Until February 2010, Danny Butterfield’s career was going along nicely, if unobtrusively, at Crystal Palace, latterly in the Championship. But that all changed in a televised Fourth Round FA Cup replay at Selhurst Park when Premiership Wolverhampton was beaten 3-1 and

Palace’s three goals consisted of Danny’s “perfect” hat-trick – right foot, left foot and a header – in less than seven second-half minutes.

It was an amazing feat made even more improbable by the fact that Danny, who had been Palace’s established right-back, had been playing in other positions of late because 18-year-old Nathan Clyne had burst upon the scene so stunningly that Wolves had been trying to sign him that very week. Had they succeeded, Danny would have been at right-back for this replay. But when Clyne turned down the move, manager Neil Warnock, who had run out of fit forwards, decided to play Danny upfront.

A further twist of fortune brought the 30-year-old Butterfield to Southampton, four months on. Manager Nigel Adkins had signed Frazer Richardson, but he promptly dislocated his shoulder and Adkins needed a replacement for the start of the 2010-11 season. Danny answered the call and played more often than Frazer that season, as the Saints were promoted to the Championship. He lost out to Frazer in 2011-12, though, as another promotion was achieved, but then Adkins signed, of all people, Nathan Clyne. Danny was now out of contention and had a few games on loan at Championship Bolton before his contract expired in the summer and he became a free agent in search of a club. Carlisle didn’t work out and he joined League Two Exeter, then managed by ex-Saint Paul Tisdale. When Tisdale landed the manager’s job at MK Dons he invited Danny, by then back at Staplewood working with the U18s, to join him.

He was back at Staplewood at the beginning of 2021 as loans manager for the Academy before again departing this time to become Lincoln’s assistant head coach just two days before Christmas in 2022.

In February 2024 he became Kelvin Davis’s assistant at the Silverlake Stadium.