Darren Hepworth may not be able to say he guided Emley AFC to their holy grail of promotion, but he certainly put them back on the map during his seven memorable years as manager.
He was so close to achieving to promotion on two occasions. Emley lost the 2016 NCEL Division One play-off final on penalties to Bottesford and 12 months later they missed out on automatic promotion by three goals before losing in the play-offs semi-finals to Penistone Church.
That’s when Hepworth bowed out because of a genuine change in his work commitments.
Some will regard his reign as a failure due to him not guiding Emley into the Premier Division. Others will say it was a success and will point to the infrastructure he helped build and the list of players he introduced to Non League Football from Ruben Jerome, Liam Schofield, Ash Flynn to John Cyrus and numerous others.
In this brand new interview with Non League Yorkshire, Hepworth reminisces about his infamous Friday crucification and subsequent Sunday resurrection, Mick Clark’s jiu jitsu moves, Flynn’s Panenka penalty, his trademark 50-yard goal celebration sprints, victories over Shaw Lane Aquaforce, the unforgettable Wigan Robin Park FA Cup tie and many more parts of his journey.
This is Darren Hepworth’s Non League Journey:
“Originally I was running Emley’s second team, the Development squad when I first went up there and in my first season (2009/10) I got to know Ian Banks really well. He was the first team manager at the time. I’ve read in previous articles people saying he the best tactically aware and knowledgeable manager they played for and I couldn’t agree more. As a coach he was a real technician and he understood the game inside out. In some ways he was too good. Some of his ideas were too complex if you like. He tried to involve me with the first team when he could so I got a bit of insight into the Non League world then. I got to know the players too. In a way that gave me my break. I was really sad to him go when he parted company with the club (May 2010) and that’s when Blandy (Darren Bland) came in.
“Blandy’s a great guy. He’s been around the Non League scene a long time. Like Banger he’d had a really good career as a player and he came in with his own ideas and his own people. It has been said before, but the challenge he had was that he was from Sheffield and a lot of his contacts and players he knew were from that area. Trying to integrate them into the local scene was always going to be a challenge for him.”
Assistant Manager for a Month
“At the end of the October (2010), his right-hand man (John Hayden) left and Blandy said to me ‘look Daz, do you fancy taking the step up by becoming my assistant’? I jumped at the chance and grabbed it with both hands. I thought those opportunities don’t come along very often. I knew I would learn, but we were struggling in the league so I didn’t know how long it was going to be for or how it would go? To this day I’m grateful for Blandy giving me the chance.
“I was his assistant for literally a few weeks. Blandy was an ambitious guy and he runs a very successful business in his own right so whilst football was important to him, he had a lot on. He was also doing a lot of work with the Sheffield United academy. He got an opportunity to do more there and he rang me and said ‘I know we have been only working together for a few weeks, but I’ve got this opportunity’. We were due to play Sheffield FC in the Sheffield Cup that week and we got absolutely walloped (8-1). You knew what was coming as we were walking off. I had to grow up quickly because picking the players up after such a defeat was one thing, but the stick we got from the crowd was something else. One thing I know is that with Emley fans; if the players put a shift in win, lose or draw supporters will always back you. But at the time it just wasn’t working and it was kind of a perfect storm for Blandy as he had this opportunity at Sheffield United and at the same time it wasn’t working as well as he wanted at Emley. He rang me and said ‘I know you have got the respect of the dressing room from the short time you’ve been in there and I’m going to recommend you to replace me’. To be fair to (then chairman) John Whitehead and the committee they endorsed me and said ‘Daz, you’ve got until the end of the season’.”
Darren Hepworth – Emley caretaker manager
“As luck would have it, just as I was about to take over, we had an early winter. I had to basically wait three weeks before I could take charge of my first game. It is the best thing that could have happened because we trained as much as we could. We had a great set of players, Steve Kenworthy, Marc Townsend, Antony Leech, Sean Hazleden, really good players. Credit to them because they accepted me and trusted me and in a short space of time I was able to give them some belief and get them back enjoying the game. We worked really hard in training and we did a lot of fitness work. We almost did a pre-season. Whilst a lot of teams would have been caught out by the weather, we went to work. By the time I got to take charge of my first game we were a different side – both mentally and physical. I’m naturally quite passionate guy and I always believed in my players. They really responded and we started picking up points and we went from 17th to eighth in the first season. It was a great way for me to establish myself and off the back of our results the club offered me the job permanently.”
Mick Clark causes Abandonment of Eccleshill game (October 2011)
“We were 1-0 up late on in the game and you saw Clarky doing a bit of time-wasting after he had picked the ball up. Clarky was quite a unique character, but the (Eccleshill) kid knocked it out of his hands, no question and it was obvious to anyone watching. He’s then knocked the ball in. For a split second you process it and I thought the ref is obviously not going to give the goal. I looked over to the linesman and he’s signalling for a goal and I’m thinking ‘is he for real’? All the Eccleshill lads are going nuts because they’ve equalised and we couldn’t believe it.
“Clarky took the law into his own hands as he walked off the pitch. I was shouting at the linesman ‘let me go and talk to him’. The referee and linesman then said ‘stay in your technical area or you’re off’. Clarky was in the dressing room and I’m thinking ‘what’s going to happen next’? Eventually he came out and the referee showed him a yellow for leaving the field of play. At that point you know he’s not going to change his mind, so you just want the game finished so you can deal with it afterwards. Clarky then reacted to the yellow card and after some verbals, the referee showed him a red. The funniest thing about it is then Clarky sat on the ball and decided not to leave the field. So you had this bizarre situation where he’d gone off and then he’d come back and was now refusing to leave.
“What I do remember is that it was a red hot day and a load of their supporters had been in the bar all day and had clearly had a few pints. The referee abandoned the game and you had this situation where you had supporters on the pitch including one particular meathead who I do remember. Me and a couple of our lads went over to Clarky as a few Eccleshill lads were getting irate and you had this meathead coming on intent on knocking seven bells out of Clarky. I’m stood between Clarky and this meathead and part of me was thinking ‘I’m just going to step aside here’! Thankfully we managed to get back into the dressing room and it calmed down.
“Still to this day it is one of the most bizarre things I have ever seen. He was the first player I sacked, I didn’t want to. I said to the club that he was a great goalkeeper and trying to replace key positions like that isn’t easy. I had no choice because he did have previous disciplinary issues and the committee, I wouldn’t say overruled me, but they made it clear where their heads were at.
“There was the Worsbrough game where he came out and started practising jiu jitsu outside the penalty area. It wasn’t even a good jiu jitsu move! Then there’s the Pontefract game when he squirted water at the referee and got sent off. We were unaware until he came into the dressing room at half-time. So really we had no choice to sack him.”
David Heagney (2011-12)
“We started that my first full season strongly as David Heagney was on fire for us until he went to Australia. What a player. He scored in 14 consecutive games for us. Heagy’s came to us in pre-season and he’d had some serious injury problems over the years and he had been a pro in Scotland. I think he was working as a roofer in Huddersfield and he said to me when he trained in the summer ‘look Daz, I just want to get fit and see where it goes’. You could see instantly that he was a top player. You could see with his touch, the way he carried himself. He was a top talent and I knew if he could him firing and even if we only had him for a season that he was someone who could get 20/30 goals and make the difference
“I built up a fantastic relationship with him and we got him firing. A big part of my ethos is enjoyment and we got him enjoying playing again as well. We got this phone call from this club in Perth and we were thinking Scotland. I didn’t think it was going to be Australia. So he got this opportunity to go out there and you can’t turn that down when you’re 20/21.
“I might not have won trophies, but I look back on my time and see that I’ve improved people as people, not just as footballers. For me that’s better than winning a trophy and Dave is one person I look at and think that I’ve played a small part in him getting his love for football back and him using football to change his life. I went to his family leaving do as his family invited me to and I was really humbled by that. It was nice to be part of what was an emotional and special occasion for him.”
Ash Flynn Bursts on the Scene (2012/13)
“The season after Dave left, a certain Ash Flynn signed and he scored 42 goals in his first season. I have obviously got to know Flynny really well and he’s the best natural goal-scorer that I’ve ever seen. As a manager you’re judged on the results and in a day and age when facts are important, Flynn scores goals. The stats back it up. One man never makes a team and that was never the case either with Flynny. You had to accept with him that there were certain things he wouldn’t do. So if you wanted him to go and chase full-backs, he wouldn’t. But what he would do; if there was anything that floated in and around the 18-yard box he’d be on it in a heartbeat and it would end up in a goal more often than not. He’s still smashing the goals and at this level you’ll struggle to find anyone better, but he has that edge and arrogance that you need. Underneath all that he’s a top bloke.”
Emley are back on the Football Map (2012/13)
“The FA Vase run (to the fourth round) put the club back on the map. The likes of John Cyrus, Anthony Haigh, Paul Sykes were involved at that stage and we started to get the nucleus of a good side. The FA Vase run was testament to that. Flynny with his goals were massive and with someone like that in your team you stand a chance because you believe you can win any game. I had a very clear vision then in terms of what I wanted to do at the club and where I wanted to take it so I think it was an important season.
“The Barnoldswick game is one game of the Vase run I always remember. It was just a great day and occasion. We knew we were the underdogs and it was a fantastic day for the supporters. It was a well deserved victory and a tremendous performance. It wasn’t a flukey result. It was also probably the first notable run down the touchline to celebrate a goal!”
50-yard Celebration Sprints
“I had a few rushes of blood over the years! I think anyone will tell you that when you celebrate a goal they lose all sense of where they are. I’ve played the game myself and I’ve taken that spirit into coaching. I always liked to celebrate in the best way possible which was to go and join in the players. I loved doing it and it became a trademark. I know it annoyed the hell out of the opposition and opposition managers. The officials were generally alright about it, apart from at Yorkshire Amateur when I got sent off! But it was all instinctive and harmless. I never incited anyone. One thing I never did was run across the opposition technical area to join in. There were occasions when I ran across the pitch.
“I once got a letter from the NCEL to warn me about my celebrations. I think that was one of a number of times that Andrew Painten got me out of jail with his skills as a letter writer.”
Infrastructure and Further Success Stories with Players
“We didn’t have a big budget and I could see real threats around. You had Shaw Lane coming in around that time (2013) and it was clear they had a plan of going up the leagues quite quickly. They did and they had the budget behind them. Equally I was looking at teams like Shelley who you could see were starting to really think about how they could build their infrastructure through the Junior set-up and even the women’s game. I could see that their first team would get to a point where they had players coming through naturally. As Emley manager I was worried about that and where the club would ultimately go. I was very ambitious and I wanted nothing more than to take the club up through the leagues, but equally I was conscious of how we were going to do that and have a club in 20 years’ time, not for the next two. We set up the U19s/U21s squads and I was really passionate about that and the tie-up with Kirklees College which was really good from a branding point of a view. It also opened up a gateway or pipeline for young local talent to come to Emley.
“We had real success with the U19s/U21s. Your Jordan Townend’s, your Ruben Jerome’s, two young lads in particular who have gone on to do fantastically well. I always thought Ruben would make it as a pro and I always thought John Cyrus would. JC is an interesting one because he was playing Basketball when I first met him. I actually brought him through when I was the development team manager. He was an athlete and a fantastic specimen. His brother has done well in the game. I thought he had all the attributes to make it at the top level.
“What a talent Liam Schofield was and is. People would underestimate him because they’d look at the size of him, but he’s tough as they come. He scored some fantastic free kicks and great goals. He’s one of those you looked at and said ‘you’ve got a great future in the game’. That has been proved and I love the fact he has gone out to New Zealand and he’s enjoying his football. He’s doing so well and his team have won a league out there.”
Relationships with Committee, Volunteers, Fans, Assistants
“Everything I ever did at Emley wasn’t down to me. I had a good committee and I always had their backing. I’m sure we’ll talk about one aspect of that in a minute. I had really good support from everyone in the club and you don’t hold a job down at a club as long as I did without the support.
“I built up a strong bond with the committee and the fans and the club will always be a big part of me. You don’t spend a big chunk of your life like I did and it not be a big part. I even moved into the village for a little while and every day I’d get up and open the curtains and look at the pitch. It was great. I made so many friends, too many to mention because I’d be afraid to leave someone out.
“In terms of my own staff, they were superb. I had Micky Reid and Nicky Bramald initially and they were great. Micky is an ex-pro and a top lad who knew the game inside out. Nicky Bramald is obviously an Emley legend. Having people like them around made the job very easy.
“As they moved on, I had the likes of Roly Lanes. Roly has been around football for a long time and he’s an experienced head and he played a big part. Latterly, Pat Piercy came in and he’s someone I had known for a long time. He’s a really intelligent guy who knows the game and loves the game. He’s a fantastic human being. The players loved him.
“Joe Howson, I’ve known Joe since he was a young lad and he’s a top lad. Again, he knew the game and was involved at Barnsley. Like everyone else, Joe was a big part of the team who built the club.”
Wigan Robin Park (FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round, August 2013)
“Oh yeah (it is my favourite game). I thought we were gone. There’s two games that stand out from my time with Emley. That is one and other one is the play-off final. But with the Robin Park game we were virtually out. In football it is never done until it is done, but even the optimistic person like myself would never have imagined the ending. Even when we got the equaliser (in the 92nd minute), I thought ‘that’s it, I’m off to Wigan on Tuesday night’. Then in the 97th minute we got the penalty and it has been said before, but if you get a penalty like that you get the skipper up there and Syko (Paul Sykes) was the coolest man in the place. You just knew he was going to score, but it was a bit surreal. We knew we were never going to win the FA Cup, but it is a privilege to be in and if you win two or three games suddenly you bring money into the club and it is a nice change from the league.
“Syko, 97 minutes, puts it in and the whole place erupted. The place was bouncing, the roof came off. It was one of those moments when people are just hugging each other. The photos are outstanding. It was like we had won the FA Cup. They might have as well presented us with the FA Cup there and then said ‘because of what you’ve done, here keep the FA Cup for a year, sod your Arsenal’s and your Liverpool’s’. It was just brilliant and for me that’s what made all the hours of phone calls, training sessions worthwhile. Managing is like a proper job and that day beat Alan Sunderland’s goal in the 1979 FA Cup Final for me and that took some doing because I went nuts celebrating that day as well.”
Team-Talks
“I was always someone who did my homework on the opposition and it is fair to say I was always into my detail. I will confess to being probably more detailed in some of them! I get that when you’re a player you turn up and you’re not really listening. If you have a five or ten minute team-talks, the players are only interested in two things. One is ‘am I starting’ and two is ‘where I am playing’? Players aren’t really absorbing things like where are the opposition threats to start with. I learnt pretty quickly that you’re better getting your team announced first. That’s gives the players who aren’t starting a chance to swallow that before you get into the detailed bits. For me doing the homework and making sure the players were well-prepared was an important part of it.
“I know Nose (Aaron Joseph) has been quoted as someone who fell asleep during team-talks, but he was the most laid back person I’ve met. He’s also the only person I’ve seen make a 60-yard pass and then be on the end of it. He had an amazing engine, but off-the-pitch he’d come in and be so chilled.”
Sacking and Reinstatement (September 2013)
“I wouldn’t call it a power struggle. I had really good support from the committee and a good relationship with (former chairman) John Whitehead. There was a particular evening when the club wasn’t keen on us training on the pitch because it does cost money to maintain the pitch. So you were always going to have tension. We were trying to secure better training facilities at the time and we had some big games coming up so I was keen to train.
“We were training on the pitch and John came up and saw the lights on and saw us on the pitch. He wasn’t very happy about it. John and I had a conversation and I said ‘at the end of the day, I’m here just trying to do the best I can for the club and part of that means I have to prepare the players which means we have to train’. We said some stuff which is probably best staying between us. At the time John was trying to protect the interests of the club by saying ‘we don’t want to be spending any more money on repairing pitches’ and I was trying to prepare the team for getting points on the board which I saw as important.
“John decided he had the view that he wanted to make a change and he rang me the next day to say ‘I’ve reflected on our conversation last night and I feel it is best we part company’. I was really quite surprised and what I didn’t know is that John hadn’t gone through the right protocol as he had not informed the committee and not had the vote. The committee took exception to that and John left and bizarrely I reinstated on the Sunday.
“In the meantime the lads had gone to Appleby and done brilliantly there to win. It was a crazy 72 hours. The phone was going mental. On the Friday I’d rung the players out of the courtesy to say ‘I’m really sorry, I’m been sacked’. There was genuine surprise. Football moves on quickly and they did the job at Appleby, but on the Sunday I was reinstated and I had to ring the players to say ‘I’m back so I’ll see you at training’. It was very bizarre.”
The Shaw Lane Aquaforce Double (August 2013 and January 2014)
“I was pretty fired up for the Shaw Lane games which is saying something for me as I was pretty much fired up for most things. As good as the home game was when Dozza (Doran Jordan) scored the winner in the 3-2 thriller, it is the away game (in August 2013) which we won 2-0 I remember more.
“We went in at half-time and we had lost Dev (McIntosh) so we had to do some shuffling around. I actually brought Jonny Irving in to start the game and he’s having a brilliant career. He was having a world class game. He was outstanding, but the Dev setback wasn’t ideal. It was 0-0 at half-time and just as I was about to speak I could hear Simon (Houghton) in the other room. Everybody in the ground will have heard him as he was going absolutely ballistic. I won’t repeat what he said, but we could hear every single word he said. He was trying to get them fired up and he said some things about us. Look, it is all heat of the moment stuff, but I just said to our lads ‘I know we have to change things up, but I don’t need to get you ready for the second half, he’s just done that’. His team-talk actually motivated us. Sykesy and Scoff (Liam Schofield) scored in the second half and it was an outstanding victory because we had to soak up a lot of pressure and work incredibly hard.
“To come away with that win was a nice thing as Shaw Lane had ripped out part of my team in the summer. All my planning had gone out of the window as we lost Flynny and JC in a heartbeat. I’m not begrudging them because as young men being offered what they were offered, you’re going to go.
“To get that win there and then to do the double was cracking and the highlight of our season. I remember the second game because we had 12 men that day because the weather was definitely playing for us in the second half. The conditions were horrendous, although you could have said it was like a normal summer’s day in Emley. It was blowing an absolute gale and straight into the Shaw Lane players’ faces. The rain was lashing down and I remember Dozza lashing in the winner with a volley and the place went mad.”
Opportunities to Leave Emley
“I did have opportunities to leave and I spoke to a few clubs at a higher level. Stocksbridge was one (in 2014) and there’s a brilliant story to it. They obviously made the right decision in appointing Hilts (Chris Hilton) who’s a lovely fella and I’m pleased he’s staying on for another season. It was really funny because as I’m walking through the car park to leave having just met their committee, Hilts is coming the other way and saying ‘what was it like and what did they ask you’? He wanted a few pointers, not that he needed them as his pedigree speaks for itself. He’s done an absolutely brilliant job there.”
Bogey Side
“Selby were definitely the bogey side. We’d always struggle away at Selby, I hated going there because of that. Even when I was Marlon’s (Marlon Adams) assistant (in 2019) we lost in the last minute there! There’s always one team who think ‘oh them’ and you always look out for them when the fixtures come out.”
Key Players
“There are so many players I could mention. But there’s a few players we haven’t mentioned so far who deserve a mention. Tunners (Michael Tunnacliffe) was a big part of my time with Emley so was Sam Jerome and Josh Ingham. They are all talented lads. Tunners actually came as a pair with Adam Lawler, Trigger as we called him. I tried to get Tunners to sign a season or two before he signed and I couldn’t twist his arm. I was so glad to get him and he was a good captain and leader, not just a great player.”
First Title Race (2014/15) and Twitter
“We finished fifth and it was the first time we really challenged for promotion. Our results in the last month let us down. We were top with 11 games to go after we beat Ponte (in March 2015). The following morning I tweeted a picture of the league table! It is probably one of those things which you reflect on and think ‘why did I do that’? It was meant in the nicest possible way and I complement Ponte as they’ve gone on to do really well.
“You look at Twitter and people use it for all sorts, I find it very negative now. But at that particular time (2015), social media was becoming established as way of getting the word out. I found it useful. I had a lot of players contact me and you’d speak to other managers. I also liked the way you could engage with supporters and the football community to tell people what was happening. There was the inevitable banter that would go with it and some people would take it literally too far. It was never personal, certainly not from me and I enjoyed the banter.
Ash Flynn’s Panenka Penalty (Emley 0-3 Hemsworth, 4th April 2015)
“I’ve not forgiven him!! That Panenka! We never did well on Bank Holiday fixtures and this game was a GroundHop fixture so it kicked off at 11 o’clock or something like that. We had Ruben (Jerome) sent off as well and we just had a bad day. We didn’t turn up and Flynny just put the icing on the cake with that ridiculous Panenka! It was typical Flynny because he’s incredibly confident and he’ll have been thinking ‘I’ll just try this because the ‘keeper won’t be expecting it’. If it goes in, it looks brilliant as you’ve fooled the ‘keeper. In his case, the ‘keeper has just stood there and caught it! It has had millions of views and it is on YouTube and I watched it last year. I was shaking my head and I’ll always shake my head at it!
“I once remember fining Flynny. Although he was putting the ball in the net, if he crossed the line he got punished like anyone else. We were playing Dronfield on the Saturday and it was an important game because we were on a good run. Flynny decided in his wisdom that he could play for his Sunday League side on the Friday night in a semi-final. I said if you play I’ll drop you. Flynny being Flynny he played, he didn’t think I’d drop him. I dropped him and we won 4-0 and Kieran Ryan scored a hat-trick. We were outstanding. To his credit Flynny came and watched and must have thought ‘f***ing hell’!”
Jordan Coduri and Kieran Ryan’s Contribution to Flynn’s 73-goal haul during the 2015/16 season
“Jordan Coduri and Kieran Ryan were a massive part of Flynny’s 73 goals. People can talk about Flynny’s goals, but I always said it is about the team and the chances you create. The service he was getting from the likes Jordan Coduri and the midfield behind who were working hard to win the ball back to create situations. Kieran Ryan was the perfect foil for Ash. Kieran was a talented footballer in his own right and got his own quota of goals, even though Flynnly would get the plaudits more often than not. But Flynny would not have got the number of goals he did without the partnership he had with Kieran.
“You don’t expect someone scoring 73 goals in a season though and it was an unbelievable achievement. He got a special achievement award from the NCEL and the league’s presentation night in Scarborough was a very special night for him because he also proposed to his girlfriend. He’s now got married to the lovely Georgina who has been through thick and thin with him and he’s also got two lovely kids. It was lovely to see him celebrate not just his own award, but also his own personal celebration.”
The 2016 NCEL Division One Play-Off Final
“Hemsworth won the league at a canter and like the previous season we were always challenging. There were two seasons when we could and should have gone up and this was the first one.
“The play-offs had been introduced for the first time and we got to the final after beating Penistone in the semi-finals. We were the underdogs at Bottesford. They had a good record against us and going there was never going to be easy. We had the fantastic semi-final victory against Penistone who are extremely organised by Richo (Ian Richards). Kieran ironically scored the winner. So we went to Bottesford and we went 1-0 up thanks to Tunners (Michael Tunnacliffe) and towards 90 minutes I shouted to the ref ‘how long is there to go’? He said three minutes. We had gone over three minutes and all I can remember is the ball dropping to Tom Brennan who had an absolutely brilliant season for us. It was one of those unfortunate moments where Tom has lunged in the box and as soon as the kid went down you thought ‘oh no’. They obviously scored the penalty and it went to extra time and then to penalties.
“Penalty shootouts are a lottery and we were 3-1 up and the next two up were Iwan Heeley and Ash Flynn. I thought ‘we’re up, we’ve done it’. I may have got it the wrong round, but Iwan smashed his over the bar and Flynny did the same. Basically we had two chances to win on penalties and blown them both. Of course Bottesford came back from the dead. It went to sudden death and fair play to Sam Jerome because anyone taking a penalty in that situation deserves credit. I watched Sam carrying the ball down to the bottom end as their supporters cheering behind the goal and thought ‘he’s going to miss this’. He did and that was it, season done.
“We missed out and it was one of the lowest moments of my reign. I was quite emotional after the game because it meant so much. By the time we had got back on the bus though I was already planning for the following season. We knew we would come back stronger and we did.”
The 2017 NCEL Division One Promotion Race
“I agree that it was the best title race in NCEL history. It was unbelievable. It was so close, but what was awesome about it was the quality of football. A high level of football was played. Supporters loved matches that season and so did the neutrals. There were some great games to be involved in and it went to the wire. We finished on 95 points and missed out on the second promotion spot to Pontefract by three goals. Hall Road won the league with 96 points. 95 points in any other season would have probably won the league, never mind just gone up. It was typical Emley I guess!
“Hall Road and Ponte both won promotion on the final day when we didn’t have a game. We started top in the morning and we were up as long at least one of them dropped points. We spent the day in Emley’s clubhouse hoping and praying that Worsbrough who were playing Ponte or Campion who were playing Hall Road would do us a favour. We followed both games on Twitter in the clubhouse. Both of them won and in end I decided I would have as many Peroni’s as I could drink!”
Mind Games with ex-Pontefract Collieries manager Craig Parry (January 2017)
“It was all in good spirit. I take my hat to him (Craig Parry). The games with Ponte were always competitive and I thought some of the comments added a bit of spice to the fun. It was good for the league because it created excitement about the fixture. As long as it doesn’t become personal, it is healthy. I took it in good jest when he said the pressure was on Emley and I tweeted something on the morning of the game like I’d woke up in good health. It was all good banter. But we lost 4-2 that day and it was definitely a key moment and it is one of those games that was a turning point.”
Final Game as Emley manager (play-off semi-final defeat to Penistone, April 2017)
“It was definitely my lowest moment in football. I said this afterwards, but in the semi-final Penistone had nothing to lose and they played like that. We had just come out of the 95 points situation so mentally I don’t think we were in a good place. We looked like we played with that pressure and Penistone took full advantage of that. We simply didn’t turn up that night. It was a devastating way to finish our season.
“At the time I was going through on the work front so it was in my mind there was a strong possibility it was going to be my last game. It wasn’t certain, but things were due to unfold over the following few weeks. As my situation unfolded a few weeks later, for work reasons I had to call it a day. It was an extremely hard decision because I had worked so hard for the club for seven years. I’d put my life into it. You don’t just turn up on a Saturday, it is seven days a week and anyone involved in running clubs, not just managers, the volunteers, they put so much of their life into making these things work. I have a huge amount of respect for people who do these roles.”
Huddersfield YMCA (2017) and Return to Emley as Marlon Adams’ Assistant (January 2019)
“In hindsight it was a little too soon after Emley. I had the opportunity to go there (Huddersfield YMCA) as manager when work was starting to settle down in terms of me knowing what I was doing such as travel arrangements and how much time I’d spend in London. But in the end it was probably a little too soon so I took a backseat from there.
“Maybe a year or so later I got a call completely out of the blue from Marlon (Adams) to go and help him out back at Emley as his assistant. It was brilliant and I loved it. I have a lot of respect for Marlon. I think Marlon needs a project, the backing and time. So far, certainly in the NCEL, he’s been going in and rescuing situations. He’s a very talented coach, he knows players and he knows the game. He needs a chance. I loved working with him and it suited my work commitments. It was perfect. It was great being back involved with football. In the end we did what we were asked to do which was to keep Emley up. We wanted to stay on, but Emley had a different vision which we weren’t party to. The committee wanted to take the club in a different direction and I respected that. That’s their right and obviously for them they’ve gone to the North West Counties which is a challenge with the travelling. They have a strong management team and I’m reasonably confident they’ll go up this time.”
The One Regret
“I do regret not taking Emley up. That’s the one thing I regret. When you manage you want to have something to show for it. Sure, I’ve got lots of great memories, met lots of great people and enjoyed all of that. In the end I didn’t do what I really wanted to do which was to put Emley higher up the Football Pyramid. It is hard to call it a success because I didn’t deliver the lift up the leagues what the club was looking for. It has become a holy grail for them, but I wish them all the best and I’ll be interested to see where they go.”
Future
“As a manager I didn’t win anything and that’s a bitter pill to swallow. I’m certainly not finished in the game and I’d say never say never in terms of getting another opportunity. I get the odd phone call now and then and I think for the right opportunity I’ll look to get back involved. I’ve had one or two interviews, but I’ve not been successful. I still go to games and when Covid permits I’ll be back watching local and Non League football.
“Followers on Twitter will know I have a dog called Hamish so I spend most of my time with him and the missus (Jo). At the moment we’re spending our time running and walking.”
If you have enjoyed this interview, please consider making a donation to the not-for-profit organisation NLY Community Sport which provides sport for children and adults with disabilities and learning difficulties. CLICK HERE to visit the JustGiving page.
There is a video at the bottom of the page showing our work.
NLY Community Sport, run by James Grayson and Connor Rollinson, has always had combatting social isolation at the top of our objectives when running our Disability Football teams so when the green light to return is given, our work will play an important role in reintroducing our players, who have disabilities and learning difficulties, back into society.
We have six teams, a mixture of Junior and Adult teams – Nostell MW DFC, Pontefract Pirates, Selby Disability Football Club and the South Yorkshire Superheroes (Barnsley) – across Yorkshire.
Like most organisations, we have been affected financially by the Coronavirus and we have incurred losses which we cannot recover. We have not been hit as badly as other organisations, but we do need raise £2000 to put us back at the level we were at in mid-March and enable us to make a difference once again to our players’ lives in the future, without having financial worries. As each day goes on, a substantial number of our players become further isolated so we need to be ‘ready for action’ when restrictions are lifted.
Any amount raised above £2000 will be put towards new projects (when the world returns to normal) designed to further benefit people with disabilities and learning difficulties. You can learn more about the organisation HERE and on our Facebook page.
Watch the video below to see highlights from our three years as an organisation. The video was produced for our players at the end of March to remind them of good memories from the last three years.