I’M STILL STANDING
The target of a death threat on Boxing Day, sacked by Oldham three weeks later, Stephen Robinson is now facing another huge battle to keep Motherwell in the Premiership, but insists...
STEPHEN ROBINSON insists he’s genuinely pleased to note Oldham Athletic play their final game of the League One season today well away from trouble. If only he could have been so sure about keeping his family clear of danger as he tried everything to steer the club towards safety.
Being the target of a death threat on Boxing Day, following a 2-0 defeat at Sheffield United, was the low point of a scarring six-month tenure. Robinson left relatively secure roles as Motherwell’s assistant manager and coaching for Euro 2016 darlings Northern Ireland for the mire of a first manager job — and no thanks for the tough task he was handling. The chilling greeting read: ‘#oafc tell Stephen Robinson I’m gunna murder his children’.
Robinson’s wife Tracey and sons Harry, 16, and Charlie, 12, were over in Greater Manchester from Northern Ireland for Christmas when the shocking message was posted online and brought to their attention.
Perhaps the sack, three weeks later, was a blessing. His nearest and dearest would not need to return to Oldham, the club turned to favourite managerial son John Sheridan to spare them relegation and Robinson, through a succession of other twists of fate, became Motherwell manager. But not before their tormentor was confronted.
‘That job left me worried about the people around me,’ admitted the 42-year-old. ‘Coming from Belfast, you take a death threat seriously. My younger boy was genuinely frightened, he didn’t want to go out for dinner.
‘It turned out to be a young boy who made a mistake. But it wasn’t a nice environment. The police wanted to throw the book at him but me and my wife said: “No”. That’s not what we wanted. We have two of our own who will do stupid things at times. But,
unfortunately, we have social media and the society we live in. My two boys are on social media and it does hurt them, it does hurt your family, your mum. It didn’t affect me because I don’t read it. And if you don’t read it then you don’t get upset. My wife went to meet him.
‘I didn’t really want to because I’ve got a bad temper. She’s more good-natured than me. The boy was extremely sorry. He’d learned his lesson. I think one of his parents was a police officer and the other a teacher, so they were so disappointed, too. We’ve all made mistakes. We move on.’
It was far from Robinson’s intentions to move on quite so far, so quickly following his January dismissal. He swiftly received job offers in England and back home ‘a lot cushier and on similar money to here’ to start in the summer. But he couldn’t reject Motherwell when Mark McGhee called and offered him his old No2 job back.
Six weeks after his own sacking he started back at Fir Park as assistant to McGhee, who was fired following the very next game — a 5-1 thrashing by Dundee. That ushered Robinson into a caretaker capacity then permanent role of trying to steer Motherwell clear of 11th place.
‘I must admit the difficulties I faced at Oldham did put me off initially,’ said Robinson. ‘I probably wouldn’t have applied for another job. If Mark hadn’t been manager I wouldn’t have come back. I’ve a great affection for this club.
‘I owe a lot of people for looking after me and my family well. Even when things weren’t going well at Oldham I always had people here who had my back. You remember that. I had phone calls from people like Derek McInnes, texts from other managers in Scotland.’
McInnes is able to recognise a manager locked in a no-win situation, as he was amid financial upheaval at Bristol City. McInnes returned to Scotland to hugely enhance his reputation and Robinson backs himself to succeed as a Ladbrokes Premiership manager, albeit in a post where there are harsh economic challenges. Still, if he can retain Motherwell’s top-flight status, pre-season should be easier than his Oldham crash course.
‘I inherited three players and 23 trialists,’ he recalls. ‘There was one physio, we brought a strength and conditioning student and rejigged budgets. The head of recruitment left after three weeks because he realised the task and got paid more at Scunthorpe.
‘We tried to modernise but that takes time. Unfortunately you don’t get it. People who I respect greatly advised me not to take it but you think you can turn it around. What we knew was we needed transfer windows. The chairman came out and said he spent £500,000 in January, so that probably adds to the reason they stayed up. I’m delighted they did but the job I took on was very difficult.
‘There are now big and difficult decisions to be made at Motherwell. We lack pace, the squad needs rejigged. But what I learned at Oldham makes me a stronger person and maybe a little more ruthless.’
Working under such diverse managerial styles as a player can only help Robinson, who was brought to Motherwell first time round by Ian Baraclough and stayed on when McGhee took charge in October 2015. He counts Joe Kinnear, Mel Machin, David Moyes and Danny Wilson among influential gaffers through the leagues with Bournemouth, Preston, Bristol City and Luton.
However, Robinson’s professional days began at the top — with Spurs against Premier League winners Blackburn then a North London derby. Signed by Terry Venables as a youth, it was Ossie Ardiles who handed 18-year-old Robinson those two appearances in his swashbuckling side of 1993/94.
‘Venables was a big draw when I signed because Manchester United and Rangers wanted me,’ he explained. ‘Alex Ferguson and Graeme Souness phoned my parents to try and get me. But I had gone to Spurs and just got a feeling about the place. And later on, I met my wife there, so I should say it was a great decision.
‘Gazza (Paul Gascoigne) was there, back from the 1990 World Cup. The place was buzzing. I made my debut against Colin Hendry. So I played for Spurs in the Premier League but then did my back and that was the end of it. By the time I got back fit, Jurgen Klinsmann had signed. That signalled a change in the Premier League — the start of the foreign influx.
‘Under Ardiles, the famous five up front, Dumitrescu, Anderton, Barmby, Klinsmann and Sheringham. There was no defending whatsoever. Which didn’t really suit my game because I was better running without the ball than I was with it!’
Robinson’s severe back issues began years earlier, aged 15, when informed by experts he would never play football again. Despite the problems requiring attention, he remained a prominent and popular player at Bournemouth and Luton before his 2008 retirement.
‘The doctors said I had no
What I learned makes me a stronger person and maybe a little more ruthless
chance,’ he noted. ‘I did school exams lying flat on a mat because I couldn’t sit down. So to go on and play nearly 500 games is something I’m proud of. But it constantly caused problems, needed looking after. Three operations and many injections.
‘I had periods where it was fine but I was always in the gym working on my core. I got so disciplined, that kept me playing until I was 33. Sitting down was a bigger problem than playing, with the pain down my leg.
‘At the end of every season, when there was Northern Ireland tours, I had epidurals. So I pulled out of a lot of squads. To play club football I had to sacrifice that, so my biggest regret is only having seven caps.
‘At Luton, after the third operation, I missed another six months. They couldn’t see me playing again. I was only 26. But I ended up meeting a guy who said I didn’t need an operation and that he’d cure me.
‘It was with epidurolysis, to do with scar tissue and said he’d have me playing in two weeks. I didn’t believe him but he did. My wife was in the stand crying because we thought I wouldn’t play again. But that’s when I started doing my coaching badges.
‘I retired despite having two years left on my Luton contract and the fact I’d just played against Spain. But the surgeon told me if he operated on me he couldn’t guarantee it would work. He said if I retired there and then, I’d be able to pick up my kids.
‘In other words, if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have. He said I’d have arthritis in later life. That was an easy decision. And funnily enough, since I stopped playing, it’s been great.’