WHAT makes a fit, single lad of 23 want to leave home and move to the other side of the world? For former Hindley footballer Tony Gallagher, he remembers exactly why the decision was easy.

"It was the Thatcher era and she was good at putting a lot of people out of work and I was one of them. I had qualifications as an engineer and they were screaming for engineers out here (in Australia)," Tony, now 47, recalls.

Tony was born in Ince in 1957 and went to Cardinal Newman High School, which has since merged with Rose Bridge.

"I lived in a nice area - not too rough. I remember growing up with all the kids in the street, where I learnt to play football. You'd get your mam coming to shout you in at 10 o'clock at night," Tony said.

Tony used to play football for Wigan youth and remembers the hardships associated with trying to make it to the top.

"I was 16 and I just thought it was all very hard. But I still kept on playing in the amateur divisions," Tony said.

He played for Ashton, and before he left England, he finished up playing in the local pub league on Sunday morning for the Spinners Arms at Hindley.

Tony remembers bumping into a mate who played football back in 1981 who got him thinking about emigrating.

"He was out here playing football and doing some work and he said why not have a bash at Aussie, you'd like it here. I went down to Manchester and put my name down at the embassy and before I knew it I was on the plane," Tony said.

He had to pay $100 and when he landed in Australia, they put him in a migrant hostel at Coogee (in Sydney's eastern suburbs). He was only there for about two weeks, before he bumped into a couple of lads - one was from Newcastle in England and the other a Scotsman. They got talking about football one day and before long ended up getting a flat together.

Despite the promise of a new life abroad and the excitement associated with coming to grips with a different culture, it wasn't easy for Tony to leave everything behind.

"I think always your family is hard to leave behind, I had no family here apart from my own family now. But I missed the football and I missed the pubs. Football's getting there slowly (in Australia) the pubs are not. I don't think you'll find any pubs better than what's in England. They haven't got the character," Tony said.

"I think it was fortunate that when I landed at Coogee Hostel, there were a lot of Brits who lived in Coogee, so wherever you went you always heard familiar accents. I never actually associated myself with Australians until I started working with them. I think they're great people, I think they're very friendly people, but if you can find your own people from your own country, you always tend to mix with them. To this day, I still mix with the people who I first met when I came out to Australia."

Tony got a job through the hostel's employment agency. He recalls one of the first job offers he got when he arrived.

"(The agency) told me they had a job at Blacktown as an engineer working at this production place," Tony said. "He told me it was very good money, so I said, 'oh yeah, can you show me on the map where it is?'. So he showed me from Coogee to Blacktown and I thought well, that doesn't look too far. I said: 'How do you get there?'. He said: 'Well, you need to get a bus here, then a train, then a bus.' And I said: 'Mate?! How far is it?' He said: "It's about an hour-and-a-half'. And I said: 'No way, I want a job about 10-15 minutes away. Just like England."

Tony eventually landed a job at Garden Island, the naval base, which was down on the water.

"That was absolutely fantastic. Working down at Circular Quay on the water in this weather, coming from Wigan. I couldn't grumble, could I?" Tony laughed.

His transition from engineer to football coach came about through playing the game.

"I played for many years out here. And then as I started to get a bit older (35-ish), I started to play for this English team in Sydney called Barnstoneworth United. It was named after a fictitous football team that Michael Palin invented. Anyway, one of the lads who was on the team was from Hull and he decided to put a team together full of ex-Brits. We wore the long baggy shorts and grandad-shirts. So we all got together and funny enough, we won the grand final in the first year. We were on the news and everything."

One of the highlights of his coaching career was being part of a specialised coaching course called SAQ (Speed, Agility, Quickness). The course brought together ex-Australian rugby coach Bob Dwyer, Broncos coach Wayne Bennett and some ex-NSW players, NSW Institute of Sport people and physicians.

"It was really good to get on board with that and learn with these people at the highest level," Tony said.

Tony also met his Kiwi wife Sandy through the game.

"There used to be a gang of girls who used to come watch the team play and I met Sandy through her sister, who was part of the gang," Tony recalls.

The couple now have two children Sean, 13 and Kevin, 10, and have since settled in Lisarow on the NSW Central Coast.

Despite spending many years in Australia, he will remain forever an Englishman.

"I still consider myself an Englishman, without doubt. If it was Australia v England in sport, I'd still go for England. Just for a wind up," Tony said.

"I think the climate is the one thing that can keep you here. You don't get all those rainy, north-west days and the cold weather. That and steady work, there's always work if you need it," Tony said.

The whole family went to England for a holiday in 2003.

"I thought the kids might have found it a bit strange, but they actually liked it. And taking them to places like Blackpool where you don't stop laughing and taking them to watch football where the atmosphere is just incredible. They just got right into it,"Tony said.

He said he would go back to England to live.

"I think when the kids are grown up and have decided what they want to do - and if my wife still wants me - we might go back," Tony laughs. "But I'd definitely like to go back and live there again. Probably retire there. I try and get back every two years and I try and merge it around if there's a world cup or a European Championships, so I can go and watch a few games."

Tony believes the game in Australia is looking the healthiest it has ever been and he's hopeful the raft of changes can make a difference to a game that lags behind the other codes.

"I'd like to think that obviously they've got their act together this year, with this new A-League. Clubs have invested a lot of money - not your $100,000, more like $6 million and are now getting coaches from overseas, like Steve McMahon (who has just signed for Perth Glory). So, in that regard I'm hoping in the next two years, there's going to be some prominence."Australia in 1981.