May 22nd 2001
The summer of 2001 was a bit of a crazy one to support Yeovil Town.
A short crawl through the Ciderspace archives reveal that we lost Colin Addison as Manager with the relationship between him and Chairman John Fry… how can we say, politely?… strained.
We apparently tried to get Harry Redknapp and Tony Pulis as manager – but those rumours were quickly rebuffed, whilst Steve Claridge was also on the radar for the Huish Park hotseat(can you imagine!?).
Warren Patmore left, so did a whole host of others, presumbaly unhappy at the situation of the club, but the most shocking revalation came on this day in that most fascinating of summers.
Terry Skiverton handed in a transfer request.
Yes, really… the greatest captain Yeovil Town had seen in many a generation was on the verge of leaving Huish Park after just a short stint in Somerset.
Ciderspace captured his words from the Clarion publication;
“I’m 25 years old now and I would like to see if any league club’s think I’m good enough to do a job for them. I’ve asked the club to circulate my name but they have told me they want me to stay to lead Yeovil into the third division next season. The trouble is that if Yeovil fail again then that will be another year gone by. I’m also not that happy with my contract, after all I’m the club skipper and an England international but I don’t feel my contract reflects this.”
It was reported that the club had asked Skivo to wait for the appointment of a new manager before deciding his future.
Skivo never did leave (thank god!), instead he would team up with new manager, Gary Johnson to win the FA Trophy… and the Conference title… and League Two… and then play a major part in his backroom staff as the Glovers would get promoted to the Championship. Not a bad combo really.