But I am sure that he will be okay and that he will come back and do a good job for another club.”Ward, who has held managerial posts at York and both Bristol clubs, says he is now focusing on Saturday’s game at Sheffield Wednesday.. The Maracana, the Nou Camp, the Bernabeu, the San Siro, Haig Avenue, what hallowed temples they are Just think of the deities who have illuminated them.. Pele, Maradona, Figo, Rivaldo, Ronaldo, Eric Redrobe Especially Eric Redrobe. The Maracana, the Nou Camp, the Bernabeu, the San Siro, Haig Avenue, what hallowed temples they are Just think of the deities who have illuminated them.. Pele, Maradona, Figo, Rivaldo, Ronaldo, Eric Redrobe. Especially Eric Redrobe.
Southport were my first footballing love, rather cuckolded over the years by mighty Everton 17 miles down the A565, and yet one can never turn one’s back completely on one’s first love Bury v Southport at Gigg Lane, circa 1971 That was a momentous rite of passage, my first away match Can’t remember the result. Can remember my yellow-and-blue scarf flapping from the car window all the way along the East Lancs Road.And I can certainly remember the players… Eric Redrobe, Jim Fryatt, Andy Provan, names to conjure with still.

When the Brick End chanted “Give us an A, give us an N…” and so on to the end of Andy Provan’s name, I almost fainted with pleasure. Provan was my favourite player, a little inside-forward with fiendish dribbling skills, although not fiendish enough, it strikes me now with a dull thud, to play outside the old Fourth Division.At the time, I revered him. And the idea that you could be nine years old and lend your unbroken voice to a chant led by men aged maybe 18 or more… oh, what heady stuff that was, more intoxicating even than a Vimto milkshake from Salt’s Embassy Restaurant.I derived huge delight, too, from oddments of trivia. Hey, did you know that Jim Fryatt, our centre-forward who looked like Lurch, scored the quickest goal ever in league football, barely four seconds after kick-off, though sadly not for Southport? Bizarrely, the golfer Ed Fryatt, who is quite a whizz on the US Tour, is said to be Big Jim’s son How did that happen? And here’s some more trivia. Tony Field, another darling of the Brick End, later joined New York Cosmos at the same time as Pele Imagine the dressing-room introductions “Hi, didn’t you used to play for Brazil?” “Yeah.

Weren’t you at Haig Avenue for a while?”So here I am, back where it all started, this fierce passion of mine, for the first time in more than 20 years. Here to meet Mark Wright, once of Liverpool and England, but far more importantly, manager of Southport for the past 12 months almost to the day. He took over on 15 December 1999, with Southport a miserable 18th place in the Nationwide Conference. Now they stand third, with two games in hand over second-placed Rushden & Diamonds. Admittedly, Yeovil, the leaders, have a handsome lead, but even so, it doesn’t seem too fanciful to envisage Southport back in the league from which they were unceremoniously booted in 1978, and replaced by sodding Wigan.Moreover, Yeovil and Rushden and five other Conference clubs are proper professional outfits. Southport are still part-timers, so their lofty position makes them officially the best part-time club in the country.Wright’s shrewd signings include his old Liverpool team-mate Mike Marsh, who came from Jan Molby’s Kidderminster Harriers, and, from Carlisle United, the former Aston Villa defender and Southport native Shaun Teale. Meanwhile, Wright’s progress has been clocked by his first club, struggling Oxford United, who recently asked the Southport chairman, Charlie Clapham, for permission to approach him Clapham refused.

He knows that he’s on to a good thing.The Good Thing keeps me waiting for half an hour but that’s OK, it gives me time to wander outside, to survey the Brick End and the Blowick End opposite, to gaze at the luscious Haig Avenue turf and think back to the glorious day in April 1973 when our wily, bold, brilliant manager, Jimmy Meadows (sacked a year later), masterminded the 1-1 draw against Hartlepool United which secured promotion to the Third Division. The all-important point came courtesy of a late equaliser from Alex Russell, a spectacular 25-yard free-kick, and after the final whistle I joined a euphoric pitch invasion, and … “excuse me, hello, hello, HELLO! Mark’s ready for you now”.Disappointingly, Wright doesn’t seem remotely interested in these sparkling reminiscences. No, sorry, he’s never heard of Eric Redrobe or Jim Fryatt or Andy Provan or Alex Russell He knows that Ronnie Moore was here for a while, though Inwardly, I am scornful Ronnie Moore? Who gives a toss about Ronnie Moore.