Former Barnsley FC defender Luke Potter had ‘500 per cent’ support from the Athersley Rec committee even before his lowly side shocked high-flying hosts Barton Town 2-1 in the Premier Division on Saturday.
Rec had lost ten of their first 11 matches of the season but general manager Pete Goodlad insists the club never considered sacking manager Potter as they did a year ago with his predecessor Wayne Thompson.
Potter, whose career was cut short by injury, made 21 appearances for his hometown club Barnsley, where he works as an academy coach alongside a job in the railway industry. Rec are third-bottom with six points from nine games.
Goodlad said: “It’s been a hard slog for Luke and, at times, he’s come to us distraught, but we think he’s done brilliantly and we’re 500 per cent behind him. He built a great squad in the summer then he lost six players in five days, including the whole back four, a week before the season started because other clubs offered them more money. Any club would struggle after that and it’s just the nature of our situation as a club with a much lower budget in a league of big-spenders.
“There’s never been any panic. It’s not like last season, we know we’ve got the right man and we see the big picture. We want Luke to be our manager for many years to come. The atmosphere is very good, the training sessions are excellent and he has the full backing of the fans and the players. Even if we went down, we would stick with him but I am confident we will stay up this season.”
Athersley travelled to Barton on Saturday. Jamie Moxon put Rec ahead in the 70th minute then Kyle Wordsworth made it 2-0 in injury-time. Barton pulled one back but were beaten.
Goodlad said: “Other clubs have been telling us Barton are the best team they have played this season so to go there and win is fantastic. It was back to the typical Rec ‘roll your sleeves up and grind out a result’ performance.”
