Rochdale Division

Chris Fitzgerald

Description

Rochdale AFC had occupied the fourth tier of English football for so long that the division was unofficially named after them. In 2006, manager Keith Hill took charge and transformed the unfashionable, cash-strapped club into a side known for flowing football and overachievement. But what about the other Rochdale bosses? Those who sought to rid The Dale of its tiresome fourth-tier anchor? The Rochdale Division is told by the managers and players, who reveal the struggles and joys of life at an out-of-step club in the modern football age. It features managers such as Hill himself, Mick Docherty, Graham Barrow, Paul Simpson, Steve Parkin, Steve Eyre and John Coleman, plus the players they led. The book shares insights from cultured centre-half Alan Reeves, Rochdale's sons Craig Dawson and Matt Gilks, prolific strikers Rickie Lambert and Adam Le Fondre, fleet-footed Will Buckley and Paddy McCourt, plus powerhouse Glenn Murray. Alongside them are cult heroes Steve Whitehall, Shaun Reid, Gary Jones, Calvin Andrew and Ian Henderson.

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 31 octobre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781801504102
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2022
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
Chris Fitzgerald, 2022
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Print ISBN 9781801503778
eBook ISBN 9781801504102
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Contents
Introduction
Timeline
Part I: The Managers
Mick Docherty
Graham Barrow
Steve Parkin
Paul Simpson
Keith Hill
Steve Eyre
John Coleman
Chris Dunphy
Part II: The Players
Alan Reeves
Matt Gilks
Rickie Lambert
Glenn Murray
Will Buckley
Adam Le Fondre
Craig Dawson
The Others
Part III: The Cult
Shaun Reid
Steve Whitehall
Gary Jones
Paddy McCourt
Ian Henderson
Calvin Andrew
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
Photos
In memory of club saviour David F. Kilpatrick and dedicated to all of those who make Rochdale AFC mean so much to so many.
Introduction
AS I picked my way among the throng of fellow supporters milling around the pop-up beer stall and inflatable penalty goals that had been erected outside Spotland Stadium, it truly hit home what Rochdale AFC means to me, and to all of its followers.
The festival occasion the club had put on to mark its 100 unbroken years of Football League membership took on an extra resonance. It wasn t just a nod to a sentimental milestone, it was a nod to survival, against all odds. Formed in 1907 and accepted into the Football League in 1921, never has the club been penalised for living beyond its means, nor has it ever sought to be more than the community-based hub it truly is. This is largely down to a legacy of like-mindedness.
Occupying that grey area of geographical identity between Greater Manchester and Lancashire, and living in a deep, enveloping shadow of football behemoths on all sides, Rochdale has always offered something different to the extravagant norm.
In a world of haves and have nots, football is seen as an anomaly. At the top end of the spectrum, many clubs, let alone the players who pull on their shirts, have lost most of the roots which bound them to their communities. Lifelong fans can no longer afford the ticket prices to go to games. This has never been an issue for Rochdale AFC. It has always been an inclusive place, where ageing supporters have easily been able to bring the next generation, hoping they too will catch the bug and continue the legacy.
The centenary event in August 2021 was a celebration of strength and durability. For a small club such as Rochdale AFC, 100 unbroken years in the Football League is quite remarkable. In that time, the club has survived league re-elections, mismanagement by celebrity chairmen, an attempted hostile takeover and a global pandemic.
However, those 100 years have also brought with them little in the way of success on the field.
In fact, for so long had Rochdale AFC occupied the fourth tier of English football - from 1921 to 1969 and then 1974 to 2010 - that the division was unofficially named after it. The Rochdale Division ; the bestowment wasn t meant as a compliment.
When I began supporting the club in 1988, as an eight-year-old boy, the gates were little over 1,000 and the players on the pitch were not the athletes who take to the field today. The latter was not unusual; it was typical of British football as a whole - but a revolution was coming that would leave Rochdale even further behind football s elite.
By the late 1980s, English football was beginning to unravel. Since the glory of the World Cup win in 1966, the game had become mired by hooliganism. The working man s sport seemed to mirror the plight of the working classes in Thatcher s Britain. Grounds were crumbling and unsafe, facilities were poor; admission prices were rising. The product on the park was a far cry from the days of Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Bobby Charlton.
Football s reinvention came at a critical - in fact literally terminal - time for the game. A series of separate disasters, at Heysel, Bradford and Hillsborough, resulted in the tragic deaths of hundreds of fans. These off-the-pitch events forced clubs and authorities to drag the game into the modern world, and turn it from a relic of a bygone age into a world-leading example of a premier entertainment event.
New stadia emerged from the crumbling terraces in towns and cities across the country. Shiny, plastic, all-seated, family-friendly places. They were safe, comfortable, easier to police.
Meanwhile, media magnate Rupert Murdoch took a gamble with his newly launched satellite television service and started to invest unprecedented sums of money into the elite end of the game. This, coupled with the rebrand of the European Cup to the Champions League, brought the promise of pots of gold at the end of the goal line.
English football was quick to exploit the potential. A new Premier League marketed itself aggressively, attracting affluent new spectators prepared to spend thousands of pounds to become a passive part of an upwardly mobile pastime.
This was great for the top clubs, but the money was slow to trickle down to Rochdale s level. Admirably, while this revolution was taking place, Rochdale refused to bite. The club stayed true to what it had always been. Other clubs overstretched themselves in order to buy a quick ticket to the big time, the inevitable outcome being that the administrators were called in and league points were docked.
But, while it is remarkable that Rochdale relied on player sales, meagre gates and the occasional benevolence of directors to get by, it is perhaps even more commendable that a string of managers during this period agreed to take on the footballing challenge that comes with austerity.
Only one man has managed to triumph against this adversity at Rochdale during the Premier League era. Keith Hill, unarguably the best to ever hold the post of manager, took an unfashionable, penurious club and made it known for flowing football and overachievement. In 2015, the club accomplished its highest-ever league finish - eighth in the third tier. Heady days indeed.
It was all achieved without a rich benefactor too, nor via the club spending beyond its means. Spotland Stadium, while having undergone some modernisation, still remained the quaint back-street sanctuary it always was, an agreeable contrary to the new generation of out-of-town identikit monstrosities other teams now call home.
Other men sought to achieve the greatness experienced by Hill, both before and after him, seeking to rid the club of its tiresome fourth-tier anchor or, latterly, to keep Rochdale at the next level. None succeeded.
The first pages of this book contain the accounts of managers who, at differing points over the past 30 years, have sought to make their own mark, each under a divergent set of circumstances.
This book is not meant to be an exhaustive or comprehensive account of the club s history during this time. It is instead a chance to explore the viewpoint of these managers, to obtain an insight that fans in the stands were never privy to. It is an attempt to understand what possessed them to manage little old Rochdale in the first place and how they found the experience. Mick Docherty describes the task akin to batting against thunder . This analogy sounds so fitting, conjuring a perfect image of impossibility.
I want to thank each and every one of those who contributed, not just for talking to me, but for being open and honest about a period in their career that was not always easy. Each provided a unique insight into the struggles and joys of managing a traditionally unfashionable club in the modern age. For the managers I was unable to speak to - John Hollins and Alan Buckley - I turned to former players Gareth Griffiths and Paul Connor to share their memories of what it was like to play under these men for the limited time they were in charge.
And it isn t just the managers who deserve credit for taking on the impossible. The players, too, countless numbers of them, have contributed to both Rochdale s achievements and bank balance over the past 30 years.
While the Premier League is seen by many as a detriment to lower-league football in England, it still remains the dream of almost all players to make it to the elite end of the game. But when does a player transition from being merely good enough to play and become elite? Is it all technical? Or does physicality and mentality play a part, too? What makes a player not only talented enough to play the professional game, but also intelligent enough to retain and then execute manoeuvres akin to a seasoned chess player - without the time to ponder them?
Throughout the 1980s and most of the 1990s, it was rare to see any Rochdale player demonstrate what could be termed an elite level of ability. The club was, on the whole, a destination for players who were on the downward slope of their career path, the last stop on the lower-league journeyman express.
But from the turn of the century, a not insignificant number of players went on to achieve their dreams at the top end of the game. I ask them, in their view, what they had within themselves that so many others didn t. Perhaps more importantly, I also wanted to find