Ron Atkinson
Personal information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Full name | Ronald Frederick Atkinson[1] | ||
Date of birth | 18 March 1939 | ||
Place of birth | Liverpool, England | ||
Position(s) |
Wing half | ||
Youth career | |||
Wolverhampton Wanderers | |||
–1956 | BSA Tools | ||
1956–1959 | Aston Villa | ||
Senior career* | |||
Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
1959–1971 | Oxford United | 560 | (21) |
Managerial career | |||
1971–1974 | Kettering Town | ||
1974–1978 | Cambridge United | ||
1978–1981 | West Bromwich Albion | ||
1981–1986 | Manchester United | ||
1987–1988 | West Bromwich Albion | ||
1988–1989 | Atlético Madrid | ||
1989–1991 | Sheffield Wednesday | ||
1991–1994 | Aston Villa | ||
1995–1996 | Coventry City | ||
1997–1998 | Sheffield Wednesday | ||
1999 | Nottingham Forest | ||
*Club domestic league appearances and goals |
Ronald Frederick Atkinson (born 18 March 1939) is an English former football player and manager. Nicknamed "Big Ron",[2][3] he was regarded as one of Britain's best-known football pundits in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Nicknamed "The Tank" during his playing career, he represented Oxford United for twelve years, and still holds the club record for appearances.[4] As a manager, he won the FA Cup with Manchester United in 1983 and 1985 and the Football League Cup with Sheffield Wednesday in 1991 and Aston Villa in 1994.
Early life and playing career
Atkinson was born in Liverpool in the Old Swan area of the city with his brother Graham Atkinson who was also a professional footballer. After a few years his family moved to Shard End (then in Warwickshire, now an area of Birmingham).[5] He attended Lea Village Secondary School.[6] After beginning his career as a ground staff boy at Wolverhampton Wanderers,[7] he was signed by Aston Villa from works team BSA Tools at the age of 17, but never played a first-team match for them.[8] He has referred to then Villa coach Jimmy Hogan as his biggest influence.[9]
Atkinson was transferred to Headington United (renamed Oxford United in 1960) in the summer of 1959 on a free transfer. There he played alongside his younger brother Graham. He went on to make over 500 appearances in all competitions as a wing-half for the club, earning, in his playing days the nickname: "The Tank", and scoring a total of fourteen goals. He was United's captain through their rise from the Southern League to the Second Division, achieved in only six years from 1962 to 1968. He was the first ever footballer to captain a club from the Southern League through three divisions of the Football League and played three seasons in the Second Division.
Managerial career
Kettering Town and Cambridge United
After retiring from playing, Atkinson became manager player of non-league Kettering Town in 1971, aged only 32. His success there led to a move to the league with Cambridge United, in November 1974, going on to win the Fourth Division in 1977 and leaving them when they were on the verge of promotion to the Second Division, which they later achieved that season under Atkinson's assistant John Docherty.
West Bromwich Albion
In January 1978, Atkinson moved to manage First Division West Bromwich Albion. He soon signed Brendon Batson from his former club, to play alongside Laurie Cunningham and Cyrille Regis. Never before had a team in the top division of English football simultaneously fielded three black players on a regular basis.
Atkinson led West Bromwich Albion to third place in the league in the season
Manchester United
Atkinson was seen as the man who could bring the spark to Manchester United that had been so sorely lacking under his predecessor. Sexton had taken them to second place in the league in
In the
In the 1982–83 season, two appearances at Wembley, one of which was an FA Cup victory against Brighton & Hove Albion, coupled with another third-place finish in the league, fuelled speculation that United were back in a big way. During the first half of the season, they had topped the league more than once but a storming run of form by Liverpool beginning before Christmas meant that the title headed for Anfield for the second year running. 1982–83 also saw the breakthrough of Whiteside as one of the best performing players in the First Division. Whiteside was also on the scoresheet for the FA Cup final replay as United beat Brighton 4–0 after drawing the first game 2–2.
In the
In the
In the
There was more disappointment for United's fans when the sale of Mark Hughes to Spanish club Barcelona was announced at the end of the season. Atkinson had prepared for Hughes' departure in March 1986 by paying Nottingham Forest £570,000 for England striker Peter Davenport. Although Davenport was their top scorer in the 1986–87 season, he failed to achieve the same success as Hughes and was not a popular figure among fans.[citation needed]
Despite media speculation that Atkinson would be sacked in favour of Aberdeen manager Alex Ferguson or Barcelona manager Terry Venables, the 1986–87 season began with Atkinson still at the helm. His two FA Cup wins and five successive top four league finishes had made him the most successful United manager since Matt Busby, but the pressure to build on the earlier successes was becoming more intense than ever. The 1986–87 season began poorly with three successive defeats, and despite a minor upturn in September and October which included a 5–1 home win over Southampton in the league, the pressure on Atkinson remained intense and the board finally ran out of patience on 6 November 1986 when he was dismissed as manager two days after a 4–1 exit at the hands of Southampton in the League Cup. United were still in the bottom four of the First Division with a third of the season already gone.
Return to West Bromwich Albion
Atkinson returned to West Brom in the autumn of 1987, by which time they had fallen into the Second Division and were battling against relegation to the Third Division. Survival was achieved, as Albion finished the
Atlético Madrid
Following his time at Manchester United, Atkinson was due to take charge of Atlético Madrid, however internal politics at Atlético delayed his appointment, with Atkinson returning to manage West Brom in the meantime.[10] In October 1988, Atkinson was finally appointed manager of Atlético Madrid, winning his first game in charge 6–1 against Espanyol.[11]
Atkinson's tenure at Atlético was quite a turbulent one and despite relative moderate success in terms of league position, a clash of personalities with the then-owner of the club, Jesús Gil, led to Atkinson being sacked after just three months as manager. His right-hand man at West Bromwich Albion, Colin Addison, was appointed, much to the disdain of Atkinson, who went on record in the English media as saying Addison had "stabbed him in the back". The pair never worked together again following the events at Atlético.
Sheffield Wednesday
Atkinson went on to manage
Aston Villa
Taking over from
Despite leading Villa to their first major success since their 1982
Coventry City
Three months after being sacked by Villa, Atkinson became manager at Coventry City replacing Phil Neal, who was purposely and acrimoniously sacked to make way for him. He took over in mid-February 1995, with the Sky Blues just above the Premier League relegation zone.[12] His new team managed some good results, including a 4–2 home win over local rivals Leicester City, a 3–2 away win over Liverpool and a point against a Blackburn Rovers side who ended the season as champions.[13] With survival looking certain several games before the season ended, Atkinson was named Premier League Manager of the Month for March 1995. The penultimate game of the season brought another fine result when the Sky Blues travelled to North London and beat Tottenham Hotspur 3–1.[14] Survival was finally confirmed as Atkinson guided the Sky Blues to a 16th-place finish.[15]
In December 1995, Atkinson guided the Sky Blues to one of their best results of the 1990s, a 5–0 home win over defending champions Blackburn Rovers.
Return to Sheffield Wednesday
In November 1997, he returned to Sheffield Wednesday following the sacking of David Pleat. Wednesday had made a poor start to the 1997–98 season, including a 7–2 loss at Blackburn and a 6–1 loss at Manchester United. Under Atkinson, Wednesday's form picked up immediately and they pulled well clear of relegation trouble, but he was not offered a permanent contract and left the club at the end of the season.
Nottingham Forest
Atkinson's last managerial job came with Nottingham Forest, for the final four months of the 1998–99 season. This spell was not a success and at his first home game against Arsenal he even climbed into the wrong dug-out.[17] He also angered a number of Forest fans following an 8–1 defeat at home to Manchester United when he stated in an interview after the game that his team had given the fans a "nine-goal thriller".[18]
Atkinson took over as manager on 11 January 1999[19] and Forest's relegation was confirmed on 24 April with a 2–0 defeat at his old club Aston Villa. He announced his resignation as manager within hours of the final whistle, with effect from the final game of the league season on 16 May and said that he would be retiring from football management altogether.[20]
Broadcasting career
TV work
Atkinson was already working as a pundit for
In 1997, he appeared as manager of Harchester United in Dream Team.
In August 2013, Atkinson became a housemate on the
Music
In 2002, Atkinson released a Christmas song, "It's Christmas – Let's Give Love a Try",[21] but this failed to gain chart success. The following year, Atkinson was a guest on an episode of TV chat show Room 101 and host Paul Merton played the video as an outro to the show.
Racist comments
Following his sacking from Atlético Madrid, club president Jesús Gil claimed Atkinson had racially abused his own player, Donato, during his final game in charge of the club against Barcelona in January 1989.[10]
Atkinson resigned from ITV on 21 April 2004, after he made a racial comment live on air about the
Carlton Palmer, one of Atkinson's players while he was manager at Sheffield Wednesday, defended Atkinson by saying, "I'm black and I'm sitting here and I'm gonna stand up for Big Ron not because he's a friend of mine; I'm standing up for him because I know what he's like as a bloke. If we're going to deal with racism then let's deal with the bigger picture of racism not about a throwaway comment that wasn't meant in that manner."[24] A BBC Radio documentary about Batson, Cunningham and Regis, entitled Three Degrees West, repeated on 16 May 2004, was cancelled owing to Atkinson's central contributions.
Also in 2004, Atkinson said to an audience at Hillsborough Stadium: "The Chinese people have the best contraception in the world - their women are so ugly. I can't understand why there are so many of them."[25]
On Celebrity Big Brother in 2013, he jokingly asked fellow contestant, Irish doctor Danielle Marr, "you're not carrying a bomb with you, are you?", when she draped her jumper over her head like a headscarf.[26][27]
Other TV work
It was reported Atkinson was being brought in to support
Atkinson spent the 2006 World Cup recording an amateur video blog and distributing it through the UK-based video sharing site SelfcastTV.com. He also provided commentary on the World Cup for the UK digital channel UKTV G2.
In 2006, Atkinson took part in the
He briefly made a return to television, appearing as a pundit on Football Italia broadcast on Bravo. He left the programme when Bravo lost the broadcast rights to Italian football.
Atkinson returned to the screen on 16 August 2009 on the
Atkinson brought out an autobiography 60 Minutes with Ron Atkinson, in which he talks about his controversial comments and his football career.
Atkinson is currently a pundit on William Hill's "The Punt" podcast and on Manchester United's channel MUTV.[31] In October 2019, he made a return to broadcasting, commentating on 6 a side World Cup final in Crete, alongside UK commentator John Gwynne.[32]
Director of football
On 23 January 2007, Atkinson returned to Kettering Town, the club he had managed more than thirty years previously, as director of football.[33] It was announced on 19 April 2007 that he had left the post at the Conference North club following his disapproval over the sacking of manager Morell Maison.[34]
Leisure Leagues
In December 2018, Atkinson was announced as an ambassador for worldwide six-a-side football firm, Leisure Leagues,[35] as part of the deal he was to act as Director Of Football for the England 6-a-side team.[36]
Managerial statistics
Team | From | To | Record | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
P | W | D | L | Win % | |||
Kettering Town | 14 December 1971 | 22 November 1974 | |||||
Cambridge United | 22 November 1974 | 12 January 1978 | 146 | 68 | 36 | 42 | 46.6 |
West Bromwich Albion | 12 January 1978 | 9 June 1981 | 159 | 70 | 36 | 53 | 44.0 |
Manchester United | 9 June 1981 | 6 November 1986 | 292 | 146 | 67 | 79 | 50.0 |
West Bromwich Albion | 3 September 1987 | 12 October 1988 | 53 | 15 | 23 | 15 | 28.3 |
Atlético Madrid | 12 October 1988 | 16 January 1989 | 12 | 6 | 3 | 3 | 50.0 |
Sheffield Wednesday | 14 February 1989 | 6 June 1991 | 118 | 49 | 34 | 35 | 41.5 |
Aston Villa | 7 June 1991 | 10 November 1994 | 178 | 77 | 56 | 45 | 43.3 |
Coventry City | 15 February 1995 | 5 November 1996 | 74 | 19 | 28 | 27 | 25.7 |
Sheffield Wednesday | 14 November 1997 | 17 May 1998 | 27 | 9 | 11 | 7 | 33.3 |
Nottingham Forest | 11 January 1999 | 16 May 1999 | 17 | 5 | 2 | 10 | 29.4 |
Total | 1,078 | 464 | 306 | 308 | 43.0 |
Honours
Manager
Kettering Town
- Southern League Premier Division: 1972–73[38]
- Southern League Division One North: 1971–72[38]
- Northants Senior Cup: 1972–73[38]
Cambridge United
Manchester United
Sheffield Wednesday
- Football League Cup: 1990–91
Aston Villa
Individual
See also
- List of FA Cup winning managers
- Celebrity Big Brother (British series 12)
References
- ISBN 9781852916657.
- ^ McGavin, Harvey (22 April 2004). "Ron Atkinson quits ITV after his racist remarks are heard on air". The Independent. London. Retrieved 22 May 2010.
- ^ Bishop, Rob (18 March 2014). "ATKINSON AT 75: BEHIND-THE-SCENES AT VILLA WITH BIG RON". Aston Villa F.C. Retrieved 27 January 2022.
- ^ "Ex-U's boss: 'I can't believe my pal Ron has gone in the Celebrity Big Brother house'". Oxford Mail. 24 August 2013.
- ^ Young, Graham (16 March 2014). "Ron Atkinson at 75: 'I would have done it all for nothing". BirminghamLive. Retrieved 24 August 2020.
- ^ "Ron Atkinson at 75: 'I would have done it all for nothing". Birmingham Mail. 16 March 2014.
- ^ "Ron Atkinson: How Stan Cullis changed the world « Express & Star". www.expressandstar.com. Retrieved 28 November 2016.
- ISBN 978-1-85291-585-8.
- ^ "How total football inventor was lost to Hungary". The Guardian. London. 22 November 2003. Retrieved 12 September 2010.
- ^ a b "Big Ron, the Calderón and a call from Jesus". The Versed. 29 March 2017. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
- ^ "Big Ron and His Doomed Spell at Atlético Madrid". Pickles. 24 May 2021. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
- ^ "Coventry City FC News – Coventry MAD". Coventrycity-mad.co.uk. 11 February 1995. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Fixtures/Results – Coventry City FC – Coventry MAD". Coventrycity-mad.co.uk. Archived from the original on 5 October 2011. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Coventry City FC News – Coventry MAD". Coventrycity-mad.co.uk. 17 April 1995. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Coventry City FC News – Coventry MAD". Coventrycity-mad.co.uk. 14 May 1995. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Fixtures/Results – Coventry City FC – Coventry MAD". Coventrycity-mad.co.uk. Archived from the original on 5 October 2011. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Sporting Spotlight: Ron Atkinson". BBC Sport. 26 December 2012. Retrieved 20 January 2013.
- ^ Thomas, Russell (26 February 2007). "Solskjaer shows plenty in reserve". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
- ^ "Nottingham Forest: 20 years on from 'Big Ron' Atkinson and the beginning of the end". 11 January 2019.
- ^ "Big Ron retires as Forest relegated". BBC News. 24 April 1999.
- ^ "Football legend hopes to score a Christmas No1". The Scotsman. 4 December 2002.
- ISBN 978-1-349-31427-0.
- ^ "TV pundit Ron Atkinson sacked for racist remark | ITV PLC | the Guardian".
- ^ "Atkinson quits over racist slur". BBC News. 22 April 2004.
- ^ Peter Yeung (25 March 2015). "5 controversial TV presenters". telegraph.co.uk. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022.
- ^ "Big Ron warned over racist 'bomb' remark on Celbrity [sic] Big Brother". Irish Examiner. 26 August 2013. Retrieved 14 January 2021.
- ^ Joannou, Andy (26 August 2013). "CBB: Ron warned over burka joke". Digital Spy. Retrieved 14 January 2021.
- ^ Stewart, Colin (29 December 2005). "Atkinson back on television with fly-on-the-wall role at Swindon". The Scotsman. Archived from the original on 28 October 2007. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
- ^ "Cambridgeshire – Sport – Big Ron Manager comes to Posh". BBC. 29 December 2005. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "Cinq Jours En Juillet". BBC Kent. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
- ^ "Hire Ron Atkinson | Speaker Agent".
- ^ @OnlyJohnGwynne (22 October 2019). "Flying home from Crete tonight after..." (Tweet) – via Twitter.
- ^ "Atkinson named as Kettering chief". BBC Sport. 23 January 2007. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
- ^ "Atkinson leaves post at Kettering". BBC Sport. 19 April 2007. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
- ^ "EX MAN UNITED MANAGER TO BE ENGLAND'S DIRECTOR OF FOOTBALL AT THE WORLD CUP | News". 19 December 2018. Retrieved 24 August 2020.
- ^ "DREAMING OF A REVOLUTION | News". 18 April 2019. Retrieved 24 August 2020.
- ^ "Web Oficial de la Liga de Fútbol Profesional". Retrieved 26 November 2008. [dead link] (in Spanish)[dead link]
- ^ a b c Ron Atkinson LMA. Retrieved 22 May 2023.
- ^ Lovejoy, Joe (27 March 1994). "Football / Coca-Cola Cup Final: Saunders destroys United's dream: Aston Villa's master plan puts paid to Ferguson's malfunctioning Big Red Machine as Kanchelskis is dismissed". The Independent. Retrieved 16 April 2024.
- ^ "Manager profile: Ron Atkinson". Premier League. Retrieved 14 September 2018.
External links
- Ron Atkinson management career statistics at Soccerbase
- Example of Big Ron's chalkboard (text only) The Guardian,