Source: Northern_Echo
Saturday Spotlight: Davey aiming high with Quakers
New Darlington boss Simon Davey is aiming to rebuild his career at The Northern Echo Arena after his sacking by Barnsley earlier this season.[LNB] Craig Stoddart spoke to the 39-year-old about his hopes and aspirations for the Quakers.[LNB] SIMON DAVEY will forever be known as the young manager in charge when Barnsley stunned Liverpool and Chelsea on their way to Wembley.[LNB] Reaching an FA Cup semifinal in such style placed the Yorkshire underdogs at the centre of the international media spotlight, putting Davey on a pedestal befitting an established manager at the top of the game.[LNB] It is going to take something special to supercede such achievements.[LNB] It will take something heroic, if he is again to carve his name into football folklore. Taking Darlington back into the Football League would be a good start.[LNB] Now that he's had a taste of success, the Swansea-born 39- year-old wants more and he wants it with Quakers after being appointed manager this week.[LNB] At Barnsley we punched above our weight on a weekly basis in fantastic stadiums and getting to Wembley was a memorable occasion, said Davey, who brings with him assistant Ryan Kidd.[LNB] We beat Liverpool and Chelsea on the way, great days for myself and Barnsley.[LNB] It was my first full season in charge and I led a team out in front of an 86,000 crowd in the club's first FA Cup semifinal in 96 years so it was a great time for me.[LNB] But I'm still only 39 and a lot of managers haven't got to Wembley in their whole career. I want more of it because I am hungry to succeed and I want to do that with Darlington.[LNB] I want to push for promotion and then I want to push for the play-offs the season after. I want to do well in every cup game and that's my nature. The aim is promotion next season if we go down obviously and getting this club back to where it belongs.[LNB] DARLINGTON are a club he has previous experience of, having played, briefly, at Feethams in 1997, but it is his managerial record on which chairman Raj Singh has appointed Davey.[LNB] He and Kidd bring with them the experience of leading Barnsley for two-anda- half seasons in which they succeeded in keeping the comparatively small club in the Championship.[LNB] They first worked together a decade ago, when Davey was placed in charge of Preston North End's Academy.[LNB] Davey brought in Kidd as his assistant, though their paths first crossed when they became Preston team-mates in February, 1995.[LNB] Manchester-born Kidd, a left-back and occasional centre-back, had made his Lilywhites debut three years earlier while Davey, one year older, had been with his hometown club then Carlisle.[LNB] He played a part in the Cumbrians' 1994-95 promotion before joining Preston and at the end of the 95-96 campaign he was able to celebrate winning the Division Three title while Quakers reached the playoffs.[LNB] Darlington were unable to join Preston's promotion party they lost the play-off final at Wembley to Plymouth. But just over a year later Davey joined on a two-month loan and it is a spell he remembers with fondness.[LNB] I played 11 games and the philosophy was to play good football so I enjoyed it here,[LNB] he said.[LNB] Everybody used to say that the mentality in the lower leagues was kick and rush, winning your second balls.[LNB] But it was a joy to be at Darlington because they played football in the right way and we were relatively successful at that level.[LNB] I remember training at Catterick Garrison and David Hodgson was manager. The atmosphere around the club was good and it's an area I like. I've visited in the past because I've got cousins in Hurworth.[LNB] You only have an affinity with certain football clubs and it's usually clubs you've played for. I've always looked out for results of clubs I've played for, so to come and manage Darlington is a privilege.[LNB] Shortly after that loan, however, Davey had to hang up his boots when an accident with a medicine ball inflicted a back injury from which he could not recover.[LNB] David Moyes had not long previously become manager at Deepdale and it was he who handed Davey Preston's head of Academy post, a move which put him on the road to management.[LNB] I was 27 when I had to finish, he said. I had three kids and a mortgage and when you have played in League One and League Two all your life there isn't a lot of money in the bank. I had no job or coaching qualifications.[LNB] David pulled me to one side and said he had a job in the youth team for me. I owe him a lot.[LNB] Having had to stop playing so early has, as Davey explains, assisted him in his route towards first-team management.[LNB] He now holds the UEFA Pro Licence and he said: I like to develop players and I think going through the set-up, from being an Academy coach then a first-team job, has helped. A lot of players finish then walk straight into a manager's job and it can be an alien world.[LNB] But I believe players can be developed no matter what their age.[LNB] Kidd agrees, as would be expected of a management pair that first worked together a decade ago.[LNB] He too wishes to improve players, and said: We've dealt with Championship players, we know what they're about and how they live off the field. If these players at Darlington have got aspirations to better themselves they're going to have to start training right and living right.[LNB] We can help them do that and can help the young kids grow. I believe the youth policy is good at Darlington so it would be good to bring one or to kids through and perhaps move them on one day. We would be more than happy to do that.[LNB] They (the players) will learn very swiftly about us.[LNB] We are very open, players can come and talk to is whenever they want about whatever they want. But they are going to have to train right, behave right and play right.[LNB] It is that approach which saw Davey guide Barnsley to three successive finishes above the Championship relegation zone, probably most impressively in his first season at the helm.[LNB] Having held the same Academy position at Oakwell that he had at Preston, Davey succeeded the sacked Andy Ritchie in the November of 2006-07 with the Tykes second-bottom.[LNB] By the end of the season Davey had guided Barnsley to eight points clear of the relegation zone and he repeated similar feats during the next two seasons of a tenure he looks back on with pride.[LNB] But for some at Oakwell he had not done enough and paid the price in August. He was sacked five games into the season and now he is facing up to managing at a lower level.[LNB] You adapt to different situations, he said. I was Academy manager at Barnsley and suddenly thrust into being a manager of a club at the bottom of the league.[LNB] You have to adapt and we had some fantastic times at Barnsley for the budget that we had.[LNB] There are perceptions in football and the perception for some of Barnsley Football Club is that they should be in the Championship year on year. But we were punching above our weight. Some Barnsley supporters would have you believe that they should be in the Premier League.[LNB] But from our perspective we always knew that there was a time scale and a life span to a manager. I think the average before us was 11 months but we stayed for nearly three years.[LNB] Given Darlington's plight at the end of what is currently their worst ever season, it is fair to assume that returning to the Football League will be easier said than done.[LNB] Davey inherits a squad that has lost 27 of 36 games, winning only five, and he said: The biggest problem at the moment is that the players have got used to losing and we have to change that mentality.[LNB] It was similar at Barnsley.[LNB] When you're the manager of Barnsley in the Championship you know that most teams you play against have got a bigger budget and better players so you have to motivate them.[LNB] You have to instil a belief and we stayed in that division for three years on the bounce and went to an FA Cup semifinal.[LNB] It's tough when you're at the bottom of the division because you have to make sure that the mentality changes. You need a winning mentality, even when you're not winning.[LNB] We've got to instil that winning mentality on a weekly basis because we should be one of the top teams, if we go down, in the Blue Square.[LNB] Kidd added: You've got to change the ethos and quickly because this squad has been used to losing games all season and if that carries on then there's no impetus for next year.[LNB] Ultimately we'll want our team to get the ball down and play, which is what we tried to do at Barnsley, but most importantly we want some momentum to take into next season.[LNB] Quakers supporters certainly need something to give them belief after what has been a dire season.[LNB] For Davey, being in charge of a team in such a plight contrasts sharply to this time two years ago, when he was three days away from Wembley, a time when he must surely have been hoping his next career move would be up.[LNB] My next move was always wherever football takes you,[LNB] he says. I look at someone like Peter Taylor, who was the England under-21s manager, and he's since been to Hull, Crystal Palace and Stevenage.[LNB] It's all about getting experience. Myself and Ryan are both still young and we've managed in the Championship.[LNB] Now we're in League Two, hopefully we won't go into the Conference, but it is most likely that we will and want to make sure we're there no longer than a year.[LNB]
