IAN’S THE MASTER OF CITY’S DESTINY

Manager is raided after shock exit

WINCHESTER City wasted no time in appointing Ian Saunders as their new manager after Paul Masters walked out on Wednesday.

Masters guided City to the Evo-Stik South & West play-off semi-finals last season where they lost to eventual winners Banbury United and had hoped to go a step further this time around.

However, with money tight at the club, Masters decided to step down with just over a week before Winchester’s season opener at Slimbridge.

But director of football Dave Malone moved swiftly to bring in Saunders from fellow Hampshire side Petersfield Town just 24 hours after Masters’ departure.

“I think Paul got increasingly frustrated with a culmination of events,” Malone told The NLP.

“It was quite a shock when it actually happened but I can, to a certain extent, understand his feelings. We aren’t going to commit money we haven’t got or can’t afford.

Attraction

“It’s been a frustrating time. We had a very good season last year and we at least wanted to emulate that in the season ahead.

“We didn’t have any time to dwell on it. We drew up a shortlist of people and our number one target has come up trumps.”

Saunders, who spent four years at Petersfield, achieved consecutive promotions through the Wessex Division One and Premier to the Southern League Central where they finished 13th last season.

“His success record was the attraction,” added Saunders. “I spoke to the Petersfield chairman Graeme Moir to give him the courtesy that I was going to speak with Ian.

“He understood why I wanted to speak to him. I apologised to him about the bad timing but it was a situation that was forced upon us.

“We were able to convince Ian that we offered greater potential than what he might have had at Petersfield.

“I couldn’t give him a lot of time to think about it because we needed to get a manager in place ready for the start of the season.”

Saunders has taken his assistant manager Jason Hampton with him to the City Ground, while Petersfield have begun the process to find a new manager.