“HE WANTED ME IN JANUARY BUT HE DOESN’T WANT ME NOW...”

Matthew Bell on the Warnockian contradiction.

Matthew Bell

As all football fans know, Neil Warnock is a somewhat controversial character. He falls out with match officials, supporters, players (one of his former players, Peter Swan of Bury, publicly called him ‘a prick’) and even his chairmen. Opposition players and staff also get it in the neck; for example, after a particularly bad-tempered League Cup semi-final second leg at Anfield in 2003 Warnock yelled at Liverpool coach Phil Thompson: ‘You can fuck off Pinocchio, get back in your fucking cupboard!’ and said of Liverpool forward El-Hadji Diouf, who he accused of spitting at him: ‘I was going to call him a sewer rat, but that might be insulting to sewer rats. He’s the lowest of the low.’ Warnock once (probably more than once actually) called Burnley manager Stan Ternent – with whom he had a long-running feud – ‘a dickhead’ and reckoned that Gary Megson’s autobiography would be ‘good news for people who suffer from insomnia’. Warnock appears to have mellowed somewhat in his old age, but many football people still think of him as a charmless man. His nickname throughout English football is ‘Colin Wanker’, an anagram of his name. However, he is also a master of getting teams out of the Championship and keeping them in it. His methods work.

When Warnock was manager of Sheffield United a few players had disputes with him. A couple of them, however, managed to escape from his ‘dog house’. In 2001, Paul Devlin and Shaun Murphy were banished when they sought improved contracts but were later forgiven and allowed back in. After more than a month on the sidelines, Devlin accepted he would not get a new deal and returned to the first team. Murphy was sent out on loan, before realising he was better off staying at United. He then became an important player over the next couple of seasons. Warnock’s hard-line stance with both proved to be justified. In contrast to this side of Warnock’s personality, he could elicit unusual loyalty from his players, such as in the aftermath of the March 2002 ‘Battle of Bramall Lane’ against West Bromwich Albion, which resulted in the game being abandoned. After United beat Millwall 3-2 a few days later, Paul Peschisolido remarked, ‘Some of the things people have been saying about [Warnock] are disgraceful, totally out of order. We just want everybody to know that as a team we’re fully behind him. People should really show the gaffer a bit more respect.’

Now we have established Neil Warnock’s contrasting credentials we will examine the fate of three players who during his time at Sheffield United were ostracised for no obvious reason (to the outsider anyway). In July 2004 United signed striker Barry Hayles on a free transfer from Fulham. A late starter in league football, Hayles joined London-based minor league team Willesden Hawkeye in 1989, when he was 17. Success there saw him sign for upwardly mobile Stevenage Borough, with whom he won the Conference title in 1995/96. With a record of 73 goals in 154 games, Hayles finally got his chance in the Football League with Bristol Rovers. He was 25. Success at Bristol saw Hayles sold to Fulham for £2 million in 1998. It was a great move for both player and club as Fulham reached the Premier League for the first time in 2001. Before they won promotion, Fulham were given some real battles by Sheffield United, rebuilding under Warnock, including one game at Craven Cottage when, inspired by young Nick Montgomery marking influential midfielder Lee Clark out of the game, the Blades earned a deserved 1-1 draw. In fact United were the only team Fulham failed to beat that season as both games were drawn. The previous season, when United beat Fulham 2-0 at Bramall Lane, Flashing Blade described how Hayles was “walking a tightrope all game” before being sent off ten minutes from full time.