McDougald the nomad has Daggers out for Norwich

Well-travelled striker aiming to continue impressive FA Cup run by shooting down First Division high-flyers at Carrow Road

The story so far. Junior McDougald plays for two football clubs – one real, the other fictional. The real team, Dagenham & Redbridge, were drawn against the fictional team, Harchester United from Sky's Dream Team football soap, in the third round of the FA Cup. In the show, McDougald is on loan to his real team from his fictional side, a Premiership club, and scores against them.

Days later he scores for Dagenham again in the FA Cup to set up a tie against a club run by the most famous celebrity chef in the country who has just thrown in the sponge (would that be Delia's Victoria sponge?) to concentrate on football. That bit is for real.

Confused? That's only the start of it – just look at his CV. McDougald, footballer and actor, walked out on his boyhood club after he felt let down by the manager, a World Cup winner, and has played for half a dozen league clubs plus an (allegedly) Mafia-run French side before pitching up in Essex. He has also harboured dreams of turning out for the United States. He was born in Texas.

The man is also a devout Christian, wears silver boots on the pitch and has gained permission from the authorities to be simply known – on his No 13 shirt and team sheet – by his first name as a tribute to Brazilian football.

This may take some unravelling. But first things first. Tomorrow, non-League Dagenham play the First Division high-flyers Norwich City at Carrow Road in the FA Cup. It is the first time the Conference side have made it into the fourth round, having fallen to Premiership opposition in the past two years at the earlier hurdle.

They also lost this year – but only in Sky One's drama as Harchester came from behind to beat them, 3-2. On the sports channel, of course, they were dumping Plymouth Argyle out of the competition, 2-0.

Among the directors of Norwich is, of course, Delia Smith, who has just announced her intentions of scaling back her television appearances just as McDougald wants to increase his. "It's brilliant," he says, "And I would love to do more – adverts and things like that." But first and foremost he is a footballer and a nomadic one at that although, at 28, he feels he has found the right club in the Daggers. It is best if he explains his football odyssey.

"I have never been shown the door by a club. I was always trying to find the right one for me," McDougald says. "I started off at Tottenham but I left because I did not get on with Ossie Ardiles and I was offered first-team opportunities with Liam Brady at Brighton.

"That was great but I was then bought by Rotherham for £50,000 and it then looked like I was going to Barnsley. Instead I went on a Bosman ruling to France and played for First Division Toulon.

"When I look back now it was an awesome experience. The weather was tremendous, the lifestyle too, but that part of France has a lot of Mafia involvement and there was strange stuff going on.

"The manager was sacked, the chairman got sacked and there were players in the team who just should not have been there. No one wanted to sponsor us and suddenly we were not getting paid.

"I stayed for one season and then signed for Chesterfield but Rotherham wanted a fee so I then played for Cambridge City before going to Millwall. They offered me a deal but it was half of what I expected so I left.

"Then it was Leyton Orient, where I picked up an ankle injury, and finally to Dagenham. I have never looked back since." That's probably because he would struggle to keep up.

This is his fourth season at Victoria Road. "It is great here," he says. "The club is very ambitious, with a good manager and good players. As a team and individually we are capable of playing at a higher level."

The only way that will come this year is via the play-offs – it is the first season they have been used in the Conference – which offer a second place into the Third Division. After a poor start, maybe a hangover from losing out on promotion on goal difference last year, the Daggers are quickly gaining ground.

Surprisingly for such a go-ahead club, they are not professional – although eight others in the Conference are. "It is the one disappointment," McDougald says. "We are classed as semi-professional but there is a professional mentality here. My ambition is still to be the best footballer I can possibly be and I think I can do that here."

To that end McDougald has had an impressive run in the FA Cup – his goal against Plymouth was the seventh consecutive tie in which he has scored, which had Daggers officials excitedly reaching for the record books. They found that the striker needs to register in another three to equal Wrexham's Dixie McNeill.

Tomorrow there will be another television appearance – this time an interview on BBC's Football Focus programme, and then the big game. What does he expect? "Well, the food will be good," he jokes. "We know Norwich are a good side who play good football. But we will fly the flag."