GARY Bowyer received many messages of congratulations when he was appointed as Blackburn Rovers permanent manager last month.

Among those to get in touch were two current England internationals, Phil Jones and Tom Huddlestone.

They had not forgotten the help he had given them during his many years as a youth coach, first with Derby and then with Rovers.

“When Jonesy went to Manchester United, that was a special moment, I must admit,” Bowyer said.

“It was the same sort of feeling when Tom Huddlestone left Derby with us and went to Tottenham.

“Tom used to live around the corner from me in Nottingham and I used to pick him up and take him to training.

“It’s a measure of the lad and the measure of his mum Maxine that when I got the job both of them were on the phone, and the same with Jonesy.”

Forced to retire from playing because of injury in 1997, Bowyer knew coaching was the direction he wanted to take.

“It was the only thing I could do to be perfectly honest,” he said.

Early on Bowyer would work for Keith Alexander at non-league club Ilkeston.

Alexander would later return to Football League management with Lincoln, Peterborough and Macclesfield before his death in 2010 at the age 53 – seven years after a brain aneurysm.

“Keith was a top footballing man and he gave me my first little taste,” Bowyer said.

“I was working for Ilkeston Town, they’d set up a college scheme, one of the first in the country.

“Keith wanted somebody to coach it, so I did that alongside working for Derby County’s academy.

“He’s sadly missed. He’s a loss to football, because he’d still be managing now.”

Bowyer took his coaching badges with current Burnley first-team coach Tony Loughlan, a former colleague at Forest.

He briefly coached part time at Forest before six years at Derby, four of them full time with the Academy.

“John Peacock, who is now technical director in the FA, offered me a job,” Bowyer recalls.

“That was me, I was hooked.”

The chance to join Rovers came in the summer of 2004, when Under-18s boss Ian Miller departed to link up with Colin Hendry at Blackpool.

“I’d been on holiday to Australia and when I came back I landed and switched my phone on I’d received a phone call from Bobby Downes,” Bowyer says.

“He said, ‘We’ve got a position available, would you be available to come up for an interview?’.

“I drove up the next day.

“He asked me when I could come and I said I could come tomorrow.

“I did the interview and came back for a second interview.

“It was a tough interview. Bobby had me in his office for three hours and rightly so because anybody can talk for 20 minutes but in three hours you get a feel of somebody better.

“Then he was good enough to offer me the job.

“I’m always grateful to people who give me these opportunities.

“John Peacock gave me my first opportunity in coaching, I’ll always be grateful to him and the same with Bobby.”

Bowyer’s task was to develop players to progress to the reserve team, working closely with Glyn Hodges and later Iain Brunskill.

His first experience in charge of the first team came as caretaker boss in late December, after Henning Berg was sacked along with coaching staff Eric Black, Brunskill and Bobby Mimms.

“It was sudden,” he said.

“It was straight after the Middlesbrough game, we all came in and it wasn’t a nice day.

“Eric Black, who is a top bloke and a top coach, came into the office and said, ‘That’s, it we’ve been sacked’.

“I still contact Eric now and he gives great advice and Henning was a top bloke, I enjoyed my conversations with him.

“I still speak to Iain and Mimmsy too, so that was a difficult day watching them pack their desks. I didn’t like it.

“That was on the Thursday and I got a call then on the Thursday night to ask, ‘Would I look after it on Friday and prepare the team for the Saturday?’. That’s what we did.

The players were brilliant, they took responsibility for it and we went to Barnsley and produced a performance and they had a smile on their face.

“We carried that on into the Forest game and the Bristol City game and there was a really good feel-good factor about it.

“We got told that we were having it until the end of January, which was no problem, I said all along we were there to do whatever the club wanted us to do.

“We agreed to take it until the end of January and during that time they made the decision to bring Michael Appleton in. I was fully aware that could happen.”

But Appleton was sacked after only 67 days in charge, being handed the news at Brockhall while Bowyer on the training field with the under 21 squad.

“Again I liked Michael Appleton,” said Bowyer.

“He was a top bloke, he was straight and honest.

“I was on the training pitch when it happened and I was shocked and stunned to see that he’d gone. But again the club asked us to look after it initially for the game and then they said until the end of the season.”

From there Bowyer went on to earn the job on a permanent basis, a position that was finally announced during the summer.

Bowyer had impressed in stearing Rovers away from the Championship relegation zone to safety and most Ewood supporters were pleased to see him get a chance.

Although when he arrived back in 2004, Bowyer admits he could never have envisaged he would one day be manager of the first team.

“I’ve never set myself personal targets about where I need to be by this time or that time,” he said.

“I didn’t think I’d be manager at this club when I first joined.

“It’s just one of those things and things happen for a reason.”