adminChorley manager Andy Preece arrives slightly late for our afternoon chat at Victory Park.
He has been planning the evening’s training session and you don’t get much spare time when you are in charge of a part-time National League North club. Even less when you are trying to guide them into the play-offs and there are only a couple of regular season games to go.
Results have not gone well for the Lancashire club in the days since we spoke, but they go into the final weekend a point off the top seven. A play-off spot would be a satisfying way to celebrate Preece’s 750 games as a manager.
It is a journey he is proud of – following a playing career taking in Wrexham, Stockport County, Blackpool, Bury and a short spell in the Premier League with Crystal Palace.
As a manager, there is less glamour to be found in places like Northwich and Chorley. He spent four years in the Welsh League at Airbus UK, where he earned the distinction of becoming the first black English manager to both qualify a team for European football and then take them into the competition.
But, Preece, 56, has stuck at it since he was appointed player-manager at Bury in the autumn of 1999, on the recommendation of Neil Warnock.
“People say ‘do you feel lucky at getting the opportunity’,” he says. “Why should I feel lucky?
“I have managed for more than 750 games and have a 40% win ratio. I have been at clubs who have been struggling due to their financial situation. It is not luck. It is hard work and determination. I have taken jobs other people didn’t want.”
That tally of games is impressive. Even more so in an industry that statistics show simply does not afford black managers the opportunities given to their white counterparts.
‘24 years and statistics haven’t changed’
At the start of the 1999-2000 season, there was one black Premier League manager, Ruud Gullit, who resigned as Newcastle boss in the August.
Patrick Vieira’s exit at Crystal Palace in April means there are now no current black Premier League managers.
In the Football League — with struggling Reading sacking Paul Ince earlier this month — there is only Vincent Kompany at Burnley, Sheffield Wednesday’s Darren Moore and Liam Rosenior at Hull City.
“When I started out [at Bury] in 1999 I was one of five or six black managers,” says Preece. “It is 2023 and I am probably one of less than five or six black managers. That is 24 years. Nothing seems to have changed.
“What has changed is that there are a lot more black players on the pitch; 43% of players are black and 40% have the Pro Licence [the coaching qualification]. But we are seeing 4% in managerial jobs. There is something still not right.”
Preece is placing a lot of faith in the Black Footballers Partnership to challenge statistics and push for change.
Co-founded by former Derby and Jamaica player Michael Johnson, BFP commissioned two reports, in 2022 and 2023, that show no real improvement in management opportunities given to black candidates.
It says the Football Association’s ‘Football Leadership Diversity Code’ paints a “partial and unusually rosy” picture of the present situation.
As someone who has spent a quarter of a century at the sharp end of management, Preece feels it is only through BFP that the true reality can be understood.
Ask Preece if his skin colour has been an impediment to his career, and he accepts that is the reality.
“There is no hiding from it,” he says. “It is sad for me and, in 2023, it is ridiculous we are talking about things like this. But we have to. The data is backing it up.
“But I do feel there is a bit of hope now. We have to have a voice. If we don’t talk about it and challenge things, they are not going to change.”
Preece refuses to dwell on what opportunities he might have missed out on, stating simply: “My skin colour is not going to change. I am proud of who I am.” — BBC Sport.
Online Reporter