The Nowhere Men (19 page)

Born on the Wirral Peninsula, in Bromborough, Philpotts played 221 games for Tranmere in two spells between 1974 and 1985, punctuated by two seasons with the Carolina Lightnin’ in the short-lived American Soccer League. He was a rugged central defender in an era in which few prisoners were taken, but the highlight of his career was a headed goal in a 2–0 win over Stockport at Edgeley Park, which secured Tranmere promotion from the old Fourth Division in 1976. The other goal was one of 37 scored that season by Moore, who had returned to the club for a second spell as manager in March, 2012.

The two men resembled a pair of old slippers: they were comfortable, well-worn and perfectly matched. Moore joined us, silently, midway through the first half and took a seat, two places down, to the right of Philpotts. He had worked without guarantees before being given a year’s contract as a reward for saving the club from relegation. There was an unconscious choreography to their movements, which were marginal yet reflected the ebb and flow of what was a desultory, one-paced game. Their eyes flicked quickly, constantly across the pitch. Their facial expressions were weathervanes, which predicted turbulence. Words were secondary, occasional chimes of doom.

Devaney was the most conspicuous of those going through the motions. ‘He doesn’t want to be here,’ muttered Moore. As epitaphs go, it was concise, intuitive and damning. Philpotts, whose duty was to focus on the future, nodded without averting his gaze. He was paying particular attention to the triallists, whose performances were shaped by difference in character, as much as variance in natural talent. Midfield player Luke Dobie, in particular, appeared recklessly self-possessed.

‘Another day, another dollar,’ he had announced to his 1,904 followers on Twitter that morning. ‘The cream always rises to the top.’ He had obvious technical ability, but a telling fondness for the unproductive Hollywood ball. For a teenager who had been nurtured by Crewe, released by Everton, rejected by Middlesbrough, and had four games on loan at Accrington Stanley, he was remarkably sanguine about the uncertainty shrouding his future. He did himself few favours by conceding possession and allowing Marvin Morgan, Shrewsbury’s leggy striker, to score the opening goal.

The second goal highlighted the inner turmoil of goalkeeper Ben Woodhead, who had been released by Burnley at the end of his second year as a scholar. He had travelled from Grimsby, where he had just completed an unsuccessful week’s trial. Tall and slender, he was a young 19, conspicuous by his cropped ginger hair and his audible nervousness. He peppered unfamiliar defenders with a stream of consciousness which failed to register, and was a skittish, unconvincing presence.

The staff at Turf Moor had given him a persuasive character reference; he was diligent, intelligent, and regarded as coaching material. Yet the pressure of the occasion had clearly got to him. It was no surprise when he, too, was caught in possession on the right-hand edge of his area. He panicked, and conceded a penalty which Morgan despatched with the minimum of fuss. This prompted Woodhead to emit an unintelligible howl of self-reproach, and volley the base of his left hand upright. ‘Fucking hell,’ said Philpotts, under his breath. He had seen enough.

Bizarrely, the sounds of children playing in a nearby schoolyard invaded the consciousness. Their joy was an ironic counterpoint to the simultaneous struggle of Ryan Brunt and Jack Law, forwards from Stoke City and Oldham Athletic respectively, to impose themselves. Long before the match ended, Moore had decided to look elsewhere for the two strikers, two wide men and three midfield players he sought to supplement a squad that would be reduced to 18 or 20, for financial reasons.

Philpotts, who had a brief spell as Wigan manager after joining Stockport as a youth coach and scout at the end of his playing career, understands the cadence of life in the lower leagues. He accepts the consequences of the club’s frugality. His role had been downgraded to a part-time post for the previous two years, yet he still routinely worked a 70-hour week, in addition to making pin money scouting for Fulham in the North of England.

The game sustained him, but did not dominate him, despite the ferocity of his commitment. He took two weeks off a year, each June. He thought nothing of covering a night game at Exeter, although unnecessary lane restrictions on the M6 and M53 in the early hours, towards the end of a 520-mile round trip, drove him to distraction. On this morning, like so many others, he had let himself in to the ground at eight o’clock.

Tranmere’s budget, one of the lowest in League One, precluded the payment of transfer fees. The indignity of unearthing players, who promptly signed for better-paying non-league clubs, came with the territory. Philpotts redressed the balance by delving into local football in Wales; his principal summer loan target would be Jake Cassidy, a richly promising Wolves striker he logged scoring 28 goals in 32 games for Llandudno Junction in the Welsh Alliance. The numbers don’t lie:

‘At our level, the going rate for a good striker is about fifteen hundred a week. That’s way too top heavy for us. Can we get to a grand? We won’t mess a lad around, and stretch out negotiations knowing we can only afford a couple of hundred quid, but there’s not more than three or four hundred around for most young players. We tell them we will put them in the shop window. You can get frustrated, though, when you see them going into non-league football simply for financial reasons.

‘Even if you find someone in non-league you have to be quick. Leave it for a month or six weeks and another league club will have moved in. If three or four get interested there’s an auction and a transfer fee. That’s us out. I understand the economics of the situation. I understand where the chairman is coming from. He has put six million into the club. He would sell it tomorrow, if he could get his money out. He’d never take this club under, though, because he realises what a friendly, family club it is.

‘We all know there are a lot of people in this area suffering, economically. We try to make football as accessible as possible to the public. The club matters to people. We try to attract the younger generation, parents and kids. They identify with our players. I think everyone, fans and directors alike, is realistic about what we are capable of achieving. Logically, with a budget this tight, that means surviving in the division. But that shouldn’t stop us from striving to be better, to push for the highest level possible.’

The balance had shifted, to a degree. The days when players would consider a trial as being beneath them were over. Contracts were short term, and trials open ended. Sometimes they stretched up to a month. Decisions were complex, and occasionally dictated by a player’s compatibility with the group. This could only be judged over time, when guards would be dropped and true personalities would emerge.

‘Trials are useful, but my satisfaction comes in the loan that works out well for everyone. We had Marvin Sordell here, and put him up in rooms above an Italian restaurant close to the ground. It wasn’t the Hilton. It was a little test for him. His mum brought him up here; he was a quiet lad, whose confidence only became apparent at game time. He’s gone on to do ever so well since, and I feel we played a small part in that.

‘The one thing we can offer young players, who might otherwise be lost in the system at a Premier League club, is a good chance of a first team place. We promise never to stand in their way, if they excel. We will also do anything we can for them, as footballers and as young men. I love to sit down with them, and hear what they want to achieve. They are conditioned to keeping a lot of things to themselves. I always tell them that all they have to do is knock on my door, if they have any problems. I hate to think of them as being isolated, with no one to turn to.’

It is that humanity which defines a certain type of scout, and a certain type of club. At the age of 58, Philpotts had acquired the wisdom required to play a pastoral role, suited to Tranmere’s social status. He saw the human cost of progress in his profession, and rejected the cost–benefit analysis of a new generation of cyberscouts, who lacked experience, empathy and understanding.

‘The Prozone stuff is putting a few good men out of work. We can’t afford it, and I’ve been fortunate to work with managers who like to sit opposite me and get answers about players face to face, instead of on a computer screen. The industry changes so much, so quickly, and I’ve been at this club for such a long time. We’ve had our ups and downs but the honesty of the place attracts me. People ask me why I’m still here. I’ve had my opportunities to move on, but family is more important.’

The disappointments of the day would be put into perspective, soon enough. Philpotts was a registered carer, not just for his aged mother, but for his younger brother. He was 51, and suffering from the same unexplained disease which claimed the life of another brother, at the age of 51. The prognosis was not good. Prenton Park provided a release. It was not a place to waste time, dreaming about what might, could and should have been.

Neither was the Griffin Park boardroom, which had been opened up for a boot sale, a behind-closed-doors match against Reading’s development squad. The scenario was similar; players on both sides had the vulnerability of abandoned kittens. In this case, 18 scouts were in on the deal. Each, without exception, paid their respects to John Griffin, a man who exuded the quiet dignity of an old soldier at a regimental reunion. There was a reassuring generosity of spirit in the gesture of John Ward, Colchester’s manager, who put an arm on his shoulder and chuckled: ‘We’d turn up for an opening of an envelope at this time of year, wouldn’t we?’

Griffin is the scout’s scout. He has spent 40 years operating in and around London, largely for Crystal Palace, Fulham and Brentford. Hundreds of players owe their careers to his perception and sensitivity. Some, like Alan Pardew and Sean O’Driscoll, have developed into accomplished managers and coaches. They still call for discreet advice. Others, such as Stan Collymore and Ian Wright, were complex, compulsive characters, reinvented as media seers. All revere a man of Gandalfian sagacity, whose serene disposition disguises sharp street wisdom.

At 72, retirement was not an option. Griffin was working in straitened circumstances at Wycombe, where his loyalty to embattled manager Gary Waddock had a paternal intensity. The club was in meltdown. Griffin responded by helping to raise £1 million. He liaised with Waddock to alert Mel Johnson to the availability of Jordon Ibe, and engineered a £350,000 move to Cardiff for teenaged winger Kadeem Harris. Relegation to League Two was of minimal significance, compared to the arrest, on February 24 2012, of club owner Steve Hayes as part of Operation Tuleta, the Metropolitan Police’s investigation into allegations of computer hacking.

Hayes, a former double glazing salesman who once sold secondary mortgages for his father-in-law, was said to be worth £50 million, following the sale of an internet loans company he established in 1997, and promoted through tenuous links to such gaudy celebrities as Jordan. But Wycombe, together with Wasps, the Premiership rugby club which Hayes also owned, were in limbo. Griffin’s determination to prepare for the 2012–13 season would be irrelevant if negotiations to cede control to a Supporters’ Trust broke down.

‘Some of these players we’re watching today will be available for loan next year,’ he rationalised as he sipped tea at one of six tables, arranged beside the bar in the Brentford boardroom. ‘That’s all I can look for, and that’s if we have got a club at all. The way things are going with the owner there has to be a doubt. He says the club is losing a million pounds a year. I find that difficult to believe. We are the worst-paid team in League One by a distance, and we’ve sold the two kids for a million. Yet when we wanted to buy a lad from non-league for seven and a half grand we were told there’s no money. How can that be?’

A sardonic smile signalled the irony of the moment. He had survived similar strife during two spells at Brentford. ‘They named this place after me, you know,’ he said, with a self-deprecating laugh. Experience and necessity dictated that he develop a Micawberish mentality that something would turn up. He was made redundant after his first period as Brentford’s chief scout, in the mid-1980s, but was the pivotal figure at the club during his second spell, between 1997 and 2008:

‘Twice, when we thought we were going into administration, I sold somebody I brought here for nothing out of non-league. The first was Paul Smith, the goalkeeper. I’ll be honest, I stuck some stories into newspapers to try and liven it up. I got him sold to Southampton for three hundred thousand. That kept us going. A few years later I took DJ Campbell from Yeading. I was sitting in this very room, doing the deal, when Martin Allen, who was manager, walked in and said: “Just tell them to fuck off.” I told him the kid was going to score a lot of goals, so he took him for twenty-five grand. We were in trouble again within six months, and we sold him to Birmingham for half a million. I don’t look for credit, but I’ve seen some things. I know I saved this club from going to the wall, twice. That’s a fact.’

The circumstances which led to Griffin’s initial association with Brentford were revealing. He had made his name by helping Terry Venables assemble the so-called ‘Team of the Eighties’ at Crystal Palace. That was destined to disintegrate after Kenny Sansom, its marquee player, was sold to Arsenal, and he was in the process of developing another youth programme at Fulham when he left on a point of principle:

‘Ted Buxton was chief scout at Fulham when I was at Palace. To this day, I still think he’s the nicest man I’ve met in my life. They wanted to make Ted a paid director, and he must have told them about me. Bobby Campbell, who was manager at the time, took me aside after a game and had a long chat. He said they wanted me to come over as chief scout and youth development officer, but that I could never have the title. Ted would keep that so he could be paid as a director. That was how it was done in those days. People got a little extra by a tweak in the system. Matt Busby tried to keep it quiet, but everyone knew he had the club shop at Man United.