Dean Glover

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Dean Glover
Personal information
Full name	Dean Victor Glover
Date of birth	December 29, 1963 (1963-12-29) (age 45)
Place of birth	Birmingham, England
Height	5 ft 10 in (1.78 m)
Playing position	Defender
Youth career
1980–1981	Aston Villa
Senior career1
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1981–1987 1987 1987–1989 1989–1998 1998–1999	Aston Villa → Sheffield United (loan) Middlesbrough Port Vale Kidderminster Harriers Total	039 0(1) 005 0(0) 050 0(5) 363 (15) 000 0(0) 457 (21)
Teams managed
2007 2008–2009	Port Vale (caretaker) Port Vale
1 Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. * Appearances (Goals)

Dean Victor Glover (born 29 December 1963 in Birmingham, West Midlands) is an English football manager and former player. He was manager of Port Vale from October 2008 until May 2009, a club he had played for, for nine years. His son Danny, is a striker at the club.

Contents 1 Playing career 1.1 Aston Villa 1.2 Middlesbrough 1.3 Port Vale 1.4 Kidderminster Harriers 2 Coaching & management career 2.1 Coaching 2.2 Management 3 Honours 3.1 As a player 4 Statistics 4.1 Managerial statistics 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Playing career

[edit] Aston Villa

Glover began his footballing career with hometown club Aston Villa progressing through the youth ranks before signing professional terms in 1981. He remained with Villa until 1987 but never really became a first team fixture in the Division One side making just 39 appearances in 6 years scoring 1 goal. A brief loan spell at Sheffield United in early 1987 was followed by his sale to Middlesbrough during the close season.

[edit] Middlesbrough

In Glover's first season at Middlesbrough, the team were promoted to the old First Division (now the Premiership), finishing in 3rd place. The following season Boro were struggling to retain their place in the top flight and Glover was sold to then 2nd Division (now The Championship) side Port Vale, in February for £200,000. He had been at Middlesbrough for just under 18 months.

[edit] Port Vale

Port Vale became Glover's main club in his playing days as he remained at the Potteries side for ten seasons, for the majority of his playing career. At Vale Glover became an instant hit with the fans as he marked then England International Steve Bull out of the game on his debut, a 0-0 draw with Wolves.

Glover became a mainstay of Vale's defence throughout one of Vale's most successful periods, in the late 80s and early 90s, forming an excellent partnership with fellow centre half Neil Aspin. He was part of the Vale side that won the Autoglass Trophy in 1993. He was a big part of the promotion campaign of the 1993-94 season which saw Vale return to the second tier, he was an ever-present and was selected in the P.F.A.'s Second Division team.

He then had a spell battling injury as he ruptured his ankle ligaments in late 1994 and also suffered with back trouble which kept him out of action until April 1995, in January 1996 his old ankle injury returned.^[1] He managed to recover from these problems to help Vale to the Final of the Anglo-Italian Cup in 1996, as well as being part of the Vale side that achieved the club's highest finish since 1931, when they finished 8th in the 1996-97 Division One (now The Championship).

Glover left Port Vale at the end of the 1997-98 season as Vale stayed up with a final day 4-0 win at Huddersfield. He had spent nine years at the club, becoming a crowd favourite in the process for his committed displays at centre half and right back. As of 2009, he has the 5th most league appearances of any Vale player.

[edit] Kidderminster Harriers

The final year of his career was seen out at Conference National side Kidderminster Harriers although it wasn't a particularly successful season for the Worcestershire club, Glover was a regular fixture in defence but decided to retire from playing when the 1998/99 season ended.

[edit] Coaching & management career

[edit] Coaching

Glover returned to Vale as a coach in Brian Horton's management team, however when the club went into Administration in 2003 he was made redundant as a cost cutting measure. A short spell as manager of non-league side Stone Dominoes followed before he came back to Vale Park when he was appointed assistant to Martin Foyle when he succeeded Horton in March 2004. He has remained at the club ever since, taking over as caretaker manager when Foyle left the club in September 2007. Glover was in contention for the permanent managers position, but his record of guiding Vale to only 2 wins from 8 games contributed to his failure to get the job. When Farsley Celtic manager Lee Sinnott was appointed as Port Vale manager, Glover returned to the assistant role.

[edit] Management

In September 2008, Sinnott left the club, leaving Glover again with the role as caretaker-manager in a shared role alongside Andy Porter. This led to speculation as to which of the two would be made Manager. Glover was the expected choice and was duly appointed as manager on 6 October.^[2]

By February 2009, with the club in the bottom depths of the bottom tier of the Football League, fans organized protests at Glover's leadership. Many chanted 'Glover Out' during home defeats and even a large banner was unveiled on the 28 February 3-1 defeat to Luton Town, with organized protests involving hundreds of supporters being held before and after the game.^[3][4] Glover accepted he was not the popular choice to take over from Sinnott and described himself as a "dead man walking".^[5] Many fans, local journalists and pundits have questioned Glover's tactical decisions, team selection and managerial abilities in general.^[6][7][8] Slow season ticket sales have pressured both Glover's supporters and detractors in the Port Vale boardroom to consider appointing a new manager in the summer of 2009.^[9] Fans again protested after the final home game, a 1-1 draw with Wycombe Wanderers with Glover having to be escorted from the ground.^[10]

Despite the backing of several players in the local press^[11][12][13] it was ultimately the poor response to the clubs season ticket offer and poor results that were to prove Glover's downfall as the club sold less than 100 season tickets in the two weeks following the release of the scheme, with many supporters claiming they would not consider renewing until the club had a new managerial team in place.

On 1 May 2009, the club confirmed that Glover would not be the manager for the 2009-10 season.^[14] Instead he was offered the position of youth team manager, which was vacated by Andy Porter in December 2008.^[15]

Chairman Bill Bratt made the following statement regarding Glover's sacking:^[16]

“

Dean has been offered another role at the club in which he would work alongside Mark Grew with the youth team. We would like to thank Dean for taking the helm but this is a results game and the results have not gone as well as everybody would have liked.

”

Vale defeated Barnet 2-1 on the last day of Glover's reign, his son Danny scoring the club's last goal of the season.^[17] During Glover's seven month reign, the club won 12 out of 39 games and finished 18th in League Two.

On the 21st May it was confirmed that Glover had left the club after turning down the youth team job and was opting for pastures new after an 18 year association with Port Vale as a player, coach and manager.^[18][19][20]

He is now a candidate to take over at Nantwich Town a step down from his previous managerial job at Port Vale. He has said that should he get the job he'll "make sure all the lads work hard."

[edit] Honours

[edit] As a player

with Port Vale

• Football League Third Division Play-off winner: 1989
• Football League Trophy winner: 1993
• Football League Second Division Runner Up: 1993-94
• Anglo-Italian Cup Runner-up: 1996

with Middlesbrough

• Football League Second Division 3rd (promotion to Division 1): 1987-88

[edit] Statistics

[edit] Managerial statistics

As of 3 May 2009.^[21]

Team	Nat	From	To	Record[22]
				G	W	L	D	Win %[23]
Port Vale		26 September 2007	05 November 2007	8	2	5	1	25.00
Port Vale		06 October 2008	02 May 2009	39	12	19	8	30.77

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Dean Glover career stats at Soccerbase
• Dean Glover management career stats at Soccerbase

v • d • e Port Vale F.C. – Managers Hood (1876–96) · Gleaves (1896–1905) · Clare (1905–11) · Walker (1911–12) · Myatt (1912–14) · Holford (1914–18) · Cameron (1918–19) · Schofield (1919–29) · Morgan (1929–32) · Holford (1932–35) · Cresswell (1936–37) · Morgan (1937–38) · Diffin (1944) · Pratt (1944–45) · Frith (1945–46) · Hodgson (1946–51) · Powell (1951) · Steele (1951–57) · Low (1957–62) · Steele (1962–65) · Mudie (1965–67) · Matthews (1967–68) · Lee (1968–74) · Sproson (1974–77) · Harper (1977) · Smith (1977–78) · Butler (1978–79) · Bloor (1979) · Bentley (1979) · McGrath (1979–83) · Rudge (1984–99) · Dearden and Grew (1999) · Horton (1999–2004) · Foyle (2004–07) · Glover (2007) · Sinnott (2007–08) · Glover and Porter (2008) · Glover (2008–09) · Adams (2009–) Italics indicates caretaker-manager roles