My Time At Town - Mick Rathbone: “It was an incredible experience, I wouldn’t have changed it for anything”

Little did Mick Rathbone know what he was letting himself in for when he rolled up at The Shay one day in 1992 hoping to sell some clothes.

The former Birmingham, Blackburn and Preston defender was about to embark on an incredible three years that would set him on the path to working with Everton, Manchester United and England.

“I’d retired from playing, had nowhere to go, thinking ‘what do I do now? recalls Rathbone, affectionately known as Baz.

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“I went on a physiotherapy course run by the PFA and, at the same time, to make ends meet, I started selling clothes out of the back of my car.

Halifax Town manager Mick Rathbone pictured on May 8, 1993 at the game against HerefordHalifax Town manager Mick Rathbone pictured on May 8, 1993 at the game against Hereford
Halifax Town manager Mick Rathbone pictured on May 8, 1993 at the game against Hereford

“One day I went over to Halifax to see my old Preston team-mate Osher Williams, and I was telling them about the course, and they said ‘why don’t you come and be physio here?’

“And it was a massive part of my life for the next three years.”

To start with, Rathbone was basking in a relaxed, sun-soaked idyll, doing a job he enjoyed in the game he loved.

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“When I look back at my 40-odd years in football, that first six months is right up there among my best times,” he says.

9th May 1993

Farewell shots:

Manager Mick Rathbone, overcome with emotion as the Vauxhall Conference beckons.9th May 1993

Farewell shots:

Manager Mick Rathbone, overcome with emotion as the Vauxhall Conference beckons.
9th May 1993 Farewell shots: Manager Mick Rathbone, overcome with emotion as the Vauxhall Conference beckons.

“I was studying at university, selling clothes, struggling to make ends meet, and then this happened, catapulted back into football.

“It was absolutely magical.

“We had quite a big squad, and John McGrath didn’t want some players, like Ian Juryeff, Greg Abbott, five or six of them, so apart from being the physio, I trained them up at Roils Head and down at Old Earth.

“We did loads of running and ball work, so I was physio at the club but also coach to this disaffected group.

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“Those first few months were absolutely fantastic, going out running with the players, kicking a ball about.

“The weather seemed to be fantastic every day, it was heaven.”

But the storm clouds were gathering.

“The club was struggling, we got beat at Marine 4-1, lost at Barnet the next game, Paul Wilson missed a penalty,” recalls Rathbone.

“Then the chairman phoned and said ‘look, it’s not worked with John, we’re going to let him go, would you hold the fort in the short-term?’

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“It was a complete shock, but as an employee of the club, you say yes.

“It’s your duty, it’s incumbent on you to do your bit.

“It’s funny though, everyone expected it was going to be Jimmy Case, who was at the club at the time.

“I said to Jim ‘I don’t get this, you keep telling me you’re going to go into management and I have no ambition with that, I just want to be a physio, how am I the manager and you’re not?’

“And he said to me, and I’ll never forget this, talk about prophetic words, ‘Baz, if you start your managerial career at Halifax, you will finish it at Halifax’.

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“He taught me humility. He played his first game in a pre-season friendly and it was the first game where you couldn’t pass back to the keeper, and he was outstanding.
“He was forever making cups of tea for everybody, picking up kit. I’d say to him ‘Jim, you’ve won the European Cup, you’ve won the league’ and he’d say to me ‘never be too humble’.

“As I moved up to different clubs, ending up at Man United for a couple of years as a sports psychologist, I’d always be picking the stuff up there, and Nicky Butt would say to me ‘you shouldn’t be doing that’ and I’d always tell him that story.”

With Rathbone on the case, rather than the ex-Liverpool midfielder, the physio-turned-manager had work to do.

“We had a very small squad so there wasn’t the potential to change things round,” he says.

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“There was no money to buy players, and there was no game for 10 days, so we had a nice breaking-in period.

“I loved it, I’m in charge, I set the tone, I decide what we’re doing.

“We trained on the pitch and everyone came together.

“I knew how to warm the players up, I knew how to put on a session, I knew how to work on your free-kicks.”

Rathbone’s first game, on December 15, 1992, was away to Huddersfield Town in the Autoglass Trophy.

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“I remember it like it was yesterday,” he says.
“We’re in the bottom division, I think Huddersfield were in the Third Division, tough game to come into.

“We went in our own cars, save money on the bus.

“Got the Tina Turner blasting away in the dressing room, we were up for it.

“Russ Bradley, our main player, sprained his ankle in the first minute, and had to come off and we had to re-organise.

“We got beat 5-0, awful. Talk about the balloon popping, talk about the ego being deflated.

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“I’ll never forget, after the game, on the way home, I stopped just outside Burnley, got out of my car and sat on the side of the road and thought ‘this is close to being the lowest I’ve ever felt’.

“When you’re a player and you’ve had a stinker, at least you’ve given a physical contribution, but as a manager, you can’t do that, and everything is channeled through you.

“All the hopes and aspirations, you’re the conduit for everybody’s emotions.”

The sun had well and truly set on Rathbone’s idyllic existence at The Shay.

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“We got beat by Bury at home in the next game, then we drew at York, who were top of the league, played really well,” he says.

“Then we got a win at home against Lincoln, then went and won at Darlington, great result, got a 2-2 draw at home.

“We were still losing most games but winning a couple. We had a four match unbeaten run and then we got beat at Scarborough.

“But results had picked up, there was a feel-good factor about the place, and we’d got some resilience.

“The fans were absolutely amazing as well.

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“We won at Doncaster, Billy Barr scored, and results went well for us. We were fourth-bottom, and only one went down, and I thought ‘we can do this’.

“But we got done 2-1 at Chesterfield on a Tuesday night, we were winning 1-0, Ian Thompstone scored, they got a couple of late goals.

“That night we sank to the very bottom. Number ninety-two.

“This would’ve been late March because it was deadline day the day after.

“After the game, Jim Brown, the chairman, and David Greenwood, they said ‘you have to come back with us’ and I thought ‘oh great, as if things aren’t bad enough’.

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“People like them were putting money into the club out of their own pockets. I was sat in a board meeting once and Jim Brown said ‘come on lads’ and they all got their cheque books out and wrote money out they were never going to get back.

“A lot of them were local businessmen - builders, decorators - just went ‘there you are’, five grand, eight grand, put it all in the pot. Unbelievable really, humbling.

“Which made me feel even worse we were so rubbish!

“So I’m in the car going back to The Shay, feeling awful, six or seven games to go.

“They were giving me a bit of a hard time, saying ‘we can replace you as manager’ and I said ‘please do it, I didn’t ask for the job did I’.

“But they felt no-one else would really want the job.

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“They said ‘Baz, tell all the lads they’re off tomorrow, you’ve got to be in the office from 9am til 5pm on that phone, it’s deadline day’.

“I said ‘right, what budget have I got’ and they said ‘no, no, no, you need to sell a player tomorrow or you’re not getting paid this month’.

“We sold Ian Thompstone, our top scorer, to Scunthorpe, which was nobody’s fault.

“But I thought then ‘we are knackered’.”

But was a mysterious saviour about to come to Rathbone’s rescue in his hour of need?

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Could Godfrey Obebo be the man to transform Halifax’s fortunes?

“The phone rings and it’s an agent saying he’s got someone who’s played in Serie A, doesn’t want any money, just a pay-as-you-play,” he says.

“So he comes in, great guy, but we realise in training he’s hopeless.

“I put him on the bench, we’re winning at Doncaster 1-0, and I say to him ‘go and warm up’ and he went in the dressing room and sat by the radiator.

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“On the touchline he was doing break dancing and everyone was laughing and cheering.

“Then the ball gets booted out and he comes on. The game restarts with a ball their physio threw on for the referee, but the ball that got kicked out gets thrown back onto the pitch.

“So Doncaster are attacking to my right and Godfrey is attacking to the left with a different ball.”

Despite selling his top-scorer, being rock-bottom of the Football League, and signing Godfrey Obebo, Rathbone still had to rally his beleaguered troops for the final run-in.

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“You have to show leadership qualities. It’s no good coming in and crying in the corner,” he says.

“You’ve got to come in and say ‘lads don’t worry about that, there’s enough to keep us up, there’s some good players here’, which there were.

“We lost a couple, but we fought to the end. We played at Bury, a really good side, and we went 1-0 up, they equalised, and Dave German scored late on, and I remember being in the players’ lounge after that game. Oh my god, what a feeling, thinking ‘we’re going to get out of it, we’re going to do it’.

“And then incredibly, Torquay won at Carlisle, the bottom club had won at the top club, and that killed us stone dead. All the joy of winning at Bury had gone.”And then I thought ‘we’re done’.

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“We got beat at home to Wrexham, could have been 10-0, weren’t good enough.

“Then I think we could’ve got out of it if we’d won at Gillingham, whoever won would be out of it. A lovely spring day, we’d gone down the day before.

“We played ever so well, but they scored a couple of long shots, and they were on the pitch dancing and we were going to the final game.

“We must have taken 500 fans to that game, but when we stopped at the services, they weren’t shouting at us, calling us a disgrace, they were saying ‘keep going lads, chin up, we can still do it’.

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“It would have been a hundred times harder if we’d had that vitriol.

“But the fans were unbelievable, they just took it on the chin.

“I felt under so much pressure, when actually there wasn’t any.

“I didn’t feel external pressure, because I think the people in the town felt ‘that’s a tough job, he’s got his hands full’.

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“You do get some nasty letters coming through, people are understandably frustrated, but generally speaking, people would say ‘what do you expect, lowest crowds, lowest budget, smallest squad, sold his top-scorer’.”

In spite of those hindrances, Town made it to the final day of the season still in with a shot of redemption.

“We’ve got to beat Hereford at home - doable - and Northampton needed a draw at Shrewsbury, who are going for the play-offs,” recalls Rathbone.

“We needed a win and for them to lose, which is a nine-to-one shot really.

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“It was such a long, difficult week building up to the game. We were the focus of attention - Sky, BBC, Yorkshire TV. Fame at last!

“We could only hold 7,500 because of crowd safety, but that was still 5,500 more than the usual gate.

“There was a big queue, it was sunny, it was almost a carnival feel. The weirdest thing.

“I remember getting up, having been awake all night. You’re either going to be the hero cheered off, or slumping off having taken them out of the league for the first time since 1911.

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“I remember driving past a church in Luddenden and I slowed down, and I nearly stopped to pray. But it doesn’t work like that does it.

“There were so many people there when I got there. I remember the noise when we went close.

“It was 0-0 at half-time, and Northampton were losing 2-0.

“I’m thinking ‘one goal and I’m coming off shoulder high’.

“Then it went Shrewsbury 2 Northampton 1, then Shrewsbury 2 Northampton 2, then Shrewsbury 2 Northampton 3.

“That killed us. Hereford scored the winner with 10 minutes to go, and the rest is history.”

How did Rathbone feel at full-time?

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“Relief. Pride. I felt sorry for everybody. All the fans went onto the pitch.

“There were a lot of tears, a lot of chanting.

“All the lads were in tears in the dressing room, it was heartbreaking.

“But they did great to get to the last game.

“The fans wanted me to go out and speak, which was really humbling. I said about hopefully bouncing back stronger.

“It was an incredible experience, I wouldn’t have changed it for anything.

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“We tried our absolute best but unfortunately we were the weakest team in the league. With the worst manager!”

Rathbone felt he was the right man to try and lead The Shaymen out of the storm the following season.

“I was two years into a four-year degree, so Halifax kept me on, on the same wage, which was fantastic,” he says.

“I must be the only manager who got a team relegated and didn’t get the sack!

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“I thought I wasn’t a bad manager and I thought ‘we’ve got some decent players here’.

“I thought if we stayed full-time in the Conference, we can win the league and I can go on and manage in the Premier League.

“So I wanted to stay on, but Jim Brown and David Greenwood said it was too much, they didn’t want me to give my degree up and they weren’t sure I could juggle that and being manager.

“They wanted to bring in Peter Wragg, but I said ‘no, I don’t want that’. So they said ‘OK, have it your way, retain control of the team, but we’re telling you now, if after 10 games you’re not in the top two in the Conference, we will sack you’.

“And I said ‘right, I’ll take those chances’.

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“Then I had to go away and do six weeks’ hospital work, so I was driving every morning to Bolton, doing eight hours as a student on respiratory care, and then driving to Halifax to sort out pre-season.

“Then the chairman phoned and said ‘we still want to bring in Pete Wragg’ and I said ‘don’t do it’, and he said ‘OK, fair enough’.

“But as the weeks went on, one day I was driving in to Halifax and on a Halifax Courier billboard it said ‘Wragg and Bone’, which was absolutely fantastic. I laughed out loud.

“I had a meeting with Wraggy and the chairman, and they made it clear he was in charge, like it or lump it. Which was fine, I had no issues.

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“Me and Peter became really good mates, (but) he didn’t last long.

“I felt pushed out, but that was in my head. Peter was good, the chairman was good. But it was his turn.

“I was disappointed I didn’t get the chance because a couple of times Wraggy was off ill, I took the team on my own and we won both games 3-0.

“And I thought I could’ve done it with them lads. But you never know.”

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There was one more chapter to be written in Rathbone’s remarkable time at Halifax.

“That was probably the greatest moment of my life!” he says.

“John Bird was manager, top bloke, really good friends. I’m still hanging on there as physio, got a year to go, about 37, maybe 38.

“We played Gateshead away on Boxing Day, I’d had loads to drink on Christmas Day, as you do, and I’m sat on the bus thinking ‘I feel groggy, I can’t wait to get the game over and get to bed’.

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“John gets up to go to the toilet, I’m sat a couple of rows back, and says ‘how you feeling Baz?’

’Fantastic’.

“I’ve been thinking’ he says, ‘I’m starting you today’.

“Then he went past me and went to the toilet.

“I thought ‘right, I’ve dreamt that haven’t I, he can’t have said that’.

“When the teams were announced the Halifax fans in the away section went mad. I don’t know why they took their season tickets to an away game but they were getting thrown onto the pitch.

“I’m warming up thinking ‘this is an absolute nightmare’ and then we went 1-0 down, I’m not playing well, the fans are going mad.

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“But I thought ‘no, I’m digging deep here’ and me and Colin Lambert in midfield started getting hold of the game, winning our battles, Andy Kiwomya scores a couple, we win 2-1 and I was voted man-of-the-match.”

Rathbone made a handful of appearances for Town on an emergency basis, with his last coming against Dover at The Shay in 1995.

Rathbone scored the second in Town’s 4-0 romp with a cushioned volley from outside the box, prompting wild celebrations.

“We battered them,” he says. “If you could sum up what the whole Halifax experience meant - you know you’re leaving soon because you’re going to graduate and the club aren’t going to be able to pay you a full-time wage - so it was an opportunity to say thanks to the fans.

“I’d played a couple of games for Wraggy, but to leave on that note, unbelievable.”

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