Chic Bates

Philip Desmond "Chic" Bates (born 28 November 1949) is an English former footballer and manager.[1]

Chic Bates

Personal information
Full name	Philip Desmond Bates[1]
Date of birth	28 November 1949[1]
Place of birth	West Bromwich, England[1]
Position(s)	Forward
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
	Stourbridge
1974–1977	Shrewsbury Town	160	(45)
1977–1979	Swindon Town	63	(15)
1979–1980	Bristol Rovers	29	(4)
1980–1986	Shrewsbury Town	134	(19)
Total		386	(83)
Teams managed
1984–1987	Shrewsbury Town
1997–1998	Stoke City
1999	Shrewsbury Town
2004	Shrewsbury Town
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only

Bates played non-league football with Stourbridge before becoming a professional with Shrewsbury Town in 1974. He had a fine debut season scoring 17 goals as the "Shrews" gained promotion to the Third Division. He continued to perform well and in 1977 he joined Swindon Town where he spent two years before joining Bristol Rovers. After a year at Rovers he re-joined Shrewsbury Town and in 1984 he became player manager.

He left in 1987 to become assistant manager to Lou Macari at Swindon Town and followed Macari to Stoke City and Celtic and back to Stoke. After Macari left Stoke in May 1997 Bates was appointed as manager and despite a decent start Stoke's form fell away and with the side destined for relegation he was sacked in January 1998. He returned to Shrewsbury and had two spells as caretaker manager.

Playing career

Bates was born in West Bromwich began his career with non-league Stourbridge before joining Shrewsbury Town in 1974.[1] He became a useful forward for the "Shrews" and in his first season as a professional he scored 17 goals helping the team gain promotion.[1] He continued to impress for Shrewsbury and caught the eye of a number of larger clubs and eventually left for Swindon Town in 1978.[1] He spent two years at Swindon and had a short spell at Bristol Rovers before returning to Shrewsbury Town where became player manager.[1]

Managerial career

Bates was appointed player manager of Shrewsbury Town in 1984 and retired from playing in 1985 taking up full-time management a position he would keep until November 1987.[1] He again left Shrewsbury for Swindon Town becoming assistant manager to Lou Macari and Osvaldo Ardiles.[1] When Macari was appointed manager of Stoke City in 1991 he appointed Bates as his assistant and the pair worked together at Stoke until October 1993 when they joined Celtic.[1] A year later they returned to Stoke and after Macari left again in May 1997 Bates was surprisingly given the vacancy in the club's first season at the Britannia Stadium.[1]

Whilst Bates was a useful and popular coach he was not thought to be a successful manager.[1] Regardless to Bates' credit Stoke made a steady start to the 1997–98 season and by the end of October Stoke were in a play-off position.[1] But results started to go wrong which hit rock bottom in January 1998 with a 7–0 defeat at home to Birmingham City.[1] The result prompted ugly scenes at the final whistle as around 2,000 fans invaded the pitch and entered the directors box.[1] Bates was sacked a week later.[1] He moved back to Shrewsbury and became assistant manager filling in as caretaker on two occasions firstly in November 1999 and 22 October 2004 to 15 November 2004.

Career statistics

As a player

Source:[2]

Club	Season	League			FA Cup		League Cup		Other^[A]		Total
		Division	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals
Shrewsbury Town	1974–75	Fourth Division	46	17	2	0	2	0	0	0	50	17
	1975–76	Third Division	43	7	3	3	3	1	0	0	49	11
	1976–77	Third Division	45	13	5	2	2	0	0	0	52	15
	1977–78	Third Division	26	8	4	0	2	1	0	0	32	9
	Total		160	45	14	5	9	2	0	0	183	52
Swindon Town	1977–78	Third Division	14	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	14	1
	1978–79	Third Division	42	14	4	2	5	0	0	0	51	16
	1979–80	Third Division	7	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	7	0
	Total		63	15	4	2	5	0	0	0	72	17
Bristol Rovers	1979–80	Second Division	11	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	11	2
	1980–81	Second Division	18	2	0	0	6	2	0	0	24	4
	Total		29	4	0	0	6	2	0	0	35	6
Shrewsbury Town	1980–81	Second Division	15	2	3	1	0	0	0	0	18	3
	1981–82	Second Division	40	4	4	3	2	0	5	1	51	8
	1982–83	Second Division	38	9	1	0	4	0	2	0	45	9
	1983–84	Second Division	16	3	1	0	2	0	0	0	19	3
	1984–85	Second Division	20	1	1	0	1	0	0	0	22	1
	1985–86	Second Division	5	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	5	0
	Total		134	19	10	4	9	0	7	1	160	24
Career Total			386	83	28	11	29	4	7	1	450	99

A. ^ The "Other" column constitutes appearances and goals in the Football League Group Cup.

As a manager

Managerial record by team and tenure

Team	From	To	Record
			P	W	D	L	Win %
Shrewsbury Town	23 July 1984	23 November 1987	164	56	38	70	34.1
Stoke City	1 July 1997	22 January 1998	33	11	9	13	33.3
Shrewsbury Town	8 November 1999	16 November 1999	1	0	1	0
Shrewsbury Town	22 October 2004	15 November 2004	5	1	1	3	20
Total[3]			203	509	69	47	33.5

References

1. Lowe, Simon (2000). Stoke City The Modern Era – A Complete Record. Desert Island Books. ISBN 1-874287-39-2.
2. Chic Bates at the English National Football Archive (subscription required)
3. "Chic Bates". Soccerbase. Retrieved 2 July 2016.

External links

• Chic Bates at Post War English & Scottish Football League A–Z Player's Database
• Chic Bates management career statistics at Soccerbase