Ian Leslie Atkins (born 16 January 1957) is an English

football manager ''Football Manager'' (also known as ''Worldwide Soccer Manager'' in North America from 2004 to 2008) is a series of football management simulation video games developed by British developer Sports Interactive and published by Sega. The game beg ...

scout Scout may refer to: Youth movement *Scout (Scouting), a child, usually 10–18 years of age, participating in the worldwide Scouting movement **Scouts (The Scout Association), section for 10-14 year olds in the United Kingdom **Scouts BSA, sectio ...

, and former

player Player may refer to: Role or adjective * Player (game), a participant in a game or sport ** Gamer, a player in video and tabletop games ** Athlete, a player in sports ** Player character, a character in a video game or role playing game who ...

. Atkins amassed over 300 appearances for

Shrewsbury Town Shrewsbury Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England. The team competes in League One, the third tier of English football. The club plays its home games at the New Meadow, having mo ...

, the club where he began his career. He also made appearances in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...

for

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...

, Everton,

Ipswich Town Ipswich Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Ipswich, Suffolk, England. They play in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. The club was founded in 1878 but did not turn profession ...

and

Birmingham City Birmingham City Football Club is a professional football club based in Birmingham, England. Formed in 1875 as Small Heath Alliance, it was renamed Small Heath in 1888, Birmingham in 1905, and Birmingham City in 1943. Since 2011, the first te ...

. His first managerial role came as

player-manager A player-coach (also playing coach, captain-coach, or player-manager) is a member of a sports team who simultaneously holds both playing and coaching duties. A player-coach may be a head coach or an assistant coach. They may make changes to the sq ...

Colchester United Colchester United Football Club is a professional association football club based in the city of Colchester, Essex, England. The team competes in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1937, the club spent its earl ...

in 1990, narrowly missing out on promotion to the Football League. He also managed

Cambridge United Cambridge United Football Club is a professional association football club based in the city of Cambridge, England. They compete in EFL League one , the 3rd tier of the English football league system. The club is based at the Abbey Stadium on Ne ...

and

Doncaster Rovers Doncaster Rovers Football Club is a professional association football club based in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England. The team compete in League Two, the fourth tier of the English football league system. The club play their home games at ...

as player-manager, and found his most notable success at

Northampton Town Northampton Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Northampton, England. The team plays in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1897, the club competed in the Midland ...

, leading the club to promotion via the play-offs in the Third Division in 1997 and finishing as play-off runners-up in the

Second Division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

final the following season. In addition, he has been manager of Chester City,

Carlisle United Carlisle United Football Club ( , ) is a professional association football club based in Carlisle, Cumbria, England. The team compete in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. They have played their home games at Brunton Par ...

Oxford United Oxford United Football Club is a professional football club in the city of Oxford, England. The team plays in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. The chairman is Grant Ferguson, the manager is Karl Robinson and t ...

Bristol Rovers Bristol Rovers Football Club are a professional football club in Bristol, England. They compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They play home matches at the Memorial Stadium in Horfield, they have been c ...

and

Torquay United Torquay United Football Club is a professional football club based in Torquay, Devon, England. The team currently compete in the , the fifth tier of English football. They have played their home matches at Plainmoor since 1921 and are nicknamed ...

Playing career

Atkins was born in the

Sheldon Sheldon may refer to: * Sheldon (name), a given name and a surname, and a list of people with the name Places Australia * Sheldon, Queensland *Sheldon Forest, New South Wales United Kingdom *Sheldon, Derbyshire, England *Sheldon, Devon, England * ...

district of

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

, where he attended

Sheldon Heath School King Edward VI Sheldon Heath Academy is a mixed secondary school and sixth form located in the Sheldon area of Birmingham, in the West Midlands of England. Previously known as Sheldon Heath School, the school gained specialist status as an A ...

. He joined

in 1973 as an apprentice and signed a professional contract in 1975. Between 1975 and 1982, he made over 300 appearances in all competitions for Shrewsbury, helping the club to two promotions; from the Fourth Division to the Third Division and from the Third Division to the

. Atkins was signed by First Division team

in 1982 in a swap-deal and an £80,000 fee going to Shrewsbury. He made his debut for the club in a 3–1 win over

European Cup The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

holders

Aston Villa Aston Villa Football Club is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club competes in the , the top tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1874, they have played at their home ground, Villa Park ...

. After two years and 77 league appearances at

Roker Park Roker Park was a football ground in Roker, Sunderland, England, which was the home of Sunderland A.F.C. from 1898 to 1997, before the club moved to the Stadium of Light. Its final capacity was around 22,500, with only a small part being seated; ...

, Atkins moved to Everton for £60,000, where he made just seven appearances, only playing a minimal role in securing the 1984–85 First Division title and

European Cup Winners' Cup The UEFA Cup Winners' Cup was a European football club competition contested annually by the winners of domestic cup competitions. The cup was, chronologically, the second seasonal inter-European club competition organised by UEFA. The tournam ...

triumph, but receiving winner's medals for both triumphs.

signed Atkins in September 1985 from Everton for a £100,000 fee, making his debut in a 1–0 away defeat to

Leicester City Leicester ( ) is a city, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city lies on the River Soar and close to the eastern end of the National ...

on 28 September. He was captain of the club during his stint with Town, making 77 league appearances, although he could not help prevent Ipswich being relegated from the First to the Second Division. Atkins joined hometown team

in March 1988, making 93 appearances and scoring six goals.

Managerial career

Atkins' managerial career began at

in 1990, signing as

from Birmingham City. The onus was on Atkins to regain immediate promotion back to

from the

Conference A conference is a meeting of two or more experts to discuss and exchange opinions or new information about a particular topic. Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always decisions, are the main p ...

, Colchester having been relegated the previous season. The club remained full-time in their first season outside the Football League since 1950, as the U's finished in second place, two points behind

Barnet Barnet may refer to: People *Barnet (surname) * Barnet (given name) Places United Kingdom *Chipping Barnet or High Barnet, commonly known as Barnet, one of three focal towns of the borough below. *East Barnet, a district of the borough below; an ...

and missing out on promotion much to the dismay of the United chairman Jonathan Crisp. Atkins made 41 league appearances for the club and scored seven goals. After leaving Colchester, Atkins returned to Birmingham City as

player-coach A player-coach (also playing coach, captain-coach, or player-manager) is a member of a sports team who simultaneously holds both playing and coaching duties. A player-coach may be a head coach or an assistant coach. They may make changes to the sq ...

, but made only eight appearances between 1991 and 1992. In December 1992, Atkins took the managers position at

, but spent just six months with the club, unable to prevent them from relegation. He returned to Sunderland as assistant manager to

Terry Butcher Terry Ian Butcher (born 28 December 1958) is an English football manager and former player. He works as an academy coach for Ipswich Town. During his playing career as a defender, Butcher captained the England national team, winning 77 caps ...

in 1993, before being sacked alongside Butcher. Atkins was approached to succeed Steve Beaglehole as manager of

in January 1994, making seven appearances as player-manager. He left in the summer of 1994 following disagreements with club owner Ken Richardson. Atkins became manager of

in January 1995 and was quick to turn around the fortunes of the fledgling club. He took Northampton to

Wembley Wembley () is a large suburbIn British English, "suburb" often refers to the secondary urban centres of a city. Wembley is not a suburb in the American sense, i.e. a single-family residential area outside of the city itself. in north-west Londo ...

twice, in the

1997 Football League Third Division play-off Final The 1997 Football League Third Division play-off Final was an association football match which was played on 24 May 1997 at Wembley Stadium, London, between Northampton Town and Swansea City to determine the fourth and final team to gain promo ...

, which Northampton won 1–0 against Swansea City to gain promotion to the Second Division, and the 1998 Football League Second Division play-off Final, which the team lost to

Grimsby Town Grimsby Town Football Club is a professional football club based in Cleethorpes, North East Lincolnshire, England, that in the 2022–23 season will compete in , the fourth tier of the English football league system, following the victory in ...

1–0. The following season, Northampton were relegated back to the Third Division, and Atkins departed in October 1999. His next challenge was at Chester City, joining as manager in January 2000 but by the end of May 2000, with Chester relegated from the Football League, he severed his ties with the club. In June 2000, Atkins was appointed manager at

. Despite leading the Cumbrian side to safety from relegation in Division Three, Atkins was threatened with being sacked by owner

Michael Knighton Michael Knighton (born 4 October 1951) is an English businessman, best known for his involvement in Manchester United and Carlisle United football clubs. Knighton first came to prominence in 1989 for his aborted £20 million bid to buy Manc ...

. Atkins left Carlisle to become assistant manager to

Alan Cork Alan Graham Cork (born 4 March 1959) is an English former professional footballer. He played as a striker for several clubs, most notably Wimbledon (where he spent 14 years, played in all four divisions of the Football League and gained an FA C ...

at Cardiff City in July 2001, but was sacked in October. Soon after, he took over from Mark Wright as director of football at

, and was appointed manager in April 2002. 2001–02 was Oxford's first season in the bottom division of the Football League for over 30 years, and they finished a record low 21st place in the final table. Atkins rebuilt the team during the 2002 close season and the new-look squad looked capable of achieving a far higher position in the coming season. Oxford United occupied the automatic promotion and playoff places in Division Three for much of the 2002–03 season, but a slight dip in form during the final weeks of the season saw them finish eighth in the final table—one place short of the playoffs. A lively start to the 2003–04 season saw Oxford United leading the Division Three table at Christmas with just one defeat in over 20 fixtures. Atkins was suspended in March 2004 and then dismissed the following month for talking to

about the possibility of taking over as manager, which he subsequently did. Atkins was at Bristol Rovers for just over a year, and he was sacked after a disappointing start to the 2005–06 season. He returned to management in April 2006 when tasked with the seemingly impossible task of keeping

in the Football League, after joining the club as an advisor to

John Cornforth Sir John Warcup Cornforth Jr., (7 September 1917 – 8 December 2013) was an AustralianBritish chemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1975 for his work on the stereochemistry of enzyme-catalysed reactions, becoming the only Nobel l ...

the previous month. However, a run of four straight wins and a draw on the last day of the season lifted Torquay out of the relegation zone, and then Atkins was appointed manager for the following season. However, on 27 November 2006, Atkins was replaced as manager by

Czech international The Czech Open in badminton is an international open held in the Czech Republic since 1993. This tournament followed the Czechoslovakian Open and is often used by European, in particular Danish, new generation talents as jump board into the Europea ...

star

Luboš Kubík Luboš Kubík (born 20 January 1964) is a Czech former professional footballer and former manager of Torquay United, who played libero for the Czechoslovakia and Czech Republic national teams, winning 56 caps in total, and a number of notable c ...

. Atkins was offered the role of Director of Football, but turned it down. Since leaving Torquay, Atkins went on to work as a recruitment officer throughout Europe for

, including scout work for a number of other clubs, and joined

BBC Radio Suffolk BBC Radio Suffolk is the BBC's local radio station serving the county of Suffolk. It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios on St Matthews Street in Ipswich. According to RAJAR, the station has a weekly audience ...

as a summariser for their coverage of Ipswich Town games for the 2009–10 season. He spent four years as head of recruitment at Everton before taking on the role of head of European recruitment at

in 2016. As of August 2019 he is currently a scout at

Wolverhampton Wanderers Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club (), commonly known as Wolves, is a professional football club based in Wolverhampton, England, which compete in the . The club has played at Molineux Stadium since moving from Dudley Road in 1889. The club's ...

Managerial statistics

:''All statistics referenced by:''

References

Honours

Player Shrewsbury Town *

Welsh Cup The FAW Welsh Cup ( cy, Cwpan Cymdeithas Pêl-droed Cymru), currently known as the JD Welsh Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a knock-out football competition contested annually by teams in the Welsh football league system. It is considered the most ...

: 1976–77, 1978–79 *

Division Three The Football League Third Division was the third tier of the English football league system in 1920–21 and again from 1958 until 1992. When the FA Premier League was formed, the division become the fourth tier level. In 2004, following the fo ...

: 1978–79 *

Division Four The Football League Fourth Division was the fourth-highest division in the English football league system from the 1958–59 season until the creation of the Premier League prior to the 1992–93 season. Whilst the division disappeared in name ...

promotion: 1974–75 Everton *

: 1984–85 *

Division One The Football League First Division was a division of the Football League in England from 1888 until 2004. It was the top division in the English football league system from the season 1888–89 until 1991–92, a century in which the First ...

: 1984–85 *

FA Charity Shield The Football Association Community Shield (formerly the Charity Shield) is English football's annual match contested at Wembley Stadium between the champions of the previous Premier League season and the holders of the FA Cup. If the Premier Le ...

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a ...

Birmingham City *

promotion: 1991–92 Manager Northampton Town * Third Division play-offs: 1996–97 Individual * League Two Manager of the Month: April 2006

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Atkins, Ian 1957 births Living people People from Sheldon Footballers from Birmingham, West Midlands English footballers Association football defenders Association football midfielders Association football utility players Shrewsbury Town F.C. players Sunderland A.F.C. players Everton F.C. players Ipswich Town F.C. players Birmingham City F.C. players Colchester United F.C. players Cambridge United F.C. players Doncaster Rovers F.C. players English Football League players National League (English football) players English football managers Colchester United F.C. managers Cambridge United F.C. managers Doncaster Rovers F.C. managers Northampton Town F.C. managers Chester City F.C. managers Carlisle United F.C. managers Oxford United F.C. managers Bristol Rovers F.C. managers Torquay United F.C. managers National League (English football) managers English Football League managers Birmingham City F.C. non-playing staff Cardiff City F.C. non-playing staff Sunderland A.F.C. non-playing staff Everton F.C. non-playing staff Aston Villa F.C. non-playing staff