MICHAEL Clegg says a 4-0 humbling by Radcliffe on the opening day was the catalyst for Warrington Rylands’ flying start to the campaign.
Second in the Northern Premier League after a run of one defeat in 17 games, the Blues are chasing a fourth promotion in five years.
But they couldn’t have looked further from contention on a dismal August afternoon at Gorsey Park, when Radcliffe rattled home four first-half goals to leave Clegg’s side’s rock bottom of the formative table.
“That was a really tough pill to swallow,” admits Clegg, who spent several years at Atherton Collieries and Ashton United before replacing Jody Banim at Rylands 11 games from the end of last season.
“But as we know now, Radcliffe can do that to anyone. I went in there, 5 o’clock, everyone was absolutely boiling and we’d just been tanked 4-0.
“I looked every one of them in the eye and said, ‘Lads, you might think I’m a madman but I actually think you played well today. You created a lot of chances. You conceded five chances and they scored four. You played on the front foot. I can’t really ask for much more’.
“I said to them, ‘That same XI is going to start at Stafford next game because I believe 100 percent that this team is good enough’.
“We won 2-0 at Stafford and I think that was a sive moment. It got me a lot of buy-in because the players thought ‘OK, he’s got our backs and he believes in us’. We haven’t really looked back.”
According to Clegg, inset, it is a scaling back of the club’s budget and ambition that has sparked an upturn in fortunes after last season’s tenth-place finish.
“I’ll be dead straight – we’re working on half of what we were last year and that’s the truth,” he says. “You can ask anyone about that.
“But with that comes togetherness and if you’ve got that at this level, and sprinkle a bit of magic on top, you can win matches.
“We were coming to football the last couple of years worrying about finances and how we’d manage to pay people the wages they were on without going up.
“This year it’s just about enjoying the games and having a team to be proud of. Now we’re up there, there’s still no pressure from the club. If we win, we win, if we lose, we lose. That’s it.”
Win or lose, they will need to do it without Joe Piggott and Scott Bakkor, who this week emigrated to Australia.
In their place come on-loan Salford striker Djavan Pedro and former Atherton Collieries midfielder Joe Adams. “We always knew Joe and Scott were going and we’d planned accordingly,” adds Clegg. “We’ve got an absolute beast in DJ and a real technician in Joe, who was at Dundalk last year. They’re both hungry and I’m really pleased.”
