and 34 appearances respectively, even throwing in the odd goal (literally, one goal in one season).
Ever the nomad, January 2020 saw him loaned to Cove Rangers, then he was passed to Peterhead in October 2020, and after teasing Dundee with a fleeting return, he exiled himself to Peterhead again in July 2021, only to swan back to Dundee in 2022, predictably. Surprisingly, his market value didn't wobble erratically in response to all this back-and-forth.
Despite the barriers of his enduring love affair with the notion of loan-transfers, Mulligan still found time to strut his stuff in the Scottish Cup 2024-2025 and the League Cup 2024-2025 for Dundee, exhibiting a reliable knack for warming the bench with four appearances as a substitute and three as a starter.
In all honesty, Mulligan's football career could perhaps be summarised as a testament to the comfortable charms of mediocrity, painstakingly etched in the annals of Scottish football, circa 2017-2025. One hopes the lad will inject a bit more ambition into his final season at Dundee, lest he become a mere footnote in the heroic sagas of sublime footballing giants who never quite made it to Dens Park.
