IT’S BEEN SO EMOTIONAL!
AS the floodlights clunked off at Maidstone United, Danny Cowley was reflecting on Lincoln City’s incredible season after ticking off his penultimate game as a Non-League manager.
The National League title had been secured three days before with the Imps boss hoisted onto the shoulders of the adoring public.
When the majority of fans had filtered out of Sincil Bank and the final few stragglers had passed on their thanks, Cowley and his brother Nicky held the trophy for family pictures.
While their squad partied the night away, they had “two cokes instead of one” and were home in time for Match of the Day.
The management duo are a ten-year overnight success. Starting out in Step 5, they took Concord Rangers to the Conference South, guided part-time Braintree Town to the National League play-offs and, now, Lincoln City into the Football League.
It achieves their own dream too – the one Nicky used to act out by wearing a long Umbro coat and turning a sofa bed into a dug-out while playing Football Manager on their computer – of managing in football’s top 92.
“We just try really hard every day,” Danny Cowley says. “We love football so we’re naturally enthusiastic about it. It’s a whole group of people who have achieved this. It’s not by one or two people, it’s a whole group. It’s been a brilliant journey.
“I feel really sad to be leaving Non-League. It’s been so good to me as a player and then as a manager. I will dearly miss it because it’s real. Real football and real people.”
I remind him that he said something similar about looking forward to getting back to a league game with North Ferriby in the immediate aftermath of their historic FA Cup victory at Burnley that pitched them against Arsenal in the quarter-finals.
Resilience
“I didn’t enjoy Burnley or Arsenal – that’s ridiculous football isn’t it? Everything’s far too perfect. It doesn’t suit me at all,” he jokes now, thinking back.“So I’ll really, really miss Non-League. But at the same time, I’ll be really, really proud to be called a Football League manager. “For Nicky and I to take the journey from Step 5 – four promotions in ten seasons – we’ve had to really fight to get here. “To be at the top of it, from a personal point of view, it will be something we’ll forever be really proud of. “You have to earn it. When you haven’t played in the League, you have to really earn it. That’s what we’ve done. We know the rules. When opportunities come around to change your life, the most successful people take them.
“Now we’ve got this opportunity to be Football League managers. We expect to take it.”
They’ve certainly taken the chance given to them not 12 months ago. Giving up their jobs in the PE department at the Fitzwimarc School, the brothers from Essex took the plunge into full-time management with the Imps.
It was a shrewd move because they saw a club that had limited success – the Imps hadn’t finished in the top half of the table since relegation in 2011 – where they could add value.
Their achievements have also opened many people’s eyes while also giving managers who hold similar ambitions a big boost. NonLeague has managerial talent.
“There’s a lot of fantastic managers in Non-League football,” agrees Cowley. “Who have to combine working full-time with management, which is also full-time. At any level, football management is a full-time occupation.
“So to combine the two, the people who do it only know how hard and how tough it is. We did that for nine seasons. You have to really dig in. You have to really show resilience and perseverance in that period. To do that, then get this opportunity and make the most of it, has been brilliant. I feel very privileged to have the opportunity.”
What would he say to bosses dreaming of following in their footsteps? “Anything’s possible in football, isn’t it? If you believe,” he says. “If you’ve got a work ethic and an ambition and a drive, then only you can control your destiny. You can be anything you want to be in this world.
Respectful
“If you’re willing to work relentlessly hard, you can be whatever you want to be. There’s no restrictions. The only restrictions people have are the ones they put on themselves. So, try really hard every single day and you’ll get to where you want to go.”
It’s not lost on anyone that on Tuesday night there was another young, talented Non-League manager in the opposite dug-out.
Maidstone United boss Jay Saunders has been in charge for three promotions in four years and in their first season at Step 1 has steered them away from the drop to a push for the top half. The Stones’ safety and Lincoln’s championship party now on tour, there was a feel-good vibe at a Gallagher Stadium with more than 3,000 fans. “I thought tonight was everything that’s brilliant about Non-League ,” Cowley says. “Maidstone were a credit to NonLeague. They gave us a guard of honour before the game, a standing ovation as we left the field, and two groups of supporters singing at each other having some real fun. What a brilliant advert for Non-League football. “We want to move forward, but we’re respectful of football. We’re respectful that if you get carried away or ahead of yourself it will bite you. It’s chewed up and spat out a lot better and more knowledgeable football people than me. But if that’s one of my last Non-League memories, which I hope it is, then it will be a great one. “We’ve a real love for it. I’ll never forget my roots. NonLeague football has given me some of the best moments in my life. I’ll be forever appreciative of it and the people in it, volunteers and people who love it too.”