When the Englishman’s protracted deal to buy Morton from the owner Hugh Scott

When the Englishman’s protracted deal to buy Morton from the owner, Hugh Scott, collapsed, Evans was left on his own as Scott put the club into administration.”Peden paid my wages, not the club,” explained Evans. “I never had a contract at Morton and since the administrators took over the club in November, I have been on month-to-month deals.”I turned down manager’s jobs at Third Division clubs in England because I believed Morton had more potential. The place needs investment, but I only took the job on the understanding that Mike Peden’s plans would happen.”Evans was sacked by the administrator just four days after Morton’s Scottish Cup exit to Third Division Peterhead. “He told me that influenced their decision because they were looking for a cup run to generate money,” said Evans.Yet he was attending to things no manager in the land would put up with. “I put my own money into the club, either to pay players’ expenses when they were struggling or for car rental to help them get to training. Ally Maxwell [the assistant who succeeded Evans] and I even spent a lot of evenings fixing up the flats we used to put some players up in.”It was a vast sum and I will never see it back.

I was naïve and a bit of a fool but I did it all with the club in mind. This was my first job as manager and I have learned the hard way.”. Left high and dry by Budweiser and Carling, the Premiership’s chief executive, Richard Scudamore, is believed to be switching to Coke as the division’s prospective new sponsors in the wake of an embarrassing week which ended with the élite clubs’ chairmen giving him a vote of confidence. Left high and dry by Budweiser and Carling, the Premiership’s chief executive, Richard Scudamore, is believed to be switching to Coke as the division’s prospective new sponsors in the wake of an embarrassing week which ended with the élite clubs’ chairmen giving him a vote of confidence.
Coca-Cola, however, are coy about reports of any negotiations taking place at a time when European club football as a whole faces a period of uncertainty, particularly over the future of transfer fees.Carling, sponsors of the Premiership since its creation in 1992, announced they would withdraw in December while the American brewer Budweiser, the initial favourites to succeed the lager brand, confirmed last week that they had pulled out of talks. In a statement, Budweiser said the company would focus instead on the 2002 World Cup in Japan and Korea, having discovered that it would be virtually impossible to enjoy the level of perimeter advertising they required in English Premier League grounds.Sources close to the Premiership believed the double blow would undermine Scudamore’s control and influence, as well as the confidence he enjoyed among the club chairmen. However, after scare stories on Thursday, spokesman Phillip French stressed that the League are in talks with a “large range of companies” about succeeding Carling when the brewer’s £9-million-a-year deal expires.”No deal will be decided without the full backing of the Premier League’s chairmen,” French said.

“The Premier League have been working hard to secure a new sponsor. There are a large number of companies who are currently in the final round of discussions with the Premier League with the aim of securing our title sponsors.”Both of America’s leading soft-drinks companies, Coca-Cola and Pepsi, have been touted as potential sponsors. Coca-Cola, strongly identified with the World Cup finals, have indicated an interest in backing Europe’s richest domestic league, a competition that outperforms financially all of its rivals by some distance.”We are always interested in looking at sport initiatives, particularly football, which we have supported over the years in several championships,” said a Coca-Cola spokesman, Andrew Coker. “We are evaluating whether it is something we are interested in. We have to look at whether it is the right time and if we could get it at the right price. There would be a lot of important decisions to make.”Meanwhile, the rest of Europe is watching closely as it enters a potentially critical week for the shape of the game’s future.

Meetings of the Fifa-Uefa Task Force, to determine a blueprint for the transfer talks with the European Commission, take place tomorrow.The Uefa Clubs Workshop, involving every major club in Europe, will gather on Tuesday and Wednesday, with a brief to reform the Champions’ League and Uefa Cup, while an executive meeting of Uefa, football’s European governing body, follows on Thursday and Friday. Both unofficial groupings of European clubs – G14 and the proposed Atlantic League – are remaining alert to developments.The Football Association’s chief executive, Adam Crozier, will also be busy as he travels to Zurich on Wednesday, 14 February to meet Michel Zen-Ruffinen, the general secretary of Fifa, the game’s world authority. Crozier will highlight the growing problem of players entering countries under false passports.. Goalkeepers, they say, are crazy, but few are crazy enough to become managers, or even coaches. Mike Walker, who was in charge at Norwich City and then Everton, is a rare example; Peter Fox, sacked last year by Exeter City, worked at a lower level; and so did Mervyn Day, once in charge at Carlisle United and now first lieutenant to his former West Ham team-mate Alan Curbishley asCharlton Athletic establish themselves in the Premiership with unexpected comfort.

Goalkeepers, they say, are crazy, but few are crazy enough to become managers, or even coaches. Mike Walker, who was in charge at Norwich City and then Everton, is a rare example; Peter Fox, sacked last year by Exeter City, worked at a lower level; and so did Mervyn Day, once in charge at Carlisle United and now first lieutenant to his former West Ham team-mate Alan Curbishley asCharlton Athletic establish themselves in the Premiership with unexpected comfort.
From his earliest days at Upton Park, a formidable factory for the production of managerial talent, Day was able to appreciate the value of specialised coaching. He learnt there under the watchful eye and waspish tongue of Ernie Gregory, a much-loved East End figure who had himself pulled on West Ham’s baggy green jersey more than 400 times and eventually took reluctant retirement after serving the club for 51 years as man and boy.Tipped by Ron Greenwood to be first-team goalkeeper “for the next 10 years”, Day managed five, later playing for Orient, Aston Villa, Leeds and Carlisle, where he suffered a serious knee injury and gave way to a young rookie from Whitehaven called Tony Caig. He became coach and, briefly, manager under the eccentric reign of Michael Knighton, then worked as a freelance goalkeeping coach before joining Charlton, where, last Tuesday, the goalkeeping wheel came full circle as Caig, now 26, was summoned from the dug-out to make his Premiership debut at half-time against Derby County in place of a stricken Dean Kiely.”I only came on once or twice as a sub goalkeeper and it’s horrendous,” Day said. “I had a season of it at Leeds and it’s very difficult to prepare for a game, when you know you’re unlikely to play any part You try your best to be focused, but you’re not really. As an outfield sub, you can feel your way into the game, make one or two passes; as a goalkeeper, suddenly, bang you’re on and you’ve got to be right from the first moment.”He agrees – again from experience – that being deputy week in and week out to a good, fit keeper, can be a thankless task: “You’ve got to have the mentality to keep working hard and be patient, and know that when you get your chance, you have to make the most of it.”Caig, playing his first competitive game in many weeks, felt that he had done that, keeping Derby at bay in the second half and picking up a win bonus in a 2-1 success that kept Charlton in the top half of the table.