Mark Hughes

Mark Hughes.

“I was his very first signing. On the day he left, he said he would not have changed that, nor the relationship that we went on to have.”

When an England hero calls you up to try and persuade you to sign for him, there is little you can do but agree. And that decision saw Mark Hughes head south to link up with Teddy Sheringham, who had just started his first management job at Stevenage.

It would take a man of such standing in English football – a treble winner with Manchester United in 1999 – to tempt the Kirkby-born central defender away from his family up in the north west. Having established himself in the Football League with first Northampton then Walsall after leaving Everton in 2007, Hughes had spells at Bury and Morecambe to ensure he stayed local. But then the call from Sheringham came.

“Teddy rang me up not long after the 2014/15 season,” he explains. “Even though it was so far away from home, it was never an opportunity I could’ve turned down. Teddy is a legend from when I was growing up watching football.

“So I signed for Stevenage but it was probably the most unsuccessful period of my career. It was Teddy’s first management job and he would be the first to say he made mistakes. The players did as well. All round we just didn’t seem to get anything going, him as a manager and us as a team.”