Natural step for Robbie in Rochdale job
WHEN Brian Barry- Murphy walked away from Rochdale three days into pre-season training, there was a school of thought suggesting a proven manager might be the best option to take the club forward.
The thinking was that someone with a track record of success in the lower leagues might consolidate the club’s position following relegation and perhaps even provide the know-how to challenge at the top end of the table. Now was not the time to blood an inexperienced coach.
Those suggesting Robbie Stockdale falls into the category of ‘inexperienced coach’, however, would do well to cast an eye over his CV.
From youth team boss to caretaker at Grimsby, coaching and caretaker manager roles at Sunderland where he worked alongside the likes of Dick Advocaat, David Moyes, Sam Allardyce and Chris Coleman, to assistant coach under Paul Heckinbottom at Hibs and first team coach at West Brom with Allardyce again.
It’s not so much a leap from coaching into management as the next logical step in Stockdale’s career path.
“I’ve made it clear to the players that I’ve come here to win,” he said when meeting the press on Tuesday.
“Everyone will say that I’m a new manager, but
I’ve had vast experience and I’m ready for the challenge. I’ve worked under Sam (Allardyce), I’ve been a first-team coach under David Moyes and Chris Coleman, so I feel I’ve done my time in terms of building my way up from the academies, worked with some fantastic players and people and I think what you do is you steal little bits from all of them, but I am my own person and I’m really looking forward to getting the first game out of the way where supporters can come and watch and hopefully give them a team they can be proud of.”
As a player he starred on the Premier League stage, so he’s operated on both sides of the player/ coaching staff divide at the highest level.
“With Bryan Robson and Steve Mcclaren I was a player (at Middlesbrough), so you have to follow their philosophy otherwise you don’t play!” he said. “In terms of working with managers at senior level who I’ve worked under – Paul Heckinbottom at Hibs has done really well on his journey. My role was always to support what they wanted, that was important for the position I was in. Now I have an opportunity to put into place what I want to do. That’s something that I’ve wanted to do for quite a long time and I’m really looking forward to doing it.”
Stockdale impressed the board with his knowledge of the club and plans to take Dale forward.
“The board must have liked what they saw on my CV and invited me in for a chat and I’m sure there would have been other people in that process as well,” he said. “I looked at what the club was, I looked at the history, at the players under contract and I felt it was a really exciting opportunity for someone like myself to do my first manager’s role.
“I think you always aim to be here for a long time. Now, I know I’m in a business where I know I have to pick up results because it really does become medium and short term if you don’t get them! You’d have to ask the board if I hit all their short, medium and long-term targets – I think I probably did because I’m here! – but certainly we want to get as close to promotion as we can this year, that’s the aim.”
And the manager was equally as impressed by the board!
“One thing I was really impressed with when I came to speak to the guys here was how open they were – I’ve been in other buildings where you find things out after you’ve signed on the dotted line!” he said. “That wasn’t the case here, we were both open and honest with each other and that’s the only way I see it to be successful.”
BBM’S departure with pre-season already under way came as a shock to the club and meant whoever came in was doing so at a later than ideal stage in the year. However, Stockdale is not fazed by the timing and does not believe the club are already significantly behind their League Two rivals.
“There’s been some good work done already, I can tell that,” he said. “The staff have done a fantastic job. It’s never easy, I’ve been in their situation, but from taking in the game last weekend you can see the lads are slowly building up their fitness and I have asked them to now concentrate on making the right decisions and getting into the right habits and fitness will come in time.
“I think it’s a strange pre-season anyway with the amount of players out of contract and the Covid issues clubs have had to suffer with, so I don’t think we’re a million miles away from where other clubs are at in terms of the planning.”
Dale’s record of producing home grown talent has been second to none in the lower leagues over the last decade and Stockdale intends making sure that reputation stays intact.
“Academy and development is my background,” he said. “I worked at Grimsby Town as Academy Manager, at Sunderland with the under 18s and 21s and I think if you look at my track record in helping to develop players – I’d sort of do the finishing touches because there’s an awful lot of work goes on in academies that goes unseen. I think credit should go to the coaches who work with the players at younger levels – I sometimes get credit for getting them at the top end.
“So I’m really keen to develop our own, I think that’s an outstanding feature of the club and something they have done very well so we’ll look to carry on doing that and, if we can, improve it.”
Stockdale gets to meet the Dale supporters today as his side take on Fleetwood Town at the Crown Oil Arena.
“I can’t wait to meet them, I can’t wait to see them back in the stadium and we want to play an exciting, entertaining brand of football, we want to be horrible to play against as well and hopefully the fans can back us with that,” he said.