Johnny Phillips: John Coleman’s legacy will live long after Stanley heroics

After 24 years of service across two spells at the East Lancashire outfit, he was dismissed this week along with his long-time assistant Jimmy Bell following defeat at League Two promotion chasers Wrexham.

Coleman was a prolific non-league striker in his day, spending almost two decades firing in goals around the north-west of England.

He was appointed as Accrington player-manager in 1999 by the club’s legendary chairman Eric Whalley. Then in Northern Premier League Division One, Coleman set about taking the club up the leagues.

He was still a part-time employee in football, combining his role with a teaching post in Liverpool throughout the early years. But that all changed when the club joined the professional ranks when they won promotion to the Conference.

A third promotion as champions came in 2006 when Accrington returned to the Football League.

It was a promotion steeped in romanticism after the famous club had lost its league status in 1962 and subsequently folded.

The return to the Football League was achieved with a group of players who brought a vibrant attacking brand of football to the non-league pitches of England.

Coleman used his excellent knowledge of the Merseyside football scene to pick up cast-offs from Liverpool and Everton, those who had failed to break through the academy system.

Captained by former Liverpool youth team defender Peter Kavanagh, the side was full of Scousers, although Burnley-born Paul Mullin fired the goals in up top and Benin international Romi Boco appeared in midfield.

A League Cup tie against former European champions Nottingham Forest was a highlight of Stanley’s first season back in the league.

By 2012, Coleman was the third longest-serving manager in all four divisions, with only Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger ahead of him.

It was a cue to try something new, with Coleman and Bell leaving to join relegation-threatened Rochdale in League One.

He couldn’t lift the team from the bottom of the league and, after a mid-table start to the following season, the pair were harshly dismissed in January 2013 with Rochdale six points shy of the play-offs.

Short spells at Southport and on Ireland’s west coast with Sligo Rovers followed before Accrington asked Coleman to return in 2014.

Still surviving on one of the smallest budgets in League Two, and way below the finances of many clubs in the non-league set-up, the breakthrough season came in 2017/18 with promotion to League One as champions.

Coleman brought the players up a level with the likes of Billy Kee, Sean McConville and Kayden Jackson catching the eye. It was an astonishing achievement and Accrington quickly settled into life in League One.

Their five-year stay in the third tier of English football included two top-half finishes in a division that included the likes of Sunderland, Ipswich and Sheffield Wednesday operating on many times the budget of Accrington.

Sandwiched between Blackburn and Burnley, it was a constant battle for survival in an area where the local fanbase was so small.

During Coleman’s two spells at the club, the tiny Crown Ground was slowly upgraded as revenue increased along with the club’s progress. It is still among the smallest grounds in league football and the old cramped dressing rooms were notorious among visiting teams, with Roy Hodgson deciding to get his Fulham players ready in a nearby hotel before an FA Cup fourth-round tie in 2010.

Coleman will go down as the most significant figure in Stanley’s modern history and he deserved more than the few sentences issued by the club on his dismissal this week.

At a place where the manager and his players mingled with supporters in the club bar after matches, those fans on the terraces will never forget his role in lifting Accrington Stanley back into the Football League after over four decades in the wilderness.

Many of those under Coleman’s tutelage have gone on to long careers in the game as players or in the dugout.

He brings a unique style to management, personally helping players who needed support off the pitch while improving them on it. His is an incredible legacy to leave behind at one of the most famous names in football.