Sky Blues RECRUIT ex-spurs star to boost backroom staff
COVENTRY City have appointed a key new member of Mark Robins’ backroom staff, with the arrival of a new head of recruitment.
Former Tottenham Hotspur defender Dean Austin has joined the club, replacing Chris Badlan who this month joined Championship rivals Blackpool as the club’s sporting director after five years with the Sky Blues.
The 52-year-old has left his role as technical director and recruitment consultant at St Albans City FC to take up the post with Coventry with immediate effect. The club say he “brings a vast range of experience from 35 years in football to his new role at the Sky Blues, where he will spearhead City’s transfer activities, with past roles in the playing, coaching, analysis and administration areas of the game.”
Austin was assistant coach at Watford in January 2015, being only English coach in Slavisa Jokanovic’s backroom team, which led the Hornets to promotion from the Championship to the Premier League at the end of the 2014–15 season. He was retained when Quique Sánchez Flores replaced Jokanovic for the 2015–16 season.
He left Vicarage Road in 2017 to assist Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink at
Northampton Town and then took over as manager when the former Chelsea star was sacked, but returned to Watford to work with Flores again in 2019.
Manager Mark Robins said: “We are delighted to welcome Dean to Coventry City.
“He brings a wealth of experience across football to the club in what will be an important role for us both in the short-term, looking to the January transfer window, and longer-term as we look to continue the development of our football club and team, as we have done over the last few years.
“The recruitment of players and having the right processes in place to do so is very important, and we look forward to working closely with Dean in this area.”
Austin’s first task will be to identify targets for the January transfer window. City are hopeful that Doug King’s proposed takeover of the club will be approved by the EFL this week to clear the way for fresh investment to enable Robins to strengthen his squad next month.
Although Badlan and chief scout Stuart Benthom, who has also switched to Blackpool, leave an extensive recruitment database, having already identified potential new signings for the mid-term window, the City manager made it clear at the weekend
that he is open to fresh ideas and suggestions from his new recruitment chief.
“We will reassess it,” he told the Coventry Telegraph. “A different person will bring some different ideas and I am willing to listen to them and then we will attack the window when we know where we are.
“But obviously we’re still waiting (on the takeover) but things will become clearer as we move forward.
“But I am calm on that situation, which is fine.
“But things will change and I want them to. This is a chance to freshen things up and always take the positives from it and then we can move forward and build again. The work that the two lads have done remains and we can look at that, tweak it and rebuild a department that we want.”
Former full-back Austin played in the Premier League for Spurs between 1992-98, making 124 appearances for the club, while also playing in the Football League for Crystal Palace, where he made the most appearances of his career.
He also played professionally for Southend United and at non-league level for St Albans City and Woking.
Austin holds a UEFA Pro Licence and LMA Diploma in Sports Management, and is also undertaking the FA Technical Director Level 5 award.