Gary Megson

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Gary Megson
Personal information
Full name	Gary John Megson
Date of birth	May 2, 1959 (age 47)
Place of birth	Manchester, England
Nickname	Mego
Playing position	Midfielder
Senior clubs1
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1977-1979 1979-1981 1981-1984 1984 1984-1985 1985-1989 1989-1992 1992-1995 1995 1995	Plymouth Argyle Everton Sheffield Wednesday Nottingham Forest Newcastle United Sheffield Wednesday Manchester City Norwich City Lincoln City Shrewsbury Town	078 (10) 022 (2) 123 (13) 000 (0) 024 (1) 110 (12) 082 (2) 046 (1) 002 (0) 002 (0)
Teams managed
1995-1996 1996-1997 1997-1999 1999 2000-2004 2005-2006	Norwich City Blackpool Stockport County Stoke City West Bromwich Albion Nottingham Forest
1 Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. * Appearances (Goals)

Gary Megson (born 2 May 1959 in Manchester) is a former English footballer and manager. He is currently without a job, having left Nottingham Forest by mutual consent in February 2006. As a player, he is arguably best remembered from his days at Sheffield Wednesday, where his father Don Megson also played in the 1960s. As manager he enjoyed his most successful spell at West Bromwich Albion, whom he twice got promoted to the Premiership.

Contents 1 Playing career 2 Managerial career 2.1 Brief stint with the Canaries 2.2 Testing times with the Seasiders 2.3 Stability with Stockport and a short stint at Stoke 2.4 Big break with the Baggies 2.5 Struggling with Forest 3 Managerial stats 4 External links

[edit] Playing career

As a player, Megson was a tough-tackling defensive midfielder, and something of a journeyman, playing for nine different clubs.

He began his career at Plymouth Argyle, where he quickly made his name and impressed enough for Everton to sign him for a £250,000 transfer fee. Megson struggled to establish himself in the Everton lineup, and after two unremarkable years at Goodison, he moved to his father's old stomping grounds, Sheffield Wednesday, for a fee of £130,000.

Megson immediately gained a place in Wednesday's starting lineup, and was a key member of the team that gained promotion to the top flight in 1983-84. In his three years at Hillsborough, he missed only three league games. In the summer of 1984, he was signed by Nottingham Forest, only for Brian Clough to decide he didn't need him. Megson spent five frustrating months at the City Ground, without making a single first-team appearance before being sold to Newcastle United.

Megson played regularly for the Magpies for the remainder of the 1984-85 season, but lost his place in the lineup the following season, and moved back to Sheffield Wednesday. In his second spell with the Owls, Megson again established himself as an important member of the squad, and was rarely out of the starting eleven. In January 1989, he moved to Manchester City, where he spent three and a half seasons. He then moved to Norwich City in the summer of 1992, and spent three seasons at Carrow Road. In his final season at Norwich, he was also assistant manager to John Deehan.

When Deehan was sacked in the summer of 1995, Megson also left Norwich, and finished his playing career with short spells at lower division sides Lincoln City and Shrewsbury Town. Later the same year, he got a surprise return to Norwich when he was appointed manager following Martin O'Neill's sudden departure.

[edit] Managerial career

[edit] Brief stint with the Canaries

While still playing at Norwich City, Megson became assistant to manager John Deehan. He briefly left the club following Deehan's sacking in 1995, but returned to Carrow Road later the same year when new manager Martin O'Neill left to take charge at Leicester City. Megson managed the Canaries for the remainder of the 1995-96 season, but was let go at the end of the season.

[edit] Testing times with the Seasiders

In 1996, Megson became manager at Blackpool where he recorded only 21 wins in 52 matches. At Bloomfield Road, he was assisted by the former Manchester United midfielder Mike Phelan, but the partnership failed to bring a Division Two playoff place to the Seasiders, and Megson left at the end of the season.

[edit] Stability with Stockport and a short stint at Stoke

Megson moved to Stockport County in 1997 and they came just two places short of the Division One playoffs in his first season as manager. After two reasonable seasons with Stockport, he was dismissed after the board alleged that he had applied for a manager's post elsewhere without their permission. However, he wasn't unemployed for long, taking the manager's job at Stoke City. This turned out to be a bad career move, as Megson left after only a few months following a dispute with the club's new owners.

[edit] Big break with the Baggies

Megson took over as manager of struggling First Division West Bromwich Albion towards the very end of the 1999-2000 season with barely time for him to organise a few key player transfers before the deadline. Albion narrowly evaded relegation by winning their final game of the season and Megson was immediately hailed as a hero.

The following season, he astonished and delighted the fans by taking the club into the playoffs. To cap that, in the 2001-02 season the club won promotion to the FA Premier League, overcoming the eleven point lead of bitter local rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers in the closing weeks of the campaign. However, the club was barely prepared for the financial challenges of life in the top flight and a bitter quarrel soon developed between Megson and the club's chairman Paul Thompson over the latter's perceived interference in footballing matters. An undignified public showdown resulted in Thompson resigning from the board in order to forestall Megson's departure. Jeremy Peace took the opportunity to establish himself as Thompson's successor. Such public disorganisation took its toll and the club were relegated after a single woeful season in the Premier League.

Peace's financial prudence enabled Megson to mount a successful promotion campaign, and return to the Premier League the following season – but by the summer of 2004, the relationship between the two men had become strained. With a poor start to the season, by September, Megson's job was under threat. The following month Megson, whose contract was due to end in June 2005, announced that he would not sign a new deal at the club if offered one. On 26 October, Megson was dismissed by West Brom.

[edit] Struggling with Forest

Within a week of being sacked at West Bromwich Albion, Gary Megson was linked with vacant manager's job at Wolverhampton Wanderers after Dave Jones was sacked – but that job went to Glenn Hoddle instead. Megson was then appointed manager of struggling Nottingham Forest on 10 January 2005, succeeding Joe Kinnear, but was unable to save them from slipping into the third tier of English football for the first time. Promotion back to the Championship was to be his priority for 2005-06, but Forest struggled, especially away from home, for most of the season. In terms of points they were nearer to the relegation zone than the playoff zone when he resigned in February 2006 after being put under a lot of pressure by the Forest fans.

He was linked with the Sheffield Wednesday job on 19 October 2006 alongside Nigel Pearson.

[edit] Managerial stats

Team	Nat	From	To	Record
				G	W	L	D	Win %
Norwich City		December 21, 1995	July 31, 1996	27	5	13	9	18.51
Blackpool		July 5, 1996	July 1, 1997	52	21	16	15	40.38
Stockport County		July 1, 1997	June 25, 1999	102	35	40	27	34.31
Stoke City		July 14, 1999	November 15, 1999	22	9	6	7	40.90
West Bromwich Albion		March 9, 2000	October 26, 2004	221	94	77	50	42.53
Nottingham Forest		January 10, 2005	February 16, 2006	59	17	24	18	28.81

[edit] External links

• Gary Megson career stats at Soccerbase
• Gary Megson management career stats at Soccerbase
• Career information at ex-canaries.co.uk

Preceded by Martin O'Neill	Norwich City F.C. Manager 1995-1996	Succeeded by Mike Walker
Preceded by Sam Allardyce	Blackpool F.C. Manager 1996-1997	Succeeded by Nigel Worthington
Preceded by Dave Jones	Stockport County F.C. Manager 1997-1999	Succeeded by Andy Kilner
Preceded by Brian Little	Stoke City F.C. Manager 1999	Succeeded by Gudjon Thordarson
Preceded by Allan Evans & Cyrille Regis (caretakers)	West Bromwich Albion F.C. Manager 2000-2004	Succeeded by Frank Burrows (caretaker)
Preceded by Mick Harford (caretaker)	Nottingham Forest F.C. Manager 2005-2006	Succeeded by Frank Barlow and Ian McParland (caretakers)