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that man Parkinson - again !


david in sweden
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sometimes we focus so much on the big names, big clubs and transfer fees..forgetting that many lads who go through the Saints' youth schemes do make a career of sorts -often in the lower leagues.

 

Last season I counted more than 20 names who were former Saints' youth players who were still playing in the lower Leagues, but let's not forget those who made an alternative career as managers.

 

Saints' sad display v.Palace was overshadowed by Phil Parkinson's L1 Bradford City coming back from 0-2 to win 4-2 at Stamford Bridge and getting a humble congratulation from Jose Mourinho

Phil had a teenage career in the late 1980's (60+ games for the Reserves at RM /RW) but never managed to crack the monopoly of Case, Horne and... that Le Tissier 'fella...in the first team.

A move onto Bury led to many lower league games before going into management at Bradford. Their appearance in the 2013 League Cup Final was a milestone in that clubs history, but surely yesterday's legendary success really puts them on the football map - until the next round at least.

 

Wenger may have been at Arsenal (nearly 20 years) but the second longest serving League manager is former Saints junior Paul Tisdale, who has managed Exeter for 9 seasons which must be some sort of a record - especially L2). Paul was another promising lad who clocked up a handful of first team games in the late 1980's, but suffered the same fate as Parkinson, and moved onto a lower level.

 

Best known has to be Swansea's Garry Monk (next weeks visitors) whose Saints senior career was a brief 10 games in a 4 season period in the early 1990's.

He was never going to be first choice with players like Lundekvam, Monkou, Richards and Dodd before him, and a series of loan outs ended with a good career spread over four divisions with - Swansea.

 

But yesterday was Phil Parkinson's special day - and he got congratulations from " The Special One " at Stamford Bridge.

Edited by david in sweden
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