Being Steve Evans

It’s April 2022. Stevenage FC are languishing in the fourth tier of English football, mired in 22^nd place, destined for the relegation trapdoor which will cast them out into the non-league wilderness, with a return to the promised plains of professional football doubtful any time soon. 

Steve Evans, a tough, Glasgow-born football manager, is holding post-match court following defeat in his first match along the muddy touchline of Stevenage’s Broadhall Way ground.

Evans’ side have just been beaten 1–0 by soon-to-be relegated Oldham Athletic, then led by former Nottingham Forest midfielder John Sheridan. A man so dour, he was once told by Brian Clough to ‘cheer up’. 

With the waiting press, including myself, anticipating his first post-match debrief, Evans, with a glint in his eye as bright as the reflection of the spring sunshine from his glistening Rolex, licks his lips quickly, before saying, with as much gravitas as Moses coming back from the mount: “John Sheridan and his team came here with balaclavas,” pausing for dramatic effect before adding: “And stole our three points.” 

It was a sign of things to come with Evans. During his wildly successful period as manager of Stevenage, a North Hertfordshire club not founded until 1976, there would never be a dull moment.

It’s a sentiment that the eight different clubs Evans has managed during a controversy-stricken career would echo. There was a spell at Boston United, where he narrowly avoided becoming the first Football League manager to be jailed after becoming embroiled in the club’s tax irregularities, a stint at Crawely shortly after, where he smashed the then-record fifth-tier points total and infamous tenures in charge of Leeds, Peterborough and Mansfield—the latter of which ended with Evans claiming he was going to go and work in China.