Premier League Stories: Dylan Tombides is a moving documentary that shares Dylan’s tale through home video, West Ham TV and broadcasters’ archives and interviews with his family, Jedinak, his coaches, former teammate Mark Noble and Hammers vice-chair Karren Brady.
After growing up in Perth, where he excelled for Perth SC and Stirling Lions, the Tombides family moved to Macau where the young Dylan again shone at the Brazilian Soccer School in nearby Hong Kong. At the age of 15, the family moved again, this time to London so Dylan could join West Ham United’s Academy of Football.
Under the tutelage of Academy Director Tony Carr and his coaching staff, Dylan continued to develop and improve, scoring goals and honing his outstanding all-round game. After shining at Academy level, in May 2011, aged just 17 years and two months, he was named on the substitutes’ bench for West Ham’s Premier League fixture with Sunderland at the Boleyn Ground.
Only a few months earlier the striker had been misdiagnosed with a benign cyst, but following a random doping test carried out at the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Mexico in late June 2011, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer. Supported by the Club, Dylan underwent treatment, which included chemotherapy and invasive surgery, which included having lymph nodes removed from his abdomen, and in summer 2012 he returned to training.
In September 2012, manager Sam Allardyce made Dylan’s dream come true when he made his first-team debut in a League Cup tie against Wigan Athletic. Tragically, cancer returned and the teenager underwent further intense treatment, including stem cell transplants and further chemotherapy, but the disease spread during 2013.
Despite repeated setbacks, Dylan remained a positive and optimistic character, regularly visiting his teammates, staff and friends at the Club’s Chadwell Heath training ground, where his sense of humour helped both him and them smile and laugh through his evident pain.
In January 2014, Dylan summoned the strength to play for Australia at the AFC Under-22 Championship in Oman – the last time he would ever kick the ball he had loved since he was a child. Dylan passed away, with his mother Tracy, father Jim and brother Taylor by his side, on 18 April 2014, aged just 20.
The day after his death, West Ham hosted Crystal Palace in the Premier League at the Boleyn Ground, where Jim and fellow footballer Taylor laid his No38 shirt in the centre circle. Fittingly, the only goal of the game was scored by Palace’s Australia international midfielder Mile Jedinak.
A memorial service was held in Woodford, where a number of Dylan’s former teammates carried his coffin and spoke in tribute. In 2015, Tracy launched DT38 Foundation, a charity committed to fundraising and educating young men about male cancers, and the importance of early detection and diagnosis in saving lives.