Turner - the Ulimate Football Man

After mentioning Jose Mourinho, Sir Alex Ferguson and several other football managers Brian Viner of the Independent had kind words to say about Graham Turner in an article published this morning. Here's part of it:

Anyway, the ultimate embodiment of this splendid breed of football men is Graham Turner, owner, chairman and manager of League Two Hereford United. Turner, the least big-headed of characters, understandably found it difficult to wear so many hats, so a year ago to this very day he kicked himself upstairs and handed managerial duties to his friend and first-team coach John Trewick. Last month, however, with the Bulls veering perilously close to a relegation battle, Turner was forced to sack Trewick and at the age of 62 become manager again himself, since when Hereford have won five out of seven games to banish any prospect of dropping out of the Football League.

To all football fans, Hereford United will for ever be synonymous with FA Cup upsets, having inflicted the biggest of them all, when still a non-league side, on top-tier Newcastle United in 1972. Routinely described as Hereford's finest hour, it is unarguably Hereford's most famous hour, but the greater achievement is surely that of Turner, who became manager of the financially stricken club in 1995, was unable to prevent relegation into the Conference, and then bought the majority shareholding in 1997 to stop the Bulls from being carted off to the abattoir. Eventually he got them back into the Football League, and two seasons ago, after some immensely astute moves in the loan market, even masterminded promotion to League One. At the same time, yet more significantly, he (along with company secretary Joan Fennessy, his co-owner) made them economically stable, a much more viable proposition for a purchaser than when he mortgaged his future.

Last week, indeed, Turner and Fennessy put their viable proposition up for sale. He thinks he has one more football job in him and on Wednesday he told the Hereford Times that the chances of him still being at Edgar Street next season are "very slim". So it seems timely if not quite to propose him as a legitimate rival to Mourinho, Fergie and Co as the greatest manager in the world, at least to ask whether they could have done what, in the most challenging of circumstances, he has done. I doubt it.

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