Stuart Gray (footballer, born 1960)

Stuart Gray (born 19 April 1960)[2] is an English former professional footballer and manager. He has previously managed Southampton, Northampton Town and Sheffield Wednesday as well as working as caretaker manager for a number of teams.

For other people with the same name, see Stuart Gray (disambiguation).

Stuart Gray
Personal information
Full name Stuart Gray[1]
Date of birth (1960-04-19) 19 April 1960[1]
Place of birth Withernsea, England[1]
Height 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m)[2]
Position(s) Midfielder
Club information
Current team
 Fulham (assistant manager)
Youth career
Withernsea YC
1978–1980 Nottingham Forest
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1980–1983 Nottingham Forest 49 (3)
1983 → Bolton Wanderers (loan) 10 (0)
1983–1987 Barnsley 120 (23)
1987–1991 Aston Villa 106 (9)
1991–1993 Southampton 12 (0)
1994 Bognor Regis Town 1 (0)
Teams managed
2001 Southampton
2002 Aston Villa (caretaker)
2004 Wolverhampton Wanderers (caretaker)
2007–2009 Northampton Town
2010–2011 Burnley (caretaker)
2011 Portsmouth (caretaker)
2013–2015 Sheffield Wednesday
2015 Fulham (caretaker)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only

Playing career

Born in Withernsea, East Riding of Yorkshire,[2] Gray began his professional career with Nottingham Forest, emerging from the youth system with players such as Steve Hodge and Colin Walsh. He joined Barnsley in 1984 and continued to build a reputation as a steady and versatile player, scoring 11 league goals in the 1986–87 season. He moved to Aston Villa in 1987 and won promotion the following year and runners-up in the First Division in 1990.

Gray joined Southampton in September 1991 for a fee of £200,000 as one of Ian Branfoot's first signings. Initially, this appeared to be a useful signing for the club as he could play either at left-back as cover for Micky Adams or in midfield, but a serious Achilles tendon injury sustained in an FA Cup match against former club Bolton Wanderers ended his playing career.[3]

Earlier in that FA Cup run, Gray scored his only goal for Southampton, in a replay against Manchester United at Old Trafford. Micky Adams hit a probing left-foot pass which dropped between Peter Schmeichel and Paul Parker. Gray nipped between the goalkeeper and defender to stroke the ball home from just outside the area. Southampton eventually went on to win the game in a penalty shoot-out after scores were level 2–2 after extra time. This was the first ever such shoot-out involving First Division sides.

Coaching and management career

Southampton

After his playing career was finished, Gray joined the coaching staff at The Dell before moving to Wolverhampton Wanderers in June 1994 as reserve team coach. His family were unable to settle in the West Midlands at this time, so he returned to Southampton, initially working in the community office, before becoming reserve team coach under Dave Jones in July 1997, moving up to first team coach in November 1998, a role he retained after the appointment of Glenn Hoddle as manager in January 2000.

When Hoddle was lured away to Tottenham Hotspur in March 2001, Gray initially took over as caretaker manager, before taking on the role permanently in June, as Southampton moved to their new St Mary's Stadium. Early results were poor and chairman Rupert Lowe panicked about the effect on the club's investment in the new stadium and Gray was sacked after little more than 3 months in charge, to be replaced by Gordon Strachan. During his brief tenure as manager, he broke Southampton's transfer record, signing Rory Delap for a fee of £4 million.

Coaching

He has since coached successfully at a number of football clubs. These include Aston Villa, where he and John Deehan acted as joint caretaker managers after the departure of John Gregory. Stuart Gray moved briefly to Crystal Palace to assist caretaker manager, Kit Symons. He then joined Dave Jones at Wolverhampton Wanderers in the capacity of assistant manager. The two had previously worked together at Southampton. After the dismissal of Jones from Wolverhampton, Gray remained as assistant manager to Glenn Hoddle, once more acting as caretaker manager after Hoddle's departure; he had served as a caretaker for a month between the departure of Jones and arrival of Hoddle.[4]

Northampton Town

On 2 January 2007, Gray was appointed as the manager of Northampton Town after accepting a ​2 1⁄2-year contract; he replaced John Gorman who had resigned on 20 December 2006.[5]

Gray was sacked as Northampton Town Manager on 8 September 2009, following relegation from League 1 in the 2008–09 season and being 16th in League 2 after six games in the 2009–10 season.

Burnley

On 19 January 2010 Gray became the first-team coach for Burnley.[6] On 30 December he was appointed caretaker manager following the departure of Brian Laws.[7] Gray left Burnley on 13 May 2011 as part of a restructuring after the club failed to achieve even a play-off place in the season just ended.[8] Gray became first-team coach at Portsmouth but was made redundant in April 2012 as part of cost cutting due to their financial difficulties.[9]

Sheffield Wednesday

In December 2012, Gray was hired by his former Southampton colleague, Dave Jones, as a member of the coaching staff at Championship club Sheffield Wednesday.[10]

Following the departure of Dave Jones from Sheffield Wednesday at the end of November 2013 Gray took over as caretaker manager with a view to taking on the managerial role permanently, and as of 8 February had led Wednesday to a run of 11 unbeaten games in all competitions.[11]

Stuart Gray was appointed as head coach of Sheffield Wednesday following the 2–1 win over Rochdale in the FA Cup on 25 January 2014.

In his one full season in charge of the club, he secured their highest finish for 6 years, finishing 13th in a Championship campaign that also saw Wednesday equal their clean sheet record for a season.

Following a takeover at Sheffield Wednesday by Thai businessman Dejphon Chansiri, Gray was sacked in the summer of 2015[12] and replaced by head coach Carlos Carvalhal.[13]

Managerial statistics
As of 30 August 2018[14]
Managerial record by team and tenure
Team From To Record
PWDLWin %
Southampton 30 March 2001 21 October 2001 19 6 2 11 031.6
Aston Villa (caretaker) 24 January 2002 5 February 2002 2 0 2 0 000.0
Wolverhampton Wanderers (caretaker) 1 November 2004 7 December 2004 7 3 1 3 042.86
Northampton Town 2 January 2007 8 September 2009 135 44 39 52 032.6
Burnley (caretaker) 29 December 2010 16 January 2011 4 2 1 1 050.0
Portsmouth (caretaker) October 2011 November 2011 6 3 1 2 050.0
Sheffield Wednesday 1 December 2013 12 June 2015 84 30 25 29 035.7
Fulham (caretaker) 8 December 2015 27 December 2015 4 0 2 2 000.0
Total 261 88 73 100 033.7

References
  1. "Stuart Gray". Barry Hugman's Footballers. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  2. Chalk, Gary; Holley, Duncan; Bull, David (2013). All the Saints: A Complete Players' Who's Who of Southampton FC. Southampton: Hagiology Publishing. p. 334. ISBN 978-0-9926-8640-6.
  3. Holley, Duncan; Chalk, Gary (2003). In That Number - A post-war chronicle of Southampton FC. Hagiology Publishing. p. 520. ISBN 0-9534474-3-X.
  4. "Wolves 0-1 Coventry". BBC News. 20 November 2004.
  5. "Northampton name Gray as manager". BBC Sport. 2 January 2007. Retrieved 16 April 2009.
  6. "Stuart Gray Appointed First Team Coach". vitalfootball. 19 January 2010. Retrieved 25 March 2010.
  7. "Gray Placed In Temporary Charge". Burnley FC. 30 December 2010. Archived from the original on 2 January 2011. Retrieved 30 December 2010.
  8. "Gray and Hoskin Leave In Re-Shuffle". Burnley F C official website. 13 May 2011. Retrieved 17 May 2011.
  9. "Coach Stuart Gray loses Portsmouth job". BBC Sport. Retrieved 27 April 2012.
  10. "Sheffield Wednesday: Stuart Gray experience important - Jones". BBC Sport. Retrieved 20 December 2012.
  11. "Coach Stuart Gray appointed caretaker manager of Sheffield-Wednesday". Daily Express. Retrieved 3 December 2013.
  12. "Stuart Gray: Sheffield Wednesday head coach sacked". BBC Sport. 11 June 2015. Retrieved 4 August 2015.
  13. "Sheffield Wednesday name Carlos Carvalhal as new head coach". BBC Sport. 30 June 2015. Retrieved 4 August 2015.
  14. "Managers: Stuart Gray". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
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