The AdministratorThe ChairmanThe RefereeThe SubsituteThe WAG

parklifeThe real lives of the lower leagues

PARK LiFE puts a face to the people behind the beautiful game

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The people behind the beautiful game

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Park Life 3

Welcome to the Real Lives of the Lower Leagues.

These are the faces behind the names. Forget Ronaldo and Rooney, we’ve got real people with real stories.Park Life and CARLING have given voice

to the people involved with the beautiful game in the lower leagues who aren’t normally heard

From the referee to the chairman, from the administrator to the substitute. There’s even a light sprinkling of WAG.

It’s a cracker, so enjoy...

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Prada sunglasses, Louis Vuitton handbags and fake tan.

Being the wife or girlfriend of a Premier League footballer is a dream for most women. They have the most extravagant lifestyles, drive fast cars, wear expensive jew-elry and live in big houses. But what about the WAGs of players in the lower leagues?

Park Life spoke to Zoe Farrell, the girlfriend of Blackpool striker Stephen McPhee, to get an insight into the life of a lower league WAG.

McPhee started his professional career for Coventry City in 2000 whilst the club was still in the Premiership, but he never made an appearance for the first team. A loan spell at St Mirren followed, then a long stay at Port Vale where he made 130 appear-ances.

After this he spent a year playing in Portu-gal before becoming, what was at the time, Hull City’s most expensive signing.

McPhee moved to Blackpool in 2008 breaking more club transfer records.

“He told me he was a builder called Jo…, J, John,” she said trying to recollect the hazy night at Hull’s finest clubbing venue - the aptly named Heaven and Hell.

On stage R&B lothario Bobby Valentino was crooning his way through the classic ‘Pimpin’ All Over The World,’ while Zoe sipped another Double Vodka and Coke. Just £1.50 on a Thursday.

“He played on the whole builder thing for a few days. But it became a bit obvious he wasn’t when I was going around his house and he was in his training kit.”

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‘When he’s away it’s handy because I can get the girls round.’ The WAG

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The WAGZoe Farrell

With Stephen’s secret identity revealed Zoe threw herself into the life of a lower league WAG. She goes to every home game, but doesn’t like football at all. “I go for him because he likes me to watch,” she says. “Some girlfriends go regardless of their boyfriends playing but I just get bored if he isn’t on the pitch.”

But the life of a ‘Wife And Girlfriend’ at Bloomfield Road is completely different to Zoe’s experience at Hull. “It was really catty there to be honest. It was all about who had what bag. Here it’s totally different. I’m quite friendly with some of the other girlfriends.”

Although making time for her fellow WAGs is difficult, with many of them getting pregnant, they do manage a “team-trip” in the summer. “All the guys go to Vegas in the summer,” says Zoe. “The girls are going to Portugal or somewhere. All the kids come with us, though.”

She says there’s not much bitchiness at Blackpool, compared to Hull where she would turn up to the match and leave as soon as the final whistle went. “Now we just do barbecues and stuff like that. Nothing glamorous, we just get drunk and act like idiots.”

A self-styled “independent woman,” Zoe isn’t one to stay at home and live off her boyfriend’s wages. “I have my own career and do my own thing. I’d hate to ask Stephen for money. Because I’m a student, I don’t have a lot of cash but I don’t take money off him.”

The couple met on Valentine’s Day 2006 and this year Stephen bought her the ulti-

mate WAG accessory – a Gucci bracelet.She also admits to having a special pink

Rolex watch made for her 21st birthday but Zoe says she definitely isn’t a WAG. “Not at all,” she says. “I’m just an idiot, WAGs are more sophisticated.”

She does enjoy the lifestyle that she has had for the last three years, though. “Com-pared to the average girl, I’m very lucky. I live in a five bedroom house, go on holiday every year and I drive a Mini Cooper. Not many 21-year-olds can say that.

“Since I’ve been with Steve I do make more of an effort to buy nice handbags and things.”

Zoe says that being a footballer, Stephen gets a lot of attention from girls when he goes out. “You see girls trying to get with him, there are a lot of wannabe WAGs out there. They’re all fake tanned to the max, some have got boob jobs. It’s disgusting.”

But she says that because of Stephen’s problems with injuries over the last couple of years, she doesn’t really feel like she’s go-ing out with a footballer.

Stephen has been keeping busy in his time out though, and Zoe says he’s talented around the house, if a bit lazy. “Sometimes he’s really annoying. I’ll be on a work place-ment all day, then go to the gym and come home and cook tea. He’s been in all day, why hasn’t he done the cooking?

“To be fair to him he has laid the flooring in the roof and wants to change the garage into a bar, but he gets too bored. He goes to the bookies a lot. He’s at the cinema all the time as well. He needs something to keep

him busy when he’s injured.”It’s when Stephen is playing that Zoe really

gets to enjoy herself, especially on weekends when he’s got an away match. She says she has too much fun to miss him. “When he’s away it’s handy because I can get the girls round,” she says. “I see him the next day, and don’t even notice he’s been away so it’s not too bad.”

Despite all her friends at the club being married and looking to start a family, she’s not thinking about taking the next step with Stephen just yet. “I’m still young, there’s no plans for a wedding yet,” she says. “I do think if we ever split up I’d miss it. The three years we’ve been together I’ve had a great time.

At Christmas you get lovely presents. But I feel like I have to spend the same amount of money on him. It’s easier for Stephen. To him, what takes me a month to earn is nothing.”

Zoe says she sometimes finds the atten-tion she gets as Stephen’s girlfriend too much to handle. “The first thing people ask when they find out I’m going out with a footballer is how much is he on. When we were first together I didn’t tell anybody what he did. I can’t be bothered with the grief.”

Stephen McPhee might not be on as much as Ashley Cole or David Beckham, but we’d take Zoe over Cheryl Cole or Posh Spice any day.

See more pics at www.parlife.co.uk

‘The first thing people ask when they find out I’m going out with a footballer

is how much is he on.’ The WAGBrought to you in association with

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WEDDING BELLS: Stephen and Zoe at teammate Ian Evatt’s wedding last year

‘I can’t imagine Mr Abramovich negotiating with hot dog suppliers, he probably has someone doing that for him.’ The Chairman

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Tony Stewart built a lighting and electrics empire from nothing, inventing a revolutionary alarm system and becoming a multi-millionaire. Then, at the age of 63, he decided to take on a new challenge - becoming a Football League Chairman.

From the balcony of his shared office, wreathed in cigar smoke, the league’s newest chairmen surveys his hometown, where he has lived his entire life, and explains why he decided to rescue his struggling local club.

“I only came in to this job about ten months ago. I knew the club was in trouble and a group of businessmen from the local area sat down to discuss options. No one else seemed too keen to take it on themselves and I thought that if I was going to get involved I would

want it to be on my terms and for me to be in control. So I decided to take over as Chairman.

“It’s a challenge because the club had gone into administration twice in less than 18 months and lost their ground and

training facilities. But it was nice to see a challenge. There was a lot of confusion over whether we could play at Millmoor but after talking to the ground’s owners I took the decision to move to Don Valley.

“I also organised for training to be at Doncaster’s training ground. I know this is not massively popular with some of our fans. I am here to make big decisions and I think this will save us money in the long run and help put this club where it belongs.”

The Millers began the season on minus 17

points but their form and style of play this season has brought them praise from all quarters as they cruised to a mid-table finish.

Tony says he is confident the club can continue to progress and feels the changes he is making on and off the pitch will lead to a more stable football club.

“I spend a lot of time every day calling people involved in the club as well as arranging and attending meetings to discuss the construction of our new ground and training ground.

“I know the local business scene so I get a lot of sponsorship and donations from people around the town.

“I speak to Robbo (Mark Robins, Millers manager) around twice a day, not just about games and players but about taking the club forward as a business. I know in order to make Rotherham United more successful and add value to the company we need to make the commercial side more professional with sponsorship, hospitality, advertising, better programmes et cetera.

“I am trying to professionalise the whole regime. At Don Valley we have some of the best facilities in the whole league in my opinion. The food and bars are very good. I am constantly in touch with the people there making sure that everything is going well.

“I also speak to our merchandising and hospitality specialists every day so I know exactly what is going on and our performance in those areas never goes stale. I’m not too sure what goes on at the big clubs but I imagine it’s very different. I can’t imagine Mr Abramovich negotiating with hot dog

The ChairmanTony Stewart

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suppliers, he probably has someone doing that for him.”

In an era when Thaksin Shinawatra can own a Premier League club whilst being wanted on charges of corruption and Human Rights abuses it is no wonder that chairmen have a bad reputation as sleazy money grabbers who see the team they have bought as their new pet. But Tony is more than aware that his local ties and passion for the cause will not be enough to move the club forward and he is extremely ambitious.

“I see people who have been running clubs for five, ten or 15 years and a lot of them are not as business-orientated as I think they should be. You have still got a lot of fans running clubs with their hearts. They become fans and forget they are running a business.

“However, while we have to run a good business we must not forget what football is about. It is about entertainment, getting people to come on a Saturday in all weathers. But being successful is also about having drive and ambition. Some of the clubs have been in the lower leagues for so long, not because they lack the investment or fanbase but because they have lost the ambition, they are quite content to be in League Two. I am different, I want to be in the Premier.”

Tony, a long-term sponsor of the Millers, says the strength of the company he has built at ASD means he can afford to concentrate on his new project.

“I have run ASD Lighting for 25 years. It is a very mature business and I have directors and managers who run most of it. It’s got all the practices and methodology of a good

business and this allows me freedom to give more time to football. I still make the final decisions at ASD and I am the boss but in terms of the day-to-day I have a team under me who I can rely on.

“This means I can give as much time as is needed to Rotherham and be a full time Chairman. At 63, I am not going to have a ten year apprenticeship in the Football League, I have to learn on the job and learn fast. In the first four or five months I would say I was working ten hours a day on football, now four or five hours.

With both a new training ground and

‘You have still got a lot of fans running clubs with their hearts. We have to run a good business but not forget what football is about.’ The Chairman

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OFFICE LIFE: Tony in his office at ASD Lighting that he has run for 25 years in Rotherham

stadium in the pipeline Tony is committed to the club and the fans.

“I have made a lot of money and I live a fairly decent lifestyle but I am not really the type to splash the cash unless it is on something I care about and can see the benefit of. I have been asked to be on Secret Millionaire twice in the last year but I said “no”. Can you imagine being a fan and seeing your Chairman giving away money to other people?

“When you go to games you meet all the other chairmen and lots of them have been around for a long time. I am the new guy on the block. They always tell me that football

clubs spend too much money on the footballer and most of the money goes into the player’s pockets. The players would say that it is what football is about, but it’s not. It is a community and it is about entertaining people in the community so they want to support the club and come to see the games.”

As an experienced entrepreneur, Tony can see that trying to make a living in the beautiful game is very different to any other industry but says he knows what it takes to be a success.

“I wouldn’t say I am a ruthless person, but I do make decisions even if they are tough. I think my strengths are learning from experiences and creating a vast amount of knowledge and also having clear ideas on where I want to go with each business venture.

“In some ways football is like any other business in that you have to market a product. But is different in that the product is the football and you have to make sure that is as good as possible. You are putting together, via the manager, young gladiators, athletes, that have to take part in sport.

“On the pitch things can change instantly, you win or lose a game, get knocked out of a cup, someone gets injured. Also, you have to base everything around the match days - this is when you make your money and how you judge your success.

“It is not about buying a club, its working with a club and making sure that everyone is working towards the same end which is to help this club go forwards. You have to create wealth off the pitch to be able to put the investment into the club.”

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OFFICE LIFE: Tony in his office at ASD Lighting that he has run for 25 years in Rotherham

The AdministratorDave ClarkThey are the men no-one wants to see at their club. Football’s bailiffs who clean up the mess made by over-ambitious chairmen. Park Life spoke to administrator Dave Clark who is overseeing Darling-ton’s financial troubles.

In February, Dave Clark was brought in to help Darlington as they joined the likes of Luton, Bournemouth, Chester, Rotherham, Stockport and his hometown club Leeds on the list of Football League members who have been docked points by the authorities for entering administration.

It is somewhat depressing that our section on the ‘Real Lives’ of the Football League should include a man who essentially helps clubs who are on their knees. It is a sad indictment of the state of football today.

After training as an accountant, Clark soon began to specialise in helping com-panies on the verge of bankruptcy and is finding that more and more of his clients are football clubs.

He admits it is a strange profession: “It’s quite a weird, unusual part of the business world. Until I was 25 I didn’t know what insolvency was. It was only because it related to a part of accountancy I was involved in, and it was sort of a step away. I didn’t want to complete records or just do ticking and adding, those sort of things, I wanted some-thing a bit more exciting and challenging.

“We got involved with Darlington via the chairman and the financial team behind him, from then it’s really just a case of looking at the problems that are there and how can

we protect them from creditors that are disgruntled.”

He has to make a report to the FA where he will assess if there has been any foul play in the way the club has been run, but he says for now he is simply focussed on making sure there is a football club in Darling-ton for the future. When a club goes into administration there is no easy fix though, the process of becoming solvent again is a difficult one.

“Any administrator has got a duty to investigate the circumstances surrounding the demise of the club,” says Clark. “We’ve got to report on the director’s conduct, as part of the legislation called Directors Disqualification Act, which deals with the insolvency situation, it’s the duty of the administrator or liquidator to make a report to the Department of Trade and Industry in circumstances where they think the direc-tor’s conduct has been unfit.”

But, he says he has one aim when he enters a club: “The whole purpose of an administrator is to save the business. Save jobs. The investigation and things come after-wards but initially that’s the number one priority.”

It must be daunting for someone to come into a failing company and try to turn it around from within, but Clark is full of praise for the club’s staff.

“They have been absolutely fantastic. I mean you walk into a trading operation and say ‘your job’s on the line. Oh, and by the way, will you agree to work for partial wages for the next three months while we try and

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‘The whole purpose of an administrator is to save

the business. Save jobs.’The Administrator

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find a buyer?’“There’s been no moaning and no groan-

ing or bitching and back-biting from the staff which is unusual. You always get a bit of staff trouble because they are in distressed cir-cumstances, worried about their jobs. That said they’ve just been fantastic.”

According to Clark, the commitment of the staff is crucial to attracting a new investor as it means the cost of running the club and its sale price comes down.

“The average person thinks people at the club haven’t got much of a role to play here, but they do, the less impact the cost-cutting exercises I have to undertake, or the more profitable the club is, the closer it is to breaking even. If the purchaser only has to put in £100,000 in a year for the club to operate at a sensible level; it’s mas-sively more attractive than £1.5m a year.”

Clark claims that around 40 clubs have en-tered administration since the turn of the century and the credit crunch is making things even worse. A die-hard Leeds fan, Clark found the period when they were in administration very difficult as he could understand both the points of view.

‘There is often quite a lot of animosity towards the administrator because they are making hard decisions.’ The Administrator

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FROM LEEDS TO DARLO: As a lifelong Leeds fan Dave has experience the lows of administration

“I found it particularly difficult because I knew what was going on more than most other fans. It’s my job as well as my hobby. My hobby is my release from my job. You go there, scream your head off for a couple of hours, you feel a lot better about it when you’ve finished, especially if you win. And it brought all the issues I deal with on a daily basis in my job, right into my hobby.”

He admits he would have liked the chance to be involved at Leeds to help the club but realises it would have been too difficult to remain a fan.

“I would have both hated and loved doing it at Leeds. I would have met people I have seen play, but it would have made it very dif-ficult for me to go and sit in the stands with my mates who I have sat with for 20 odd years. It would spoil my hobby.”

Obviously, being charged with clearing debts and potentially making people lose their jobs, Clark is not always a popular face at a club. “People know who you are, even if you didn’t know them yourselves. There is often quite a lot of animosity towards the administrator because they are making hard decisions.”

One of those choices that he believes will benefit the club in the long term is the closing down of one of the stands at the Northern Echo Arena to save money.

“There were 351 people in that stand, but I had to pay for 30 staff and stewards in there at a cost of £1,000 per match. The fans have paid their money but a third of it was going to pay for people to stand there and make sure they were sat in the right place,

making sure they were behaving, serving them a sandwich or a pie at half-time. It was costing a £1,000 a match.”

Clark says it’s even more important that fans support their club during administration than in normal circumstances. If the ter-races are empty then selling a club becomes an even bigger task. Despite this, Clark is appreciative of how important the club is to the local people and that it is hard to keep making the trip to the stadium in such hard

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FROM LEEDS TO DARLO: As a lifelong Leeds fan Dave has experience the lows of administration

times.“Darlo really needs a football club. It

would be a much, much sadder place with-out a football club, as would any town or city.”

He says that attendances are ultimately down to a side’s performance on the pitch. People drift away with defeats, but come back when the players hit form. So why are the Quakers in so much trouble? Clark blames the size and location of the new

stadium.“The planning that was granted for the

ground was for a 15,000 seater stadium, which would have been perfect. The chair-man at the time took it upon himself to increase that significantly, so we have a stadium that could hold 27,500. Now, look up the stats on Darlington, look at the aver-age attendance for the past 50 years and you point to a day when they got 20,000. I’d be amazed, absolutely amazed. The cost of running and maintaining this stadium is too much. It is only 10% full every game so the atmosphere created is like going to watch a reserve game.”

Clark thinks attendances have been de-pleted because the stadium is on the edge of town, so he says it’s important that revenue comes from elsewhere: “We have 5-a-side football pitches, indoor soccer pitches as well as nurseries and hotel developments. These are all quite ambitious ideas but the cost, planning issues, and council policies are prohibiting.”

Even though his role is synonymous with doom and gloom Clark just loves being involved with football and gaining an insight into how clubs work.

“It’s fantastic to go into a club and see how it works, and look at how it all pieces together to put that team out on a Saturday. And it is quite surprising how much goes into ninety minutes. But in my circumstances, I’ve got to step away from the football fan aspect of it, which we’re all massively inter-ested in.”

Go to www.carling.com/parlife for more

The RefereeBrian Webster

Slated in the press, unloved by managers and hated by the fans, the referee plays possibly the most controversial role in football.

Every week we see decisions made which infuriate us. So often it seems that the ref has decided the game, not our beloved play-ers.

So who would choose this as a career?Park Life met Brian Webster, a former

lower league referee, to talk about the char-acters he has met, the future of refereeing and the abuse he has suffered over the years.

“The best comment I ever heard was a suggestion of where to put my flag, when I was a linesman, but he told me where to put it sideways. You do hear these comments, for sure, but you have to switch off.

“The chanting gives you an adrenaline rush, though. It’s got a buzz to it. However, the crowd are constantly trying to influence you. You’ve got to be calm. You’ve got to switch off from the crowds calls.

“It’s sometimes harder to run the line than referee. You are very close to some very angry people.”

It can’t be easy having 30,000 fans scruti-nising your every decision, but Brian admits that the on-pitch relationship with players is more of a strain.

“You have players that like you and then players that absolutely hate you. They’ll dis-respect you whatever. There’s nothing you can say or do to win them over. They’ll then question every decision. It can get very draining.

“Little things can sometimes spark big

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disasters. Sometimes you can get something wrong. We don’t have action replays. It then just builds up and builds up and there’s no way you can get it back. Players will keep bringing it up throughout the game.”

For Brian, now 58, the animosity shown towards referees is a real problem.

“You listen to Alan Green on the radio; he’s always on the ref’s back, however well the referee has done. He starts by saying “oh he had a bad game last week.” That negativ-ity just builds and builds.

“It has a negative impact on younger refs who want to get into the game. Hopefully the Respect campaign will help encourage younger refs.”

Players loathe him, his slightest mistake can spark a mass brawl and fans are suggest-ing using his equipment for unusual methods of torture. This begs the question: with all the pressure, criticism and disrespect that The Referee has to take, why would some-one do this?

He pauses. “When you come out down that tunnel

and there’s the roar of the crowd it’s just like going into an ancient arena. It’s how I im-agine the Romans and the gladiators would have felt going into an amphitheatre.”

A lover of the game, Brian played Satur-day and Sunday league football throughout his teenage years. Then he decided to stay involved in football as a referee.

“It was the difference between get-ting kicked to pieces and getting verbally abused,” he says.

“When I talk to junior refs now, it’s often

the case that they decided to let go of the dream of playing football professionally. If they ref for five or six years, then they will always ref at a higher standard than they would ever have played at.

“We encourage players who have that potential to stop playing Saturday football and put time into refereeing.”

Brian started officiating in the ‘One Man and His Dog’ Yorkshire Leagues and admits that attitudes back then were not the most professional.

“There were times when I’d get ready in the back of my car, I’d look across the road and see the players running from the pub, where they’d got changed. The hospitality obviously improved as I went up the levels.”

‘Little things can sometimes spark big disasters. Sometimes you can get something wrong, genuinely, you can get it wrong. We don’t have action replays.’ The Referee

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GAGGLE OF REFS: Brian and his fellow refs at a Futsal tournament in Sheffield in February

Brian moved up the ladder swiftly, finding himself in the old Second Division by 1981.

He was convinced he’d make it to the very top, explaining to his mother-in-law that he’d be at the World Cup in 1990. However, he made the conscious decision to remove himself from such high level refereeing to improve his personal life.

“Family life got in the way. There are a lot of divorced referees. They start out with married life in their early 20s and by the time they get to their mid 30s the massive commitment puts a great strain on the fam-ily and I chose not to do that. “

Brian now referees in Futsal tournaments all over the country, but still has many posi-tive recollections from his time in profes-

sional football. “One of my best memories was meet-

ing Brian Clough at a Nottingham Forest Academy game. He’d come to watch his own youth players, but also his son, Nigel. I felt quite a lot of pressure knowing he was in the stands.

“That was one of the perks of referee-ing at that time; you’d get to meet so many characters. Clough was an absolute gentle-man.”

Brian cites an FA Cup third round replay as his favourite game.

“It was Scarborough v Blyth Spartans on a Tuesday night. I had to walk there and I was running the line. Ken Retford reffed it.

“I was a real junior at the time and I was on the stand side away from dugouts. What sticks in the mind for me was a guy smoking cigars all game. It was a dark night, 7.30pm kick-off, floodlit; I remember the smell of the cigars, I was so happy to be there.”

Although no longer involved in the Foot-ball League, Brian has plenty of views on the main issues facing referees and football in general.

The question of whether to use video technology for particularly contentious deci-sions is one that’s hotly debated. Brian is of the belief that a balance needs to be struck.

“I believe the introduction of video tech-nology would undermine the referee and cause too many stoppages,” he says. “The only thing that I think we should develop is goal line technology; the ball crossing the line can be extremely hard to get right. The rest needs to be left to the refs.”

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GAGGLE OF REFS: Brian and his fellow refs at a Futsal tournament in Sheffield in February

“I think I was about 11. It was one of those school days where they bring coaches in from the local football teams. The Blackpool coach came that day. I was playing out on pitch but I went in goal and one of the coaches said ‘you’ve really got something there fella’. They took me on trial and they pretty much signed me straight away.

“I don’t know how they saw it in me then, but I’m glad they did.”

It’s the ultimate dream for any football-obsessed boy. You’re spotted, prove your ability and then sign for your local club. And it came true for Scott Davies, a 22-year-old goalkeeper, whose CV already includes a promotion and Wembley experience. Davies is now playing for Morecambe in League Two.

“I signed my first professional con-tract in 2005 with Morecambe,” says Scott. “It was amazing, a dream come true. The gaffer who signed me was Jim Harvey and he said ‘look, you’re signing a professional contract but you’re still a young kid, it’s up to you to do your graft and you’ll get your chance.’”

So he’s made it, he’s at his physical peak, training under an experienced manager and reaping the rewards of being a pro. But it’s not ideal. What does it feel like to train in the knowledge that you probably won’t see a minute of action come the weekend?

“It’s horrible being on the bench. To be fair I get on with our other goalie (Barry Roche) really well,

The SubstituteScott Davies

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so when I’m not playing and he is, I back him 100%. You don’t stitch each other up. Anyone I’ve ever played with has backed me and has given me a good warm up so I’m always the first person to say ‘all the best’ before a game and at the end I say ‘well done’. It gets frustrating because you’re waiting for an injury or a series of mistakes,” he says.

It’s not the kind of glamorous lifestyle that Davies would have thought could unfold before him when he was snapped up by Blackpool.

“You prepare throughout the week even if you know you’re not going to be playing at the weekend. But you just don’t know, he could get injured in the first minute. If you don’t prepare as if you’re going to play then you’ll come on after five minutes and end up making a mistake yourself so you’ve just got to keep yourself mentally right,” he says.

He’s accepted that as a 22-year-old he’s going to be playing second fiddle to a player with eight years more experience than himself. He sees training alongside more ex-perienced players as vital to his development as a professional. But what exactly is the schedule like for a lower league goalkeeper?

“We have to get in at about 9.30-10am on a Monday but then we just chill out for an hour. Anyone that needs physio will see the physiotherapists and get massages. Then we’ll train,” says Davies.

“On a Tuesday it’ll be hard work because we usually get Wednesdays off for a match. We always do mornings and then we all have dinner together at the club. Thursday will be an intense day but Friday, as it’s the day before a game, we won’t generally do a lot. If the lads have had a hard game Saturday then play again Tuesday we might come in on Sunday to have a bit of a jog, but it will only

be light with the game on Tuesday coming up.,” he says.

As jobs go Davies realises that his week isn’t anywhere near as rigid as your average nine to five. There are the pressures of per-forming though, so what’s the atmosphere like on a Sunday after taking a beating the day before?

“Its strange, the lads have banter. On the Saturday we deal with everything. We have a big do in the changing room and everyone will say their piece, the gaffer will say his piece. You get it all out of the way on the Saturday. If he brings you in on the Sunday you might watch the video of the game but there’ll be no arguing or anything. It’s just a case of looking at the video and learning from it,” he says.

A substitute goalkeeper in the lower leagues can be a lonely position and not particularly rewarding. At 22, Scott Davies is on the right path to becoming a first team regular but he’s mature enough to know that patience and professionalism are vital.

“It’ll happen for me if I keep my head down. I’ve tasted Wembley, it was amazing and I want more of that. I’d go anywhere to be honest. Obviously I’ve only got a ten to fifteen year career.

“I’ve been told from when I was a young kid; you’ve got to play as high as you can and for as long as you can. I’d go to whatever level I could and obviously earn as much money as I could in this short but sweet career.”

‘It’ll happen for me if I keep my head down. I’ve tasted Wembley, it was amazing and I want more of that.’ The Substitute

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