Carlisle United's golden generation remember David Wilkes

The News & Star has spent recent months speaking to many of the players Wilkes nurtured and developed at Carlisle during the 1990s - when an unprecedented golden generation of Cumbrian talent emerged from his youth system.

In their own words, here are their memories of a special coach and man.

PAUL MURRAY

(Carlisle United, QPR, Southampton, Oldham Athletic, Beira-Mar, Gretna, Shrewsbury Town, Hartlepool United, England Under-21s and England B. Currently academy manager of Oldham Athletic)Paul Murray, left, had two spells in Carlisle's first-team and also played for England Under-21 and England B (Image: News & Star)

At the time I signed as a schoolboy at 14, Wilkesy had been heavily involved in setting up a scouting system at Carlisle. He had scouts at Penrith and I had a couple of options to go to other clubs - but Wilkesy approached me and said, ‘Why not come and ply your trade at Carlisle?’

At that time I never considered myself as someone who’d go on and have a long career. I just thought, ‘I’m gonna give it a right shot’.

I went into the School of Excellence and Wilkesy was always at training, giving you feedback. At 14, he would also take us into the little gym at the club, which wasn’t the best to say the least.

Aidan McCaffery was the manager then, and we would be chucking medicine balls around while the senior pros were doing weights. I’m stood there, this skinny little lad from Penrith, thinking, ‘Yeah - I want to do this’.

Dave dangled that carrot, even from that stage. He was good at that.

The story has been told a few times that, on the first day of my scholarship, Dave took me up to Mick Wadsworth, who was the manager by then, and said: "Mick, this is Paul Murray and he’s got something to say to you."

I just looked up and said, "Alright Mick, I’ll be in the first team by Christmas," and just walked off. I could hear Wilkesy saying to Mick, "Er…that’s Muzza, he’s a bit different from everyone else".

But he supported us all the way through. He had experience of being a young player himself from his time at Barnsley. Anything you needed, he was there to talk about. He knew when it was time to crack a joke, and when you needed a firm word in your ear.

He was a good coach and a good laugh, but he was ready to put his arm around you – that’s how he engaged with you, helped you learn.

I was 16, the youngest in the youth team squad, when we went over to Den Haag in the Netherlands. It was a brilliant trip. We did really well in a big tournament and at the end Dave said, "Don’t drink any pints, Muzza. Just behave yourself. I don’t want to see you in any bars."

So we go on a walk and end up coming into the first bar outside the hotel. We go in, and I get myself two halves. A couple of the lads are puffing away on cigarettes, and Dave walks in, sees everyone dancing around and shouts, "******* hell, Muzza, I thought I told you no pints!"

I said, "Dave, they’re halves!" And he stopped for a second – then just started having a boogie.

He said, "Lads, take it easy, don’t be late…" We had a curfew - and he was waiting for us…

When I was a first-year scholar, nobody wanted to go against me in training, because I was horrible. I never really got on with anyone – I didn’t care, I would just smash people. So I was often left spare in one-v-ones.

Dave said, "I’ll go against you Muzza".

I said, "I’ll snap your ****** legs".

He was furious. He said, "Muzza, get in that changing room now – go and see Mick and tell him what you’ve just said to me". I was nervous when I went in to Waddy and explained what I’d done. But Mick said, "Muzza, get out there and tell Dave to stop picking on my best player".

So I go back out and tell Dave. He must have wondered what on earth was going on, and I’m sure the lads were the same. But Dave took it and just carried on.

One of Dave’s skills was knowing how to handle different characters. He got to know what everybody needed. People like Janny [Matt Jansen] needed bigging up. I probably needed toning down a little bit. I was a bit of a wrong-un, really. A Denton Holme boy.

If you were pushing the boundaries, he would remind you how to be respectful. He was a pretty boy, let’s be fair – a good-looking lad. We always had a laugh about his hair, and the way he used to flick it. He let the lads take the mick out of him and have a bit of fun, but you knew the line and where it was.

A lad like Janny was always destined for great things with his natural ability. The rest of us had to be grafters. And that’s where Dave came into his own with us. He instilled that work ethic – and because of that he was a massive part of our careers.

We would probably never have gone on to do what we did without Dave, and Mick to a point, instilling that desire to succeed, and the resilience we had. I certainly wouldn't have had the career I had.

At that time at Carlisle we used to grind out results and look after each other. That mental attitude we developed made us a good unit and we got success.

To get so many Cumbrians through the system in that period was phenomenal. It will never happen again. The number of lads he recruited, who went on to be pros, is frightening.

They were some of the best times Carlisle has ever had, in terms of the people, the staff, the characters, the old pros, the young lads coming through, all the Cumbrians in the team. The best camaraderie, the best feeling, the best group of lads. It was brilliant, a fantastic place to work.

I stayed in contact with Dave throughout, and in more recent times we had more face-to-face contact in coaching circles. As is often the case, I often thought I should have kept in touch with him more, but the thing with Wilkesy is that, when you saw him, 20 years could have passed but it would be the same relationship as when you left it.

Even though I didn’t see him in person for quite a few years for a period, when I did it was like we were back in Carlisle having a bit of crack.

He’s done such a lot for the club. In football, people come and go sharpish. To have essentially your whole life at Carlisle should be commended. But we’re always too late. It's such a shame we don’t talk about this when he’s alive, and tell him. When someone dies, people start telling stories. We’re all guilty of it.

I don’t see enough of my friends. You have to make time for them.

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MATT JANSEN

(Carlisle United, Crystal Palace, Blackburn Rovers, Coventry City, Bolton Wanderers, Wrexham, Leigh, Chorley, England Under-21s and the full England squad. Currently player liaison at Stockport County)

Wetheral's Matt Jansen was one of United's most talented youth products, going on to star for Blackburn, right, and make the full England squad (Image: News & Star / PA)

When I heard the news that Wilkesy had died, I was in floods of tears. He meant that much to me.

My dad and Wilkesy were the biggest influences on my football career and moulded me into the player I was. As a coach, Dave was exactly what I needed. He gave me a lot of love – he always said I was a ‘genius’, that sort of thing, and said I was going to play for England.

He bigged me up. My type of character needed that.

I was in the School of Excellence from eight years old, and first encountered Wilkesy when I was 13 or 14, in the Neil Sports Centre, on the sandpaper astroturf. He’d been a decent player himself, and as a youngster you think, ‘Wow, he’s playing first-team football for Carlisle’ – you’re a little bit starstruck as a kid.

As you grow, you get to know people more – and I got to know someone who was, at heart, a great guy, friendly…just Wilkesy.

When I stepped up to the YTS system, I only did one year because he was constantly pushing me to get into the first team squad – "This boy’s special," he would say to the managers. And he made me know it.

He was infectious. I just loved the way he was with me. A lot of what I did was down to Wilkesy and how he believed in me.

When Mick Wadsworth was manager, we didn’t necessarily see eye to eye, but when Mervyn Day took over, I flourished. Merv was of a similar temperament – a calm, loving guy who was forgiving. Then you had Wilkesy in the background pushing me forward. It was a perfect environment for me to be in.

As I was getting my first serious run in the first team, Merv got the sack, and Wilkesy and John Halpin took the job with Michael Knighton in close proximity. Their first game in charge was at Wycombe Wanderers. I scored two and got a 10 out of 10 in the paper.

That shows what an influence he was on me. I just loved playing for him. If I made a mistake, it wasn’t my fault in my own mind – or in his. "Janny doesn’t make mistakes..."

That spell as joint manager didn’t sit easily with him. There was one game at home when we were losing and, at half-time, I guess he felt he needed to be the kind of person he wasn’t. He suddenly started having a rant and a rave.

It was not him. Everybody knew it was false. A few of the lads were sniggering a little bit. I just thought to myself, ‘You don’t need to change, Wilkesy’.

I think that period was tough for him. He was thrust into the job and I don’t think he really wanted it, but he was doing what he thought he needed to do because Knighton was pushing him that way, and his hands were tied a little bit along with Halpy’s.

If he was managing today, I think people would have loved to play for him. These days, more people love to be loved. When our generation was coming through, coaches tended to rule by fear, but now it’s gone the other way. Wilkesy’s style would be perfect for the modern footballer.

When I went into management at Chorley, I took aspects from Wilkesy. I would only have a go at somebody if they weren’t working hard and I suppose Wilkesy would be similar. He was so nice a guy, and that good a person, that you didn’t want to let him down. It was that kind of respect.

Every so often, as the years went by, we would still speak. My dad was very friendly with him because he worked alongside him a little bit, and knew his family. Every so often I’d have a phonecall with him, and my dad would play golf with him and always said, "Wilkesy was asking after you."

When I came back to Carlisle, I’d often see him and say hello. After my book launch, in Waterstones, I bumped into him when we were in Pizza Express, and he was just the same as ever.

He loved his own jokes, but his laugh was even funnier. He was daft as a brush but loveable, and so caring.

Everybody loved him. He always wanted to have a laugh and always had a smile on his face. I’ve seen videos that lads have put on social media of him singing Billy Joel’s ‘Piano Man’ in the dressing room.

That was him – there was never a dull moment, and he was infectious.

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RORY DELAP

(Carlisle United, Derby County, Southampton, Sunderland, Stoke City, Barnsley, Burton Albion, Republic of Ireland. Currently assistant head coach at Maccabi Tel Aviv)

Rory Delap, left, emerged through Wilkes's youth system and went on to play in the Premier League and for the Republic of Ireland (Image: News & Star / PA)

Dave had started taking the School of Excellence the year before I joined as a YTS from my last year of school. Myself and Tony Hopper had actually been released midway through that last season, but at the back end Dave came to a game I was involved in, qnd luckily I played well.

He invited me and Tony back down to have a week’s trial, and within a couple of days they offered us both a two-year scholarship at Carlisle.

That was the start of it for me.

Everyone knows what he was like – bubbly, fun. But the important thing to know is that he was a bloody good coach. He was ruthless, he was tough, but he’d let you have fun as well.

He understood we were young lads and we were going to be doing certain things. We did get up to a lot of stuff he turned a blind eye to, but he did come down heavy at other times.

Those YTS years were the best two years in my career in terms of coming into football and enjoying it, and improving as a player, which were the most important things.

As a coach, he was really young – he’d finished playing quite early through injury, so he wasn’t generations older than us. He was in his late twenties, maybe early thirties. I think that helped – he’d been through it all, and quite recently.

My first impression of him was his character – he was funny, a bit off his head at times in the stuff he’d do. In my first YTS game, we played Preston. We were 4-1 up at half-time, but lost 7-5. After the game, Dave was in the changing room, and he was so angry he’d stripped off everything apart from his socks and boots, with his socks pulled up to his knees.

I’d just come out of school and here’s a fella hammering everyone, and all he has on is his socks and a pair of copers. I’m like, ‘What have I come into here?!’ But that was Dave.

He was passionate, first and foremost, about the game, and the work he did with us was second to none. He was brilliant on the little details.

Sometimes coaches expect you to know or understand when they say something to a young player. Dave knew the ones who would grasp it, and the ones who wouldn’t.

He’d give you little bits of individual advice, and technical detail. I can always remember he was the first person I heard talk about back-foot receiving and opening up to play forward. I’d never heard that before.

The detail of his work was exceptional for the time. Mick Wadsworth saw that in him, and having Dave at the club was a huge part of why the club was so successful in that period.

In terms of psychology, he knew who needed a cuddle and who needed a kick up the arse. That’s not just a football skill but a life skill – how to treat people, how to make them feel wanted and valued. That was a real trait of his. It wasn’t one size fits all. It was about treating the individual rather than the team.

That’s why he had so much success. We were good players, but that age between 16-19 is vital to how your play develops and if you're going to make the most of your talent.

He’d let us get away with certain things but he knew when to put the hammer down. We went on a pre-season trip to Holland, played three games, had a training camp, and after four or five days in this youth hostel with ten bunk beds in a room, along with a Russian team and a Chinese team, one of the older lads said, "Right, we’re going out tonight – we’ll have dinner, then go up to the rooms, get your gear on and go out the fire escape".

It was military-planned. We waited until Dave went to bed, sneaked out, got to this nightclub and were away with it. Half an hour later Dave casually walks up. He’s got a pint in his hand and he says, "Lads, finish your drinks and **** off."

At the end of the trip he said, "Look, I know we’ve had one or two little things to deal with, but the most pleasing thing was everybody went out that night – you didn’t leave one or two lads behind."

We still got the riot act read to us, and a punishment – he ran us hard the next day. But he still gave us a good message through it. He impressed upon us the importance of being a team.

He never let us get above our station. Not that we would have, because we were humble lads – apart from Muzza, maybe! But he knew how to handle that.

He’d congratulate us when we did something good, but would always follow up by saying, "Look, that’s a first step of many". There was never a feeling that you'd made it. He drilled that home – that there’s more to come, there’s more work, it gets harder, there are expectations on you, people will want more from you every game.

He honed you to become a good player but a good person as well.

In that period at Carlisle we had a lot of lads making their debuts early and getting into the team at a young age, and he was all about making sure it didn’t get to people’s heads, so that it wasn’t a case of having ten or 15 games and not being seen again. The majority of lads coming through had careers that lasted for many years.

He could see things before you could. I remember getting taken off at half-time at Bradford once. Dave wasn’t at the game but the next day he brought me in and said, "It happens – it’s how you deal with it, how you come back from it the next time you get an opportunity."

He did a little session with me, on our day off. We didn’t have mobile phones then, which made it more difficult, but when I was back home at night, the phone rang and he said, "Come in tomorrow, 10 o’clock, we’ll have a chat".

That period in your teens is so crucial. Through playing and coaching for 30 years myself, I’ve not seen too many people change from that age, whether that’s in attitude, work-rate or confidence. I think that’s why Dave understood he had to get so much into us in those two years in the YTS.

One of the biggest testaments to Dave is that none of the lads he had to release - those who didn’t go on to have a career - hold no grudges. They remember him fondly. That in itself tells you what type of character he was.

One thing he can’t claim is my long throw! The story behind that is that Colin Carter was watching a youth team game, the ball went out, he gave me the ball, pointed to someone in the middle…and I thought, ‘I’ll just have a go at it’. It was something I never knew I had until that moment and I used it to different degrees through my career.

Wilkesy, though, was responsible for so much more, and that certainly applies now I’m a coach too. That part about knowing which characters need what sort of approach is something I’ll never forget. I’ve probably taken more from Dave than any other coach I’ve worked with, because he was so influential in those formative years.

The biggest thing for me, when I think of those Carlisle days, is that we loved it. We had fun. The sessions were good, and there was a competitive edge to them.

As life goes on, you do drift away from people a little bit. But the first two years after I left Carlisle for Derby, I spoke to him every month or so. If I ever needed him I knew he’d be there. And if I ever saw him, it would be like I’d seen him last week.

He’d send me the odd text before or after a game, and he actually rang me when I ruptured my ankle before the FA Cup final when I was at Southampton - just to ask how things were, to say he was gutted for me but to keep my head up. Little things like that mean a lot, and that was Dave.

The crop of players we had was outstanding and so much of that was down to him. There was a good surrounding area to choose from, and we used to pick the odd one from the north east or Scotland, but the majority of them were from Cumbria.

There wasn’t a vast array of scouts back then. He put the work in. If he hadn’t been at that game when I played well, I don’t know what would have happened in terms of my career. I’ve got so much to thank him for.

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SCOTT DOBIE

(Carlisle United, West Bromwich Albion, Millwall, Nottingham Forest, St Johnstone, York City, Scotland. Currently a police officer)

Scott Dobie rose through the ranks at Carlisle and played at the top, as well as becoming a full Scotland international (Image: News & Star / PA)

I first met Wilkesy when there was an open day at Moorclose in Workington. I was ten or 11. He didn’t actually spot me at first – he spotted one of my friends at school. He asked him who the best player was at school, and my mate said, "It’s Scott over there."

After that, I was invited to the School of Excellence at Carlisle.

At about 12 or 13 I had the chance to go to Middlesbrough. That came through Peter Kirkley, the scout who’d spotted Paul Gascoigne. Dave didn’t begrudge me that chance. “It’s an opportunity you can’t miss - go and do it,” he said.

That’s a memory that stuck me all the way through, regarding the type of person he was. He wasn’t looking out for what was best for him as a youth coach or even Carlisle necessarily. He wanted the best for you as an individual. “If it doesn’t go to plan, come back and we’ll take you in a heartbeat,” he added.

I got released by Middlesbrough, by a coach who said I’d never make it as a footballer – "You’re too small and skinny", that kind of thing. I rang Dave, and he said, "We’re training tomorrow, come back in".

And that was it. He rescued me and I felt I owed Dave a lot from that point.

He was someone who knew what we wanted at that age. We were young kids chasing the dream, and he wanted to help us get that dream.

When I first joined Carlisle I was a central midfielder, then he put me out wide because he felt I could get at people. Then, during my YTS spell, I started playing up front because Dave felt I could score goals. Those latter two positions stuck with me through my whole career. It was Dave who saw that in me.

When I was struggling, especially in the early days when it was a baptism of fire at Carlisle, Dave was a godsend. He would keep your head up if you’d had a bad day. I remember playing Spurs away in the League Cup. We were winning 2-1, I gave the ball away, and Spurs went and scored.

One of the senior players was shouting, "Get him off". Dave, on the way home, was like, "Ignore him, he’s a muppet. You concentrate on yourself. You’re a young lad learning the game. Forget about that."

He could see how much it had hurt. That stuck with me – yes, how I needed to man up a bit, but also how supportive he was.

When I started getting a real run in the team, it was after Mervyn Day had gone and Michael Knighton put Dave and John Halpin in charge. He would probably be the first to admit he didn’t want to do the job and was essentially forced into it.

He found that role really hard to do, I think, because everyone saw him as ‘Wilkesy’. For me he’s one of the few coaches that crossed the line between coach and friend. Dave had known a lot of those players from when they were kids. It was a really hard time for everyone.

Being honest, I think the club would have been in a bad place if so many good young players hadn’t come through the system at that time. What Wilkesy did for the club in that era kept them going.

He wasn’t just a coach but a mentor as well, teaching you about life. As youth team players we were on £30 a week, cleaning boots and toilets…and all that’s still instilled in me today.

Some of the stuff you learned about taking responsibility, being part of a team...that stays with you throughout life. Wilkesy was at the heart of that.

You could approach him about anything, which I did myself on a few occasions - be it bereavements, or troubles you go through at that sort of age, when you’re learning how to become an adult.

In the beginning I really struggled leaving home and coming into the YTS digs full time. I’d see Wilkesy and tell him I wanted to go home on a particular night – and he’d give me a lift to the train station, then pick me up and bring me back in the next day, just to ease me into it.

When I came back to Carlisle [in 2008] I wanted to make sure I had a talk with Wilkesy to let him know how grateful I was for all the help I'd received from him over the years. It was one of the first things I did. Wilkesy was in the gym and we spoke to each other there for the best part of an hour.

And even then, he didn’t claim any credit. "You’ve done it all yourself," he said. "You were always going to play at a good level."

He found it hard to accept he was a massive, massive influence in me getting towards where I always wanted to be. Dave was never about himself, or about individuals. That whole team ethos went right through the YTS period.

Away from football, he was a gentleman – so easy to speak to. I can’t remember, in all my time there, him giving someone a real hammering. He’d always try and concentrate on the positives.

And he had a ridiculously infectious laugh. That’s the first thing that comes to mind. You could hear that laugh from the other end of the club and know it was Wilkesy. I certainly remember and miss that laugh.

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PAUL REID

(Carlisle United, Rangers, Preston North End, Northampton Town, Barnsley, Colchester United, Scunthorpe United, Eastleigh, Whitehawk, England Under-18s, Under-19s and Under-20s. Went on to become academy manager at Sunderland)

Harraby's Paul Reid, left, was in United's first team at 17 and went on to join Rangers (Image: News & Star)

I don’t remember a time that Dave wasn’t part of my football life. He was a constant, right the way through.

I suppose it started when I was under-11, at the School of Excellence. I was desperate to impress him from the day he sat at my parents’ house at Harraby, talking about the pathway into the Carlisle United first team. He came to have that chat because there was a bit of interest from elsewhere.

As I spent more time with him, going through the age groups and then into the YTS system, I saw more of the man and character he was rather than this adult I was a bit scared of.

And seriously – he was brilliant. I think sometimes he could come across to people that didn’t know him as a bit dour, but he was the exact opposite. As soon as you got to know him, he was one of the funniest guys you'd ever meet.

As YTS lads, we’d have to do the jobs like cleaning the dressing rooms, doing the boots and so on, and he’d walk around making jokes. If I was mopping the floor, and had spent half an hour doing it, he’d kick over the muddy water that was in the bucket. "Oh, sorry mate!" He was absolutely hilarious.

I remember a time in the under-15s when, at an away game, for some reason we didn’t have 11 players – a couple had pulled out with illness and injury, I think. Dave was like, "I’m not letting that happen – I’ll play". He got permission from the referee and the opposition, and went right wing.

I was 15, desperate to impress and desperate to make it as a footballer - and there was Dave, running around with a big smile on his face, cajoling everyone.

That was him - one of the lads. Jokingly, during that game, I had a pop at him a few times, because I was starting to get more comfortable and vocal. But I had a smile on my face too, and I know he enjoyed it. He wasn't moving all that well on the Monday morning, mind you…

As a man-manager, he was really good at altering his style depending on who it was and what the situation demanded. He could be quite harsh and blunt in football terms – "That’s not acceptable, you need to do this". But he’d also put his arm around your shoulder when you needed it. He'd give you that quiet word and boost.

Because he was so close to the lads, they accepted it when he was a little bit blunter. They knew it came from the right place. It was never a case of Dave in a bad mood just having a go at you. He was really good at reading the appropriate time to do that and show a little bit of steel, because it can’t all be laughs and giggles. We were trying to be elite footballers.

But if you needed a little gee-up, a confidence builder, he’d be really good at making a little one-liner, and you’d forget the fact he’d just had a go at you.

I made the first team at 17 and because I’d been closely connected with Wilkesy from the outset, I leaned on him in that time too. The first team manager would deal with the experienced pros more, but I turned to Wilkesy for that support.

He was constantly giving me little pointers – what I did well, and things to think about. It felt like he was my personal coach, on a one-to-one basis. I think he made a lot of people feel like that.

It’s probably only now, as I get older and have time to reflect, that I realise how important that was. That period from about ten to 18 are your formative football years, when you’re learning the game, working out how to act and behave, how to conduct yourself on and off the pitch. He was a massive part of that learning experience. I certainly credit a big part of my journey and career to him. He was integral to it.

I feel he was probably ahead of his time in the way he was a more softly-spoken coach. He wasn’t all laughs and jokes - I thought I was very professional and conscientious, but he’d still give me a rocket and say something wasn’t good enough - but he had that great skill of talking to you in the other way.

I had personal pride but also didn’t want to let him down – I wanted him to think, ‘Yeah, he’s a good player’. He made you want to be better for yourself and for him. Looking back, he made me a better human being, ultimately.

As my career moved on, our relationship changed and it became more of a friendship. Suddenly he wasn't my coach or manager – now I could talk to him on a more peer to peer level. I’d often come back to Carlisle from Rangers to see my mates, and watch United, and he’d stand with me and talk about football in general.

It never felt like he was sitting me down and giving me a masterclass, but in some respects he was. Sometimes it was a quiet word, a little snippet. He had that emotional intelligence to read a person, read the situation.

As you get older, you try to tap into the good people you’ve met, the good things you’ve seen them do, the techniques they have, and try and unpick and understand why it worked and resonated with you.

I spend a lot of time reflecting and thinking about situations, and what would I have done differently. Often Dave’s name pops up in my mind – what would he have said, how would he have reacted to that?

In later years, the relationship changed again as I got older and became a man myself. If I’d go out for a meal in Carlisle, I’d often see him, and we’d have a beer and chat football and life in general. It felt like seeing an old friend.

We’d reminisce about some of the funny stories from when I was a YT. He’d constantly do stupid dances, singing, silly stuff – things that, when you reminisce, put a smile on your face.

What an era that was at Carlisle. There was a real conveyor belt. When you think of the people before me who left – Matt Jansen, Rory Delap, Paul Boertien, Scott Dobie, and so on – it felt constant. I know Carlisle has a decent catchment area but we were punching well above our weight in terms of player development.

We could stand shoulder to shoulder with anyone in that respect. It was down to the culture he created. I think other coaches took a lot from Wilkesy’s style as well.

Genuinely, out of all the things I managed to do in the game – and I’ve had some good times and tough times – I always I go back to my YTS and first year pro days at Carlisle as one of the happiest periods of my life.

That’s down to people like Dave creating that atmosphere, which made me feel I was looked after, cared about. My best mates are from that time. He was also brilliant with my mam and dad. Years and years later, he’d bump into them and say, "How are you Mr and Mrs Reid, how’s Paul?"

He didn’t need to do that. His remit in developing me as a young player had long gone. But it wasn’t about that for him. He cared about people.

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RICHARD PROKAS

(Carlisle United, Cambridge United, Workington Reds, Gretna. Currently assistant manager at Penrith)

Richard Prokas broke into the first-team at Wilkes's recommendation - and became a title-winner and a stalwart player in United's midfield for years (Image: News & Star)

I was a Penrith lad, and as a boy I played a lot of games against Carlisle schools – Morton, Trinity, Newman. Dave came to watch a lot of games in Penrith, including on a Sunday. He’d go round picking the best players in the area, and invite them to training at Carlisle. That’s how I got taken on as a schoolboy with the club.

My first impression was of someone who made you feel at ease, and comfortable. He took myself and all the other young lads under his wing and made sure everything was alright in your personal life, school life…

He looked after you, ultimately. He was like a father figure, to be honest.

He’d retired because of a knee injury and maybe still being a young man helped, in how he dealt with us. He knew how to treat us and get the best out of us. As a coach, he was brilliant – really enthusiastic, and always put good sessions on. All the lads bought into it. He could spot players with potential, and the amount of lads who got into the first team at a young age was unbelievable.

That was down to Dave Wilkes. He could find talent, nurture it and a lot of those players played at a higher level, including the Premiership. That says it all.

When we were in the YTS system, Dave would recommend some of us to go and train with the seniors. Mick Wadsworth, the manager at the time, didn’t have the biggest squad and he was always asking for players to step up from the youth team. That’s how it all really started for me.

Being a young lad, you wanted to go and impress the first team lads, and of course it helped you develop. Being involved around that set-up gave you the chance to catch the manager’s eye. And Dave was always keen to push us forward.

I didn’t know it at the time, but apparently Dave was in Mick’s ear urging him to give me a chance when he was short of a midfielder early in the 1994/95 season. I was training with the first team, so I felt I must have a chance, but Wilkesy really made my case and I’m grateful for that.

It resulted in Mick giving me my debut in the second game of that season, away at Torquay. It was an overnight stay and I shared a room with Peter Valentine, a really experienced player who looked after me that weekend. I got the opportunity and thankfully I took it – I was in the team for the rest of the season, and we won the league. It’s an experience I’ll never forget.

He would always be there for me, even from that point. He’d always have time for you and would talk to you, whether things were going well or if you needed any help or extra training, or had any problems. That’s the kind of man he was.

I was still at the club in the spell when he stepped up as joint manager, in 1997. Michael Knighton asked him to step up to take first team duties, which Dave and John Halpin did. I’m sure it was difficult for them, but to me, they did a good job. They didn’t want to let the club or the fans down and if someone had to step up, it sums them up that they were ready to do that.

He was just a nice man. Even when I finished playing football, if I saw him down at Frenchfields when I was walking the dog, he’d shout over and ask how I was doing. He would take time out to come and talk to me.

He’d always ask about my mam and dad, he’d speak to my wife…he always had time for you even if you hadn’t seen him for months and years.

He was known as a mild-mannered coach, but he could let rip at times, and it makes me smile when I think back to a game at Preston. One of our centre-halves got the ball and tried to nutmeg the striker. It didn’t succeed and the Preston striker went away and scored.

All I can remember is that, after the game, Wilkesy was standing there with his football boots, socks and shinpads on, and his briefs – nothing else – going berserk at the defender. I won’t repeat what he said. He was right in what he came out with – it was just funny the way he went about it.

The amount of years he was at Carlisle is unbelievable, and the amount of players he produced was unheard of. The only other team you’d probably say that about is Manchester United, with the likes of David Beckham, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, the Nevilles, Nicky Butt…

What Dave did back then, albeit at Carlisle, was our equivalent. The number of players who went on to play at a higher level, and made the club millions of pounds, is incredible.

Whether it will be repeated…you don’t know. But Dave Wilkes played a massive part in that.

That is his legacy in one way - but another is the fact that anybody you speak to won’t have a bad word to say about him. He wasn’t just a coach, he was a great bloke. A friend.

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PAUL BOERTIEN

(Carlisle United, Derby County, Crewe Alexandra, Notts County, Chesterfield, Walsall, Burton Albion. Currently an academy coach at Carlisle)

Paul Boertien broke into United's first team in his teens, and was soon snapped up by Derby County (Image: News & Star / PA)

Without Dave, I genuinely don’t think I would have had a football career.

I was never in the School of Excellence. At about 11 or 12, I came in and trained at Carlisle, but I didn’t love it – I was from Haltwhistle and felt almost out of the group because I didn’t know any of the Carlisle boys. I was shy, and so I stopped coming in.

I went to Sunderland on trial for a week at 16, and didn’t get kept on. The Sunderland scout must have felt I was a bit unlucky and I think he had a good relationship with Dave – although, saying that, Dave had a good relationship with everyone. And when you’re like that, things happen.

At 17 I came back into Carlisle on trial, and did a week’s training with Dave and the youth team. This time I loved it straight away, and Dave was a huge part of that. He was so good to work with, and he signed me straight away as a YTS after that one week, which doesn’t always happen.

Because I came in late, I was a YTS with Dave for a year and a half, and he then gave me a one year pro deal. Without that, would I have got anywhere in the game? Probably not. It was probably a 50-50 call, but he saw something in me, had faith in me, gave me that contract.

When he took charge of the first team with John Halpin under Knighton, it was Dave who played me at left-back for the first time. I’d played in midfield against Walsall away, with Warren Aspinall and others in that period, but then I played at Brentford at left-back a month later, and that was my way forward.

I was really poor at the start but he didn’t toss me aside and not use me. He kind of went, "I think he’s still got something, but maybe not in midfield." I’d played left wing-back before but never left-back. So he had a lot of faith in me to do that.

A big thing about Dave was that he trusted people. He trusted the young boys. He’d give you a platform to enjoy playing football but learn at the same time. I never used to feel like I wasn’t enjoying it.

He had a great manner about him. Don’t get me wrong, he could tell you when you weren’t doing things right, but he’d come up to you later and explain why he’d said what he’d said, and would have a laugh with you, make you feel good.

He was also so much fun in how he did things. I played in the youth team at centre-half with Dave a couple of times. You can’t imagine that now, a youth team coach at centre-half! But I think it was his way of putting experience into the group. He thought he could teach people from being in the game with them, so they could learn around him. I used to love that.

I’ll always remember those bus trips to the youth team games. We’d stop at a shop and he’d be the stereotypical tight Yorkshireman - "Just get me a sausage roll, Boets and I’ll pay you back". I’m thinking, ‘I’m on 40 quid a week, Dave!’ And he never paid you back…

But we all loved that, and loved him. When he was manager with Halpy, he was possibly too nice – maybe you need to be a little bit more ruthless to be a manager and I’m not sure he ever had that.

But as a coach, he was massively influential. I realise now how well we were brought up in the game under Dave. He used to work you hard and the jobs always had to be done properly. We weren’t allowed to go home until he’d inspected our work, and it had to be perfect. If it wasn’t he’d make you do it again.

Straight away, you were learning that discipline, and I took that into my career. But he always put the accent on enjoying it too. Sometimes, with the pressures of football, you don’t enjoy it as much as you should. He always wanted you to take it seriously but also enjoy every minute, and have fun.

Subconsciously I think I’ve taken a bit of how I coach from Dave. I generally get on really well with my group, but at the same time if I want to tell them something, and say it’s not good enough, I genuinely think they listen. They don’t drop the shoulders and sulk - they take it on board and react well to it.

A lot of that comes from Dave and how he coached. I’d never think he was giving me a telling off because he didn’t like me. I always thought he wanted to make me better.

He was at the club so many years and there’s not many people who've been at a club that long. He’s done all the jobs – Centre of Excellence, the soccer schools, the youth team, reserves, the first team, and most recently in the academy as the head of coaching.

He has been a massive part of Carlisle’s history, and throughout he was a nice, approachable guy. When he was head of coaching and I was under-13s coach, he was someone I could always speak to.

He’d look out for me even then. He would ask, "How’s your dad?" even though he’d probably not seen him for 20 years.

I wish I’d told him how much he did for me. I’m sure he knew in a way, but as you go through life, sometimes you don’t say these things.

Someone has to believe in you – and he believed in me at those key moments.

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TONY CAIG

(Carlisle United, Blackpool, Charlton Athletic, Hibernian, Newcastle United, Barnsley, Vancouver Whitecaps, Gretna, Houston Dynamo, Chesterfield, Workington Reds, Hartlepool United. Currently head of academy goalkeeping at Newcastle)

Tony Caig, from Cleator Moor, broke into the first team at a young age and was a promotion and Wembley hero with the Blues before moving on (Image: News & Star)

Dave was working on the community side of the club when I first came across him, then he became youth team head coach in my second year as a YTS player. It was the first time I’d come across a coach that was really calm with his delivery and in how he did things.

He was easy to talk to. You could chat to him about things. He was really approachable and, for a young player, that gave you confidence. There was always a human touch in his conversations too. It wasn’t just football.

Back then, coaches in the professional game would mainly just talk about football. Other stuff didn’t get spoken about a lot in terms of your family, how things were at home, how you were finding living in the digs. But Dave always asked you questions, to search out the answers.

It was always about trying to make sure you were comfortable. He wanted the best for you, always.

Right through my youth team time, then to getting a pro deal and stepping into the first team – the point where I wasn't really his player any more – he would always want to stop and chat and ask how I was finding it.

As a young player in the first XI, it changes for you – there’s a lot of pressure, and he recognised that. He’d gone through it himself as a young player at Barnsley.

Very rarely did he go off the handle and have a real go at you as a team or as a player. I can probably count the number of times on one hand. Because of that, when he did it it had more effect.

It wasn’t about him being upset – he was upset that you’d let yourselves down. It wasn’t about how it made him look as a coach.

Coaching in the modern game is much more constructive than it used to be in how you deliver information to players. Yet Dave was doing that 20 or 30 years ago.

I think some people weren’t quite sure how to take it back then. Until that point, most players had probably had that more forceful manager or coach that demanded from you.

Dave had more understanding. His approach was, ‘If I can help you get where you want to get to, it doesn’t have to be a shouting match to get there’.

Football can get really serious at times. People can get consumed by it and that’s quite dangerous. He would try and lighten it.

That said, I remember a time in the youth team when played Man United away and it was the first time I’d seem him go ballistic.

We were playing Man United’s youth team, which was Giggs, Scholes, Beckham, Neville brothers…the Class of 92. We got beat 6-1 away, I think Ryan Giggs got four and the following week made his debut in the first team. Alex Ferguson and Steve Bruce were watching the game. I was in goal, and we got battered.

After the game, our heads were spinning. We hadn't been able to get close to them. It could easily have been more than six. We fell to pieces. And Dave had a right pop at us.

It wasn’t about the scoreline - he just felt we’d let ourselves down. He felt that, if you’re getting beat, you mustn’t lose heavily, and he felt we hadn’t done enough to stop that. It was a commitment thing.

He used to drive the minibus, and I remember when we stopped at the services on the way home from that game, he was going around the lads chatting, almost apologising for how he’d reacted.

I was only 17, yet in my gut I was thinking – ‘No, you had every right to say that’. But he felt it wasn’t the appropriate way for him to have reacted. He was probably learning as a coach as well.

Those seasons, we were always in the top three or four in the north west youth division, with the Evertons, Man Us, Liverpools. In that period at the club, so many lads came through and didn’t just play for the first team, but in many cases got sold to bigger clubs.

I think that comes from Dave’s way of managing expectation, nurturing players and also, at the right time, making the manager aware they were ready.

He wouldn’t be having those conversations unless he sincerely felt the player was ready. He wouldn’t want to put them into that situation too early if it was to their detriment. That understanding was key.

He was a major reason why players did come through. I feel they got their opportunities at the right time because of Dave. And when some came in and did well, anyone in charge of that first team would trust his thought process.

When he took over the first team with John Halpin, under Michael Knighton, it was a difficult time at the club. But he took it on his own shoulders, protected the players. He wanted us to do the best we could. It was never about him.

He loved a laugh and joke, was the centre of attention at times, but always good crack. As a man he was caring, understanding and passionate about his football and family.

If you were sat in his company you could talk about anything. Football, yes, but the conversation would steer away from that as you got older. He was interested in all sorts of things and would look at things from both sides, never just from one way. He was always trying to figure things out. That’s what probably made him a good person and a really good coach.

As a young player you don’t always understand all this, but when you get older and go into coaching yourself, you recognise the importance of how to have a calm, civilised, human-touch conversation with a player, rather than make it overly serious.

Even lads who didn’t get kept on at the club, if they ever came across Dave they’d stop and have a conversation with him – or he’d make a point of stopping and asking how they were.

Aftercare for players who leave clubs - making sure they are well cared for and looked after for their next steps - is a big thing now. Dave was doing that decades ago without it being a part of his job role; it was just his caring nature.

He was an absolute perfect fit and that probably shows why he was at the club so long and in different roles.

He was a mainstay of my life. I live in Carlisle, and would frequently bump into him and chat. My son’s coaching in the academy now and Dave was a big help to Roman, taking time out to help and guide him. It can be nervous as a young coach coming into that environment but Dave was a brilliant person for him to lean on.

We have come across each other so many times in social environments and football environments. In recent years, he’d say things like, "Make sure you look after each other." It’s quite poignant to think of those things now.

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WILL VARTY

(Carlisle United, Rotherham United, Workington Reds)

Will Varty came through the youth system to become a pivotal player in 1997's promotion-winning side (Image: News & Star)

Dave didn’t just influence me inn football - he influenced me in life in general.

As I sit here today I can tell you very honestly that he’s had a massive impact on me. In those teenage years, what happens tends to make you who you are in adult life. Dave instilled the right behaviours and I like to think I’ve carried those through into who I am now.

A good work ethic, honesty, trustworthiness, what makes a good team, trusting each other – all those things were taught by Dave.

I signed schoolboy forms at Carlisle in 1992-93 and was in the YTS a couple of seasons later. My earliest memory of Dave is when I walked into the Neil Sports Centre for the first time, feeling very nervous – and he was over straight away to put me at ease.

Martin Gaffney, a teacher and a coach who worked in my part of Cumbria, took me to Carlisle the first time. Within a month of being there, I was signing schoolboy forms. I remember Dave coming to Cockermouth School to get everything sorted. I can still picture those forms.

Dave made everything so easy for me and my family. When it came to decision time for the YTS intake, Dave pulled me to one side and said, "We think a lot of you, we really want you to go to the next level, so we’d like to offer you a YTS contract". It was another milestone.

As a coach, he had a bit of everything. He would put you at ease but would also tell you what was what if you needed it. He was a bit before his time in how he spoke to you. Although he had his moments, he wasn’t one for ranting and raving.

He realised shouting and screaming wasn’t always the answer. Even outside football, that’s how he was. He had that ability to communicate, which is key – the way he could put things across, the way he’d explain things to you. It was just so clear.

You’d work with other coaches and ask yourself, ‘What is he on about?’, but Dave had the ability to make you see what he wanted, the culture he wanted.

This was the case despite the fact we were all different characters in that youth team era. There was myself, Tony Hopper, Richard Prokas, Rory Delap, Matt Jansen…totally different as people. But Dave made us into a great team. We were going away to places like Manchester United, Everton and Liverpool and beating them. To control those type of characters, and to get the best out of us all...full credit to him.

As I stepped up to the first team, I’d often look to him for advice. Once he knew I was making my debut, he came straight to me for a word.

He’d been there himself and fairly recently had gone through what we were about to, or were hoping to, go through.

He knew how to prepare you. He would tell you that you were ready and you’d believe him. I’d played in a few friendlies before making my debut at Doncaster Rovers at the start of the 1996/97 season. It was a big occasion for me but I wasn’t as daunted as I might have been because of how Dave had prepared me.

He bred things into players that never left you. As important as anything was the principle of hard work. It was a non-negotiable. You can do a bad pass, miss a header, a tackle, but there’s no excuse for not working hard. That’s the kind of thing he instilled into us.

He always wanted us to be honest, trustworthy and to work hard. If you had those traits, he could bolt on the things we needed technically.

That culture of hard work is what I really take away from that time. He’d make sure we did our jobs, whether it was sweeping the changing rooms or whatever, and if there was something out of place he’d pull you aside and tell you. He set the standard, set the bar high.

As a character, he definitely had that cheeky and mischievous side. But he did it at the right time. When it was time to be serious he’d be serious, and when it was time to have a laugh he’d be there with a few of the pranks.

It’s only when you stop and look back that you realise the sheer number of lads he brought through. It’s one thing finding those people but it’s another getting the best out of them, and that’s what he was good at.

And he never made it about him. It was always all about you. I imagine he could probably have gone to bigger clubs with the success he had, if he’d put his CV out to say, "I've done this" or "I've done that."

But it wasn’t about him. He loved Carlisle, loved all the players who played for him, and it showed.

After I finished playing football, I would still see him and he hadn’t changed a bit. He would still put you at ease, ask about the family, things like that. I wouldn’t say we kept in regular touch but if I saw him in the street years later he’d be straight over and asking about you, not talking about himself.

If all of us from that time sat down together, I’m sure we’d say the same thing – none of us could thank him enough, not just for the careers we had, but the good people he made us into.

He turned a lot of young men into good men. Hopefully we’ve gone onto influence other people the way he influenced us.

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DARREN EDMONDSON

(Carlisle United, Huddersfield Town, York City, Chester City, Barrow, Workington Reds. Currently manager of Penrith)

Darren Edmondson was a young Cumbrian star in United's team during Wilkes' time at the club - and later went on to work alongside the coach as academy manager (Image: News & Star / Barbara Abbott)

I was a scholar at Carlisle United when Dave first came to the club under Clive Middlemass. By the time he came into the youth set-up, I was in the pro squad, but sometimes Mick Wadsworth would push him up to take sessions.

My first impressions of Dave were that he always had bright eyes. He was always a laugh. He didn’t like to get serious about things, really.

Mick and Dave had a really close and outstanding relationship. Mick had known Dave since he was six. The conveyor belt of talent that came through under their regime is no coincidence, I don’t think.

They were, needless to say, different characters. If I put a cross behind the goal, even in training, Mick would often throw his cap on the deck and let you know about it – whereas I’d often find Wilkesy laughing at it.

Back then, any number of lads would tell you how often their coaches would just go absolutely berserk. Dave was starting his coaching journey as a more mild-mannered person.

The group that came through under his eye had probably never had that kind of mentor before. If Dave was coming into coaching now, he'd be an absolutely perfect fit, because in society today you have to show you can tolerate and appreciate different personalities.

The truth is, he was a perfect fit back then too. Dave recognised that if you had a certain amount of ability, it’s about nurturing the player - giving them a free rein within what he would call his tactical team shape, rather than restricting them.

No wonder that group at Carlisle flourished.

When I watched him work in those early days, you could see his talent for putting people in the right positions, as well as his organisational skills. He loved tactics, and in his younger days he was really good at relaying that with enthusiasm and encouragement – encouraging open play and progressive football.

I can’t remember witnessing any negativity in what he asked players to do. It was always front foot, always an accent on enjoying it. He loved coaching, loved being on the grass.

Many years later I was fortunate to get the academy manager’s job at Carlisle and I worked closely with him. He was just the same personality as I'd known in the beginning – he didn’t raise his voice and didn’t need to. He could take any kind of adversity on the chin and speak about it professionally and analyse it.

He calmed me down. I was coming in from an open-age coaching mentality, and I had to change in an under-18 environment. "Take the emotion out of it", he would often remind me. That’s one thing I learned quickly from him as a coach – to take the emotion out of situations and analyse them better.

His philosophy was always, "Keep calm, because you think better when you’re calm". I relay that to players all the time now. The best players can keep their emotions intact no matter what situations they play in.

We went on courses and spent a lot of time going to Premier League events during the four years I was there. Our friendship grew and I got to know a bit more about his personal life.

I don’t think it was something he shared with many. Behind those eyes, there was some sadness, I think. But then he would just flick the switch back. I remember going away to Hungary with the youth team players. We were picking the gear up after a game or a session, and then he came in the changing room and suddenly start having karaoke with the lads. He’d be up on the medical bench singing in front of them all.

At times the under-18s would do dance classes, for foot movement techniques, and he would join in. He could always laugh at himself, which is an endearing thing to have as a coach. If he made a mistake, he was always the first to say, "That’s my fault".

He never professed to know everything. But at the same time, if he was asking lads to do something out of their comfort zones, he’d show them he was willing to take part himself.

As he became older, and the EPPP system came in to academy football, he needed some support regarding the IT side, but he grew at that and became accomplished with it too. But the grass was where he wanted to be - where he enjoyed being.

I suppose he’s best known for that crop of players in the 1990s but he’s played his part with talent in more recent times as well. He’ll have been involved with most of them – people like James Trafford, Dean Henderson, Joe White. Whether recruiting or working with them, as part of his role Dave will have come across them in some sort of significant way.

With Jarrad Branthwaite, it came down to a very close call when he was 16. We had one space left in the under-18 squad, and because of his size, Jarrad was struggling to get about the park a bit. He had problems with his knees, but that was just his growth. When you watched him with a football at his feet, the ability was clear.

A few [coaches] weren’t sure but I sat with Dave one night and he said, "If you think he’s worth a chance, stand up for your principles – otherwise you’re not doing your job". That’s what I did in the meeting with the club hierarchy when we decided to go with Jarrad.

In the 1990s, he’d had to push Michael Knighton for some of the boys to get that same chance. He always said that if someone else makes the decision in the end, at least be true to yourself.

I tried to do that when I was academy manager, even though there were challenging times with certain first-team managers when it came to getting young players through.

Certain sections of the club and fanbase weren’t always appreciative or respectful enough of what he did, I felt. But he never wanted to be put on a pedestal. He was all about football, about producing young kids and giving them a chance. Under Mick, it was a case of, "If they’re good enough, let’s get them in". And look what happened.

When I moved on from Carlisle’s academy, we kept in touch and met for coffee numerous times. He would never spend any money on petrol so I had to go to him! One of his daughters worked in Dobbies, near Dalston, for a couple of years. I think he always thought he’d get a free cup of tea there so always suggested that as a meeting place – a true Yorkshireman to the end…but going there was also a chance for him to say hello to Rebecca.

I ended up at Rochdale for a bit, doing the same job that he had at Carlisle – head of academy coaching – and we would often chat about the role. We’d talk about football and life.

I think he really appreciated the fact all those lads respected him, but he’d just talk about them, not himself. It was always, "How good was Janny?" or "Hasn’t Rory done well for himself". I don’t think you’ll ever find a quote from him where he’s boasted about how much money he made for the club.

He was at Carlisle for such a long time that we always use that phrase, ‘part of the furniture’. There were people over his journey at Carlisle that tried to remove that bit of furniture, for whatever reason, rather than look at the bigger picture. More fool them.

There might have been times he could have stood up for himself more. I think he was of the opinion some people had already made their minds up, and by the same token, someone else will appreciate what you’ve done.

Football is a tough environment. Dave had a knack of accepting you as a coach, of working with you and trying to put his skill set across. He was more about analysing, and giving pointers, rather than trying to impose his way on everything.

Because he wasn’t a massive personality as such, there’d be some people asking if he was doing his job properly. But it takes all sorts of personalities to make a business work. And Dave’s record, as a crucial part of the business of football and Carlisle United, truly speaks for itself.

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NEIL ‘DOLLY’ DALTON

(Carlisle United – apprentice then long-serving head physiotherapist)

Neil Dalton was a talented apprentice player before going on to become the club's legendary, long-serving physio (Image: News & Star)

I’d been with the club since 1986/87, when Harry Gregg signed me as a schoolboy, and I first came across Wilkesy in my last year or two in the Centre of Excellence. The first thing that really came to mind was that he was a young fella as our coach. If I was 16, he must have been about 28 – still a young bloke.

He’d smashed his knee to pieces at 17 or 18 playing for Barnsley, had multiple operations and was left with a carbon fibre ligament.

But he could still play. In those days you could play three over-age players in the youth team. We didn’t carry squads of 20 back then. We would have basically 13 or 14 lads at most, and then you would supplement that on Saturday with a couple of older players.

Anybody coming back from injury would get the odd game with us. It was brilliant for us – we played with pros at 16. I remember playing with Micky Holmes, Ian Dalziel, Richie Sendall and those boys. And because we were always short, Wilkesy would often play or be sub.

He couldn’t run because of his knees, but he had some ability. He used to take the free-kicks. We should have been taking them, really – it was our job to become footballers after all – but he would end up taking them, and you could see that he would have been a smashing player if injuries hadn’t hit him when they did.

As a coach he was super enthusiastic. Dead sharp. It was never boring. In those days coaches would drill things into you time after time, but he would get involved in the sessions and would always nail the basics down.

I went from left wing to full-back as soon as I went full-time as a YTS player. You didn’t have the modern-day full-back then - people like Trent Alexander-Arnold where they’re bombing forward and more of a winger nowadays. Our job was to defend and not concede goals.

So we’d do a lot of defensive work, defensive shape. That can become quite tedious and boring, but Dave’s sessions weren’t. He had that youthfulness, that exuberance. He wasn’t an old fuddy-duddy. Our sessions were enjoyable, but you still learned the basics. It was still drilled into you.

As a bloke, he was a bit of a scholar. He might not have been the brightest of buttons academically – I can’t imagine him having eight CSEs as they were then – but he was a scholar of the game. He studied things. Sometimes he would come and say, "I’ve been reading what the Americans do in the NFL – they do a physical day on a Friday, so we’re going to do it."

Nowadays we know you don’t do too much physical stuff on the Friday so you’re in prime fitness and sharpness for the Saturday game. But he wanted to put into practice something he’d read, and so sometimes we would run on Fridays.

You’d wonder to yourself if it was right, but Dave was always wanting to be better, and wanting us to be better.

We played in the old Lancashire A League in those days. We were Carlisle United – and up against teams like Man United, Man City, Liverpoool, Everton, Wigan, Bolton, Blackburn, Burnley, Marine. God knows how Marine got in it – but it was some era.

My first year in amongst that was 1992. We played against all the big boys, all the Man U ‘Class of 92’ lads, the likes of Robbie Fowler for Liverpool.

Dave tried to be innovative with the way he did things, so we could compete. I’m pretty certain we finished third in the league one year and fourth another year. When you’re doing that against these type of teams, it’s big stuff for little old Carlisle.

As it turned out, we had so many lads in our team, and in the year or so after, who went on to make careers, either at Carlisle or much higher – from Caigy in goal, to Rory, Proky, Muzza, Tony Hopper, Lee Peacock, Will Varty, Dobes, Janny…

The amount of money some of those lads brought in…we’ll never know exactly, but it was a phenomenal amount in those days. Let’s say it’s £5m, 30 years ago…that could be circa £40-50m nowadays. You probably could have bought the club back then for £1m. And Dave was the main man for it all. He was the one that started it.

I became head physio in 1997 at 21-and-a-half. Wilkesy was still a young bloke, and you could relate to him. He was a born-again Christian when he came to Carlisle – he’d obviously found something in that respect, whatever it may have been.

He was always chatty, always a shoulder, always an ear, always happy to give advice. I’d been in football a few years by then, but I had no real experience – or life experience. When we had to retire lads through injury, Dave would always talk to them. He’d been through it and was interested in that side of it.

He was still young enough to come in the gym when folk didn’t generally come in the gym. As physio you’d be fighting to get lads in a little old cupboard in the gym with an eight-piece station of equipment. Let’s face it, it was pretty crap. But he would come and get involved in it. He would still be pushing the youth lads. He’d be in and around the place daily, just a shoulder, somebody you could lean on and ask a question.

But also, he’d have a crack with you. "Were you out at the weekend?" "Aye, I went to the Pagoda…" You didn’t have that with older coaches or managers.

His sense of humour is something I’ll always remember. He told some dad jokes that were bloody appalling. You could be having a bad day, he’d come in and tell a God-damn awful joke, and it would be that bad that you’d crack up.

He had an infectious, raucous laugh and you couldn’t help like the bloke – and, as others have said, that even goes for those who he had to let down along the way.

There will be hundreds of parents whose kids he’s released, at various ages up to 18 or 19, and I bet, deep down, they wouldn’t have a bad word about him. They might disagree with the decisions, but that’s football. There was never malice or a grudge against him. He always did what he felt was right, always expressed that, and you knew he wanted to do things in the best possible way.

When he left Carlisle, after the Jimmy Glass game [in 1999], he had six years away, doing bits with Newcastle, Huddersfield and Gretna, then he came back when Paul Simpson was at the club, in 2005. He did 27 years at the club, effectively, and we worked alongside each other for much of that time.

When, towards the end, he was head of academy coaching, we still had an involvement. I was head physio, so I’d be connected to the academy physio, and also my son was on the books until 2021, from the age of seven to 13.

Dave would always look out for a young player, however they fared. He would always be the one to make the phonecall to Gretna, or Workington, or Annan, to try and help a lad out. He always wanted kids to succeed, and always wanted them to come back and prove him wrong if he’d had to release someone.

At the end of the day, he wanted kids to go and play at whatever level it may be, earn whatever money they could, and relish the game. He took his enjoyment in that.

You don’t stay in it for that long, in that type of job, if you don’t love it. For him to be doing it later in life tells you a lot about the man. He wasn’t that interested in pushing for first team jobs, managerial jobs. His passion was youth football, in bringing kids through.

When the sad news came about his passing, I remember getting messages from so many different eras. There would be texts from the likes of Rory Delap, and Graeme Wilson, who was a YTS with us and, after being a copper for ten years in Australia, is now in private security in Perth. Likewise, I’d get messages off Paul Huntington and Jamie Devitt, current and recent players who were with him at Wembley last year.

He encompasses three decades of people, and that tells you the measure of the fella and the span of time he had at Carlisle, with different eras of footballers.

It’s very rare that you get someone who’s worked with so many, either bringing them through or having at least some meaningful input into their careers. Dave was involved in all their journeys, and that’s something quite special.

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Rest in peace, Dave (Image: News & Star)