|
Post by hatter_in_macc on Mar 26, 2019 18:40:34 GMT
A much-loved Jack of all County trades features in my piece for tonight's programme... except he went by the name of Eric! ***************************************************************************************************** HATTERS’ GAFFERS: ERIC WEBSTER“He was my mentor, manager, groundsman, tea-man and all-round #TOP MAN.” So tweeted County goal-scoring legend Mick Quinn, following the death of his former Hatters’ Gaffer, Eric Webster, three years ago - and, as ever, ‘Quinny’ was bang on target. Hatter in Macc pays further tribute to an unsung Edgeley Park hero off the field of play, who also turned out for, and briefly managed, this afternoon’s near-neighbouring visitors.Eric Webster was properly in charge of first-team affairs at County for three years that, in terms of the club’s history, tend, at best, to be mentioned in passing. But a relatively forgettable end-product on the pitch during his tenure between 1982 and 1985 should not detract from Webster’s phenomenal efforts away from it, at a time when the Hatters often struggled to survive financially. Most remarkably, the role of manager was just one of several that he assumed - whether officially, or merely out of necessity - in the course of his 16-year employment at EP, starting as: 1. Youth Team ManagerThe arrival of Webster in SK3 coincided with the roll-out of Stockport’s and the nation’s modern postcode systems during 1974, and followed a playing career that had featured a single Football League appearance as a wing-half for Manchester City in the early 1950s, as well as non-league outings later that decade with Ashton United, Hyde, Macclesfield, Stalybridge and North Walian outfits Nantlle Vale and Pwllheli. His boss at the three latter clubs had been Freddie Pye - from whom Webster, by way of a first managerial appointment, actually took over the Stalybridge hot-seat after his gaffer’s dismissal. It would seem, however, that, by the time he joined County’s Board of Directors, Pye still remembered fondly the player who was thrice in his charge - and, following subsequent spells managing Hyde, Runcorn and today’s visiting ‘Robins’, Webster was invited to work with the young players at EP, before moving up to become manager of the Hatters’ youth team. 2. Manager, Caretaker Manager, Assistant Manager… you name it!Webster’s involvement first switched to the senior squad in 1978, as assistant to player-manager Mike Summerbee, and he carried on in the role from the following year alongside Summerbee’s successor, Jimmy McGuigan. With the Hatters having virtually no money for new signings, his contributions were invaluable, as he used his extensive knowledge of the game below League-level in the North West to find players who might be persuaded to join the club at minimum cost. The assistant became a caretaker for four months from the autumn of 1981, when McGuigan was taken ill - and, after the latter finally left EP following a brief return to his managerial duties, Webster, during May 1982, took up the substantive post. During the next three years, the Hatters continued the pattern of their previous dozen, with unspectacular finishes in Division Four - although they did, in 1984, produce hugely creditable performances over two League Cup legs, without conceding in normal time, against Liverpool, who earlier that year had become the first English side to lift three trophies (the League, League Cup and European Cup) in a season. As manager, and faced with the need to sell his best players to bring in money, Webster continued to keep an eye out for new talent - with striker Quinn, on a free transfer from Wigan Athletic, proving his most astute signing, as a raw 20-year-old who proceeded over less than two seasons to score 41 times in only 70 appearances for the Hatters. Webster was replaced in the hot-seat by Colin Murphy in 1985, after County had finished 22nd and needed to seek re-election - but he reverted to an assisting role in support of his replacement, as well as Murphy’s successors - namely, Les Chapman, Jimmy Melia, Asa Hartford and Danny Bergara - up until the summer of 1990. Webster also acted as caretaker manager on more occasions than anybody at EP before or since, adding three such cameos - between Melia’s sacking and Murphy’s return for a second spell, Murphy’s departure for Lincoln City and the arrival of Hartford as player-manager, and Hartford’s dismissal and the advent of what was to be the remarkable Bergara era - to that which he had performed in the absence of McGuigan. 3. Groundsman and ConfidantBeing of the pragmatic, and entirely reasonable, view that while clubs saw managers come and go, they did not tend to sack their groundsmen, Webster looked after the EP pitch for spells either side of his three years as full-time boss - but in conjunction with whatever other responsibilities he was discharging at the time, which, during his latter years in SK3, also included taking non-contract players for training two evenings a week. Needless to say, such was his commitment and devotion to the Hatters’ cause, he maintained one of the best playing surfaces in the League. And then there was the kind of work for which he was not officially employed! As another of his former players, and much-loved County favourite, Oshor Williams, recalled: “ He was also the person many players confided in at the time if they were out of the side or sidelined with injury. We didn’t have a Sports Psychologist, just Eric sharing a cup of tea between his duties and saying, ‘It’s no use feeling sorry for yourself, just get on with it and fight for a place in the side!’. Usually he would intersperse this sound advice with a funny story or a joke and somehow you always felt reassured afterwards.” 4. RecognitionWebster, rather unusually for a member of the County Family who had never played for the Hatters, was granted a testimonial - with his first club, Manchester City, providing the opposition for a well-attended match at EP on 1 August 1990. And in 2006, he was inducted here into the Hall of Fame, by way of further thanks to a man who had combined his passions for football and people with 16 working years throughout which he had lived and breathed County. 5. Eric Webster (b. 24 June 1931, d. 24 January 2016) - County management record in the Football League, 1982-85: P W D L F A 143 45 33 65 180 226 Win %: 31.47. Goals per game ratio: 1.26.
|
|
|
Post by gazz on Mar 26, 2019 19:28:35 GMT
A much-loved Jack of all County trades features in my piece for tonight's programme... except he went by the name of Eric! Brilliant piece, Maccy.
|
|
|
Post by hatter_in_macc on Mar 26, 2019 20:42:27 GMT
Thanks, matey!
|
|
|
Post by hatter_in_macc on Mar 30, 2019 13:46:16 GMT
Today's subject: not everyone's (well, truth be told, anyone's) fave County manager, but one with an interesting story or two behind him!
*****************************************************************************************************
HATTERS’ GAFFERS: CARLTON PALMER
Often derided while playing for club and country, and, subsequently, as County’s most recent player-manager, Carlton Palmer’s misfortunes were not entirely of his own making. Hatter in Macc recalls those early 21st-Century Edgeley Park blues, and also discovers one of the most fleeting appearances ever in Darlington’s Reserves!
If Andy Kilner’s appointment, as a young and untried boss, to manage the Hatters had caused eyebrows to raise ahead of their 1999/2000 campaign in the Football League’s second tier, then so, too, did that of his successor just over a couple of years later.
Carlton Palmer, at 35, was three years older than Kilner had been on assuming a first managerial post. But the former England international had also never previously taken charge of a club. And, unlike his predecessor, he could not boast of any previous County association - which had initially worked in the favour of ‘Killer’, as a popular former player and backroom team-member at EP.
More worryingly, Palmer, on arriving in SK3 on 6 November 2001, inherited a side that, with a third of the campaign played, was rooted at the bottom of the First Division (the Championship, in today’s money), having enjoyed a solitary win from 15 matches under Kilner, who had been sacked after a 4-0 home defeat by Millwall - one of six losses already suffered in SK3 that term.
On the positive side, given County’s predicament, Palmer surely had nothing to lose in terms of reputation? Well, possibly - except that things were about to become a whole lot worse for the Hatters on and off the pitch. And, in the minds of some, he himself brought with him his own certain legacy as a player…
1. Twenty years of playing
The distinctively long-legged midfielder began his career as a youth in 1983, and, subsequently, a professional, with West Bromwich Albion, before plying his trade in the Premier League with Sheffield Wednesday, Leeds United, Southampton, Nottingham First and Coventry City. Palmer’s time at Southampton did, in fact, have a County connection or two of sorts, as the manager who bought him for the ‘Saints’ from Leeds, at the cost of a cool million, was recently-departed Hatters’ Gaffer Dave Jones, in September 1997 - and some 16 months later, Jones sold him on for £100,000 more to Forest, while bringing in one-time County midfield maestro Chris Marsden, via Birmingham City, as his replacement.
Jones once quipped that Palmer ‘covers every blade of grass out there, but that’s only because his first touch is so…’ erm, poor. I paraphrase the final word to avoid Jonesy’s mild profanity, but you get the gist. And, in fact, what he said summed up pretty well most neutrals’ view of Palmer the player, who was appreciated for his industry and work ethic, as well as for his aerial strength and ability to win the ball, but not so much for his aesthetic value. And, in the course of earning 18 international caps, he had the misfortune to be part of, and forever associated with, the England squad that failed to qualify for the 1994 World Cup Finals.
2. Four years of managing
Palmer was the sixth - and remains the last - County manager to be simultaneously engaged in a playing capacity, and the first player-boss at EP since Asa Hartford, who, as it happened, had been in charge when Palmer’s chairman Brendan Ellwood assumed the board hot-seat in 1988.
His managerial reign began respectably enough with a draw at mid-table Watford, and was immediately followed in SK3 by a 2-1 triumph against play-off contenders Norwich City (with the winner coming courtesy of a terrific solo effort by the new gaffer, moments after bringing himself off the bench!) that dared Hatters to dream. But they were promptly woken up by a 5-0 spanking at Palmer’s old club Sheffield Wednesday, and fell into a nightmare as County lost a further nine straight games. Relegation into the third tier was confirmed as early as 16 March 2002 at Selhurst Park against Wimbledon, and, although the very next game did see Palmer - thanks to John Hardiker’s late brace - preside on the hallowed Edgeley turf over a victory at the expense of champions-elect Manchester City, the campaign as a whole was a wretched one, with County finishing bottom and setting an unwanted club record for the most goals (102) conceded in a season. Palmer’s next, and only full, term in charge saw the Hatters finish a modest 14th in the third tier - but away from the action, change and uncertainty were afoot, as, during the summer of 2003, Ellwood sold the club to Sale Sharks owner Brian Kennedy, whose ‘Cheshire Sport’ company took over EP and the football and rugby outfits that played on it. And with the ensuing 2003/04 season just past mid-September, when the Hatters lay fourth from bottom, Palmer was dismissed.
He made a return to management in unusual circumstances just over a year later at Mansfield Town, where Keith Curle had been suspended for (although was later cleared of) bullying allegations with respect to a Youth Team player. Palmer initially worked at Field Mill on a temporary basis and without pay, before signing a contract in March 2005 - but stepped down six months later with Mansfield lurking near the League Two trapdoor.
3. Ninety minutes of trialling for ‘Darlo’
It was one of those classic ‘blink and miss it’ associations - but two months after leaving SK3, Palmer turned out in a trial Reserve-match for the ‘Quakers’ against Hartlepool, which, by way of added obscurity, took place at Billingham Town’s Bedford Terrace ground. Palmer made his mark - however brief - on club history with an own goal, as Darlo were edged out 3-2.
4. More than a decade of other activity
Palmer did not return to football management following his departure from Mansfield - but, less directly, has retained involvement in the sport as a TV pundit, as Director of Sport at Wellington College in Shanghai, and as the founder of a football academy in Dubai. Add to the mix his brief ownership of an online estate agency, his appearance in the bath for a Paddy Power commercial, and his victory in a football-special episode of ‘Come Dine With Me’, and you have a life that (thanks also to a life-saving heart operation in 2016) continues to be lived as eclectically as it was once played out on the pitch and in the dugout.
5. Carlton Palmer (b. 5 December 1965) - County management record in the Football League, 2001-03:
P W D L F A 83 29 8 46 99 147
Win %: 34.94. Goals per game ratio: 1.19.
|
|
|
Post by hatter_in_macc on Apr 13, 2019 12:25:03 GMT
The (hopefully!) penultimate one of this term... with a rather less obscure subject planned for the Curzon issue!
*****************************************************************************************************
HATTERS’ GAFFERS: BILLY NEWTON
Hatter in Macc discovers that rare thing of a player who not only turned out for both County and today’s visitors - but also liked it here so much that he stayed around for over 30 years, and was twice a Caretaker Hatters’ Gaffer, after hanging up his boots.
Individual connections between our club and the visiting Spartans are precious few. Supporters on both sides will, of course, immediately point to the obvious one - in the form of Blyth’s current boss, who, on the pitch over two decades ago, was a firm favourite at Edgeley Park, with 160 appearances and 49 goals for the Hatters between 1994 and 1998.
Despite featuring briefly at non-league level in his native North-East towards the end of his playing career, Alun Armstrong did not, as it happens, ever take to the field for Blyth. But a trawl much further back in time reveals one man who did ply his playing trade for both clubs - once as a pre-Great War Spartan, and in two separate spells as a post-Great War Hatter - as well as jointly and temporarily taking up the managerial reins at EP on a couple of occasions, eight years apart.
That man - who came into the world 15 miles away from Armstrong’s Gateshead birthplace, but more than three quarters of a century earlier than ‘Super Al’ - was Billy Newton.
Want to learn more? Howay we go, then…
1. Into battle as a Spartan
In the summer of 1913, Britain was just a year away from the so-dubbed ‘war to end all wars’ that embroiled most of the European nations, together with Russia, the United States and the Middle East, for varying periods until 1918.
But Great War clouds were still on the relatively distant horizon here, as Blyth Spartans followed up their title-winning 1912/13 season in the Northern Alliance by turning semi-professional and progressing to the next-tier North-Eastern League. And, having moved up from his home village of Quebec in County Durham to work on the Blyth shipyards, Newton - at 15, just a year older than the Croft Park outfit established in 1899 - joined his new local club as a wing-half, and helped the Spartans to complete the inaugural season at their new level in a very respectable sixth position. They were to drop to a 15th-place finish the following term - but by the start of that campaign, the country was at war, and until hostilities ceased Newton’s football was confined to appearances for his works team at Hartford Colliery in Blyth Valley.
2. Mr Churchill? Oh yes!
Following the 1918 armistice, Newton looked to press on with a career in football. And he thought big in the first instance - joining top-flight Newcastle United for 1919/20, but only to find himself among over 60 playing-staff members, and without an opportunity to break into the first team. Undeterred, he proceeded to make Football League appearances over the next seven years with Cardiff City, Leicester City and Grimsby Town - and whilst at Leicester, just ahead of the 1923 December Advent and a Second Division contest with high-flying South Shields, he got to shake hands on the old Filbert Street pitch with Winston Churchill, who was standing locally as a Liberal General Election candidate. It all worked out rather well on the afternoon with Newton and his team-mates, who ran out 4-1 winners. But for Churchill, it was less than his finest hour, when he turned up for the West Leicester count on a foggy night the following Thursday to discover the voters had rejected him!
3. Twice a County player
Newton moved from Grimsby to Edgeley in 1927, to begin an association with the Hatters of more than four decades. His first playing spell at EP up to 1931, under then-manager Lincoln Hyde, included a trilogy of top-three finishes that saw the Hatters narrowly fail to win promotion from Division Three North - and featured throughout consistently high-scoring sides playing attractive football for the County Faithful of the day to enjoy. Hyde’s departure from the hot-seat coincided with Newton’s transfer to Hull City for 1931/32, but at the end of that season he was back at EP to take up appointment as player-coach to County’s third team. His return did not lead to any further first-team appearances, before he retired from playing, just before turning 35 in 1933, to become the reserves’ trainer.
4. Twice a Hatters’ Gaffer (pro tem)
Fred Westgarth, who managed County for the whole of 1933/34 while designated ‘trainer’, elevated Newton to the latter status upon being formally recognised as the club’s boss following the end of his first campaign in charge. And it was as first-team trainer that Newton was to spend the next 35 years - give or take a couple of interruptions for a spot of caretaker management!
Back in an era when football managers did not tend to get chopped and changed with quite the regularity that they do nowadays, Newton’s time as a member of the training staff still saw a dozen gaffers come and go - as well as a Second World War! - and during two managerial hiatuses, he was asked to act jointly in a caretaker capacity with a fellow coach. Andy Beattie’s capture by Huddersfield Town towards the end of 1951/52 saw Newton preside with Alex Herd over first-team affairs until Dick Duckworth arrived from York City as an eventual replacement for Beattie after 15 games of the following season. And the dismissal of County’s first player-manager Willie Moir led to Newton’s and Roy Clarke’s appointments as co-caretakers for the first two months of the 1960/61 campaign, in which the duo oversaw an impressive run of 12 games including eight wins and just one defeat - a sequence that would never be bettered by the next substantive appointee, Reg Flewin, during the three years of his tenure.
Newton’s unstinting and dedicated service to County received due recognition in 1969, through the award to him of a joint testimonial with Jimmy Stevenson, another former Hatter (although not one alongside whom Newton ever played) to have remained on the backroom staff at EP since the mid-1930s.
5. Billy Newton (b. 6 August 1898, d. 29 April 1973) - County joint-caretaker management record in the Football League, 1952 and 1960 (two spells):
P W D L F A 31 13 10 8 55 39
Win %: 41.94. Goals per game ratio: 1.77.
|
|
|
Post by hatter_in_macc on Apr 22, 2019 12:26:00 GMT
Final piece of this season's series below. Let us hope that the spirit of Danny comes to the fore in the games yet to come... Thanks very much to those Heaveners who have been reading. ***************************************************************************************************** HATTERS’ GAFFERS: DANNY BERGARAAs we approach the end of what has undoubtedly been County’s most exciting and enjoyable campaign in years, Hatter in Macc recalls how the arrival at Edgeley Park of a little-known Uruguayan whetted the appetites of success-starved Hatters three decades ago.When recently-arrived chairman Brendan Elwood brought in a 46-year-old South American manager to replace departed player-boss Asa Hartford during March 1989, there was little accompanying fanfare. In many ways, that should have come as no surprise. The Hatters were, after all, approaching the end of their 19th consecutive season of under-achieving in the Fourth Division where, since 1971, they had managed only four top-half finishes - and, even then, never ended up higher than 11th. Danny Bergara’s name hardly set tongues wagging with anticipation, either. It was, true enough, a novelty in those days for a club at any level of the Football League - let alone its basement, in which County dwelled - to appoint an overseas gaffer. But while the former Uruguayan Under-21 striker had, between the late 1950s and early ‘70s, enjoyed a successful playing career in his home country and city with Montevideo’s Racing Club, as well as in Spain’s La Liga with Real Mallorca, Sevilla and Tenerife, his only previous experience of FL management - following coaching stints at Luton Town, Sheffield United and Middlesbrough, and spells looking after England’s youth and Brunei’s national teams - had been seven months in charge of Rochdale, immediately before his move to SK3. And while the Hatters under Bergara drew more than half of their remaining matches in the spring of 1989 to finish 20th, the absence of any victories during his first weeks leading to the close-season did not explicitly, in the minds of the County Faithful, suggest great hope for the future. What followed, then, was all the more remarkable, as The Man From Uruguay, over the next six years, sparked what was to be a decade of boom for County - earning himself in the process an unprecedented affection from those associated with the club and a special place in our hearts. And these are some of the reasons why we adored him, and continue to cherish his memory… 1. Success on the fieldThe obvious one, granted. But it cannot be left unsaid, given the two decades of suffering - with some real glimpses of potential oblivion thrown in - that preceded Bergara’s arrival. In his first season-proper at the helm, much of that was shaken off, as County finished fourth to make the play-offs. And while the campaign ended in setback, with a 6-0 aggregate defeat to Chesterfield, it had seen a significant upturn in the club’s fortunes. Furthermore, it was not to be a ‘one-off’ - as the Hatters, a year later in 1991, finished second to gain promotion to Division Three. Bergara’s remaining three full seasons, all in the third tier, saw the Hatters achieve play-off finishes for each of the years (and in two instances reach the finals), as well as getting to the Autoglass (Football League Trophy) finals of 1992 and 1993. He thus became the first manager from beyond the British Isles to lead out a Football League team at Wembley - and not once, but four times. Alas for Bergara, County returned home from the national stadium empty-handed on each occasion. But for all the ultimate disappointment, he had given Hatters cause to cheer again - and pushed comedians of the day towards other clubs for their stand-up material. He could even claim indirect involvement in an assist for a Wembley goal, with a tumultuous chant by Twelfth Man representatives of ‘Danny Bergara’s Blue and White Army’ having virtually sucked the ball into Port Vale’s net for a consolation in the 1993 Autoglass Final. 2. Transformation of playersWhat Bergara had also done was form a squad of players from unspectacular backgrounds of whom County supporters could truly think as heroes. South American by birth and upbringing he might have been, but, for him, there was an equally important place alongside expressive skill and flair for the more traditional, unsung British qualities of team-work and hard graft. This philosophy brought together a number of unknown or previously-unremarkable footballers who thrived under County to become fearsomely good ones: like prolific six-foot seven-inch striker Kevin Francis - later voted ‘County Player of the Century’ - who scored over 30 goals for the season two years running; ‘Captain Fantastic’ Mike Flynn, who wore his heart on his sleeve as he marshalled the defence; the tenacious Peter Ward in midfield; and a certain James Gannon, whose versatility saw him win plaudits playing alongside each one of those three at various times. 3. ‘We may only have a small house, but we have a bloody big heart.’Like Colin Murphy before him, Bergara was a Hatters’ Gaffer whose programme notes simultaneously enthralled and mystified. The Uruguayan tended to favour unexpected football analogies - such as housebuilding or Christmas dinner - over Murphy’s inventive and complex application of language. But his musings were equally, not to mention as joyfully, idiosyncratic - and ensured that our award-winning publication’s ancestor-issues from the early 1990s were, then as they are now, an absolute must-read! 4. Danny rememberedBergara had later, unproductive spells managing Rotherham United and Doncaster Rovers - having left the Hatters without quite managing, despite three near-misses, to take them up to the First Division (today’s Championship). But his successor, and former assistant, Dave Jones, did so in 1997 - and with a squad that included a number of players who had first flourished under the Uruguayan’s guidance. Ten years later, the link between the two men returned to the forefront of the club’s consciousness - albeit in the saddest of circumstances, when Bergara died, following a short illness and one day after his 65th birthday. Three days later, a scheduled July friendly at EP with Cardiff City - then managed by Jones - became ‘Danny Day’, and, as such, an emotionally-charged pre-season occasion during which the ‘Danny Bergara’s Blue and White Army’ chant rang out for as long, and as passionately, as it once had at Wembley. Present-day reminders of the much-loved Hatters’ Gaffer are around the ground, too - in the Main Stand, named after him seven years ago, and at the Railway End, where his country’s flag continues to be flown in tribute. Here’s to The Man From Uruguay. 5. Daniel Alberto Bergara de Medina (b. 24 July 1942, d. 25 July 2007) - County management record in the Football League, 1989-95: P W D L F A 281 125 76 80 446 329 Win %: 44.48. Goal per game ratio: 1.59.
|
|