The Fishy - Grimsby Town FC

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Town Appoint New Manager!

By: Bill Osborne
Date: 04/03/2004

GRIMSBY Town Football Club, as expected, have today announced the appointment of Nicky Law as manager until the end of the season with Graham Rodger staying as assistant manager. The Fishy tells you first!

Law, previously with Chesterfield and Bradford city, has been given the job on a temporary basis and if he succeeds in turning the Mariner's situation around will be offered a longer contract.

This will not be easy but it will be a lot easier now that Graham Rodger has managed to get some good results on the board and lifted Town a bit higher from the relegation zone. That should not be forgotten.

Law's Career As Player

Real name Nicholas Law
Date of Birth 08-09-1961
Place of Birth Greenwich
Nationality English

Club
From
Ilkeston T 01-08-1997
Hereford 11-10-1996
Chesterfield 08-10-1993
Rotherham 01-08-1990
Scarborough 10-11-1989
Notts Co 17-06-1988
Plymouth 12-03-1987
Blackpool 28-08-1985
Barnsley 04-08-1981
Arsenal 17-07-1979

Law's Career as manager

Team From To Games Won Lost Drawn
Bradford 01-01-2002 09-11-2003
87
23
43
21
Chesterfield 25-05-2000 31-12-2001
86
40
23
23

Law's League Managers Profile

Nicky Law was appointed as Bradford City manager on New Year's Eve 2001, leaving his post at Chesterfield to succeed Jim Jefferies and become The Bantams third manager in four years.

He had spent 19 months in charge at Saltergate having taken over from John Duncan as Spireites boss and returning the Club to Division Two in the face of tremendous financial difficulties.

Nicky Law started his career at Arsenal as an apprentice but played the majority of his football in the north of England after making the move to Barnsley in 1981.

His career took him around eight clubs in the north, notably Notts County and Rotherham, before he joined the Spireites in 1993. He skippered the Saltergate club to promotion in 1995, but left for short spells at Hereford and Ilkeston Town before returning as Community Officer.

Nicky took over as caretaker manager after the departure of John Duncan in April 2000 and immediately appointed former team mate Ian Banks as his assistant. The position was made permanent soon after and Law guided Chesterfield to the top of the Third Division in 2000/01, picking up two manager of the month awards in the first half of the season as his team opened up a gap between themselves and the chasing pack. Promotion back to Division Two looked like a credible prospect.

The run towards promotion continued as Chesterfield maintained their lead in Division Three but investigations into the club's financial situation threatened to deprive the club of promotion.

For weeks it seemed that all the hard work Nicky had put in to take the club back to Division Two may be in vain but a nine-point deduction failed to ruin the promotion push that eventually saw the Spireites finish in third place and return to the Second Division.

An up and down first half of the season in Division Two saw Chesterfield near the bottom end of the table but in the circumstances, the fact that they were 5 points clear of the relegation zone could be considered as reasonable success for a Club which at one stage the previous year had seemed destined for liquidation.

Nicky Law's efforts in adverse circumstances did not go unnoticed and he was invited to take over at Bradford City, after Jim Jefferies left the Club, with the aim of reversing the Bantams' slide into the bottom half of the table and rebuilding the side for the future.

Taking over at the beginning of 2002, he managed to steer Bradford to a 15th placed finish that season, but the following year saw them slip down to 19th - still six points clear of relegation.

Although the 2003/04 season began brightly, with a home draw against Norwich and an away win at Cardiff, results soon turned against the Yorkshire side and they were struggling near the bottom of the table when Law was dismissed on November 9th despite two successive draws.

An official statement on the club's website read: "The board of directors have decided to terminate the employment of manager Nicky Law with immediate effect."

"The board felt they had given him as long as they could to turn the current form around, notwithstanding the pressure they had been under to take this action for the last month from supporters."


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This site is by the fans, for the fans, and we will consider articles on any subject relating to the Mariners whether it be related to current news, a nostalgic look back in the past, a story about a player, a game or games in the past, something about Blundell Park or football in general. Click here to submit your article!


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