The Saturday Interview

ASK Richard Dinnis if he ever regrets entering the cut-throat world of professional football and one crystal-clear image automatically enters his head.

During his time in the North America Soccer League at the end of the 70s, he suddenly found himself discussing the beautiful game with two of the sport's greatest idols.

His team, Vancouver Whitecaps -- for whom Dutch captain Rudi Krol was the star man -- had just played a Johan Cruyff-inspired Los Angeles side and Dinnis was sat in the dressing room, the steam still lingering after the post-match shower.

"I was sat next to Krol and in came Cruyff and sat down on the other side, smoking like a factory chimney.

"There was little Richard Dinnis from Clitheroe perched between two of the greatest players in the world and we talked football for half an hour.

"I still look back now and think 'How the hell did that happen?'

So how did a PE teacher from Darwen end up in a chin-wag with football legends, manage one of the biggest clubs in the country, become a confidante of Roy Hodgson and a football authority on the airwaves?

When Tony Parkes steps out at Anfield tomorrow for his fourth spell as caretaker manager of Blackburn Rovers, Dinnis, more than anyone, will know exactly how he feels.

For he once stepped into the breach in similar circumstances when Ken Furphy quit Ewood for Sheffield United almost 25 years ago.

The former Darwen PE teacher, who coached Rovers' Central League side, took over as caretaker for six matches before Gordon Lee assumed control. He started off coaching on a course run by Jimmy Adamson, doing a couple of sessions a week with Burnley A team players like Leighton James and Eric Probert.

When a vacancy as reserve and youth team coach came up at Ewood, Dinnis was recommended and began working under Furphy.

"When I first went into Blackburn Rovers, Ken came in with his own ideas and a lot of people got the elbow.

"Players like Fred Pickering, an England international, and Eamon Rogers, who was an Irish international, and a lot of other senior men suddenly found themselves in the reserves.

"I'd just come from being a Darwen schoolteacher to being manager of a reserve side full of internationals.

"But I never looked on it as intimidating -- I just thought of it as a challenge."

When Furphy moved to Bramall Lane, Dinnis stepped in as caretaker and Rovers won three and lost three of his six league games in charge.

In the FA Cup, he survived a nailbiting replay at non-league Altrincham -- "What a scare that was" -- before eventually being knocked out by Everton.

Gordon Lee took over and led Rovers to the Third Division championship before departing to join First Division Newcastle, who had just lost the FA Cup final.

Dinnis went with him as coach, the lure of working with players like Malcolm McDonald, Alan Kennedy and John Tudor proving much too strong.

"That's really what a coach wants to do -- work with the best players he possibly can." Lee and Dinnis led the Magpies to the League Cup final in their first season.

But Lee quit Tyneside for Everton midway through the following year and Dinnis stepped into the breach once again as caretaker, leading Newcastle to fifth and a place in Europe.

"It sounds strange but we just couldn't stop winning matches.

"They were good lads who worked very hard and we had some great characters, people like Alan Gowling, Geoff Nulty and Micky Burns.

"They were very bright lads who really led the players."

That run of form secured Dinnis the job on a permanent basis ahead of Lawrie McMenemy and Bill McGarry but a disastrous start to the new season, in part caused by a players' revolt over money, saw him get the sack in November.

"There's no doubt in my mind, looking back, that I wasn't ready to become manager of Newcastle United.

"But, when a job like that is offered to you, you don't turn it down because the opportunity might never happen again."

A spell across the Atlantic as head coach of Philadelphia -- working with the likes of Johny Giles, Alan Ball and Peter Osgood -- became an ideal haven.

The razzmatazz of the American game, awash with international stars such as Franz Beckenbauer, Carlos Alberto, Krol and Cruyff, was a relatively stress-free workplace.

Vancouver was the next port of call and ,as assistant to Tony Waiters, the pair led the Whitecaps to the North American Soccer League title at the end of the 70s.

"It was a fantastic experience because some of the clubs were getting vast crowds. "But it felt a bit more like exhibition football at times.

"It didn't feel as though they were teams because players had been plucked from all over the place."

Dinnis returned to England after three years, and, following another short spell at Ewood under John Pickering, he moved on to Bristol City as chief scout where he first met Roy Hodgson.

When manager Bob Houghton quit for Toronto, Hodgson took over as manager at Ashton Gate and made Dinnis his assistant.

Even at that stage, it was obvious the recently departed Rovers boss had star quality.

"Roy had a similar background to myself in regard to the fact we had never played the game professionally but we were both gripped by the coaching bug.

"He was an excellent coach, very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the game, and a very good judge of a player." A crippling financial crisis wrecked any ambitions the duo had for the club and they both quit.

Disillusioned at the lack of stability following four jobs in nearly as many years, Dinnis returned to his teaching roots, taking a one-year diploma in PE at Carnegie College in Leeds.

But, still gripped by the football bug, he spent six months as a coach at Middlesbrough and six weeks as an assistant in Saudi Arabia, before taking up a teaching post at Canon Slade School in Bradshaw, where he still works today.

A spell as manager of non-league Barrow and some coaching work at Burnley and Bolton Wanderers' schools of excellence have kept him involved in the game during the 90s.

But he is now best known for his work as a football summariser for Radio Lancashire.

Originally invited as a guest to talk about Roy Hodgson's appointment as Rovers manager, he has since become a permanent fixture and has carved out a niche as an incisive and entertaining analyst.

"I looked at all the summarisers on radio and decided Jimmy Armfield was the best, so I tried to model myself on him.

"I try not to be too judgemental and just aim to put the facts before the people.

"There are analysts who try to be too clever by far."

So what next for the man who admits football is a total obsession?

He has knocked back a couple of coaching jobs in the last six months because 'they weren't the right opportunities' but he would love the chance to prove himself again.

"I would like to grow into something else if I can but I don't quite know what. Whether it's more radio work, going back to the Centres of Excellence, or back into the game in a full-time capacity I just don't know.

"But I feel I'm a better coach now than I was 20 years ago and 20 years ago I was managing Newcastle United, so who knows?"

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.