Keyte Becomes Chairman Of Hereford United

Below is a transcript of the first part of four from David Keyte's 2020 interview with Matt Healey for Your Herefordshire. The former Hereford United chairman has given his version of events leading upto him being in charge of the club.

What made you decide to become chairman of Hereford United back in 2010?

"Well let me start by saying I'm happy to have a chat to you after all this time. It's frightening how the time is going.

"I'm happy to answer all your questions but don't be surprised if it counters an awful lot that the people of Hereford have been reading on social media in these past five or six years, a lot of which I've made no comment about before. All I can give you is the true story as we experienced in our four years there. 

"The reason I got involved in the first place is that a) it's my home town, home town football club, supported it since I went with my dad in 1964. Later on I was lucky enough to play as a schoolboy in the reserves about 40 times, Colin Addison was manager, people like Wilf Grant and Bobby Wynn looked after us.So it was almost engrained, if you like. 

"When I picked up a newspaper, the Hereford Times, and it said the Bulls were up for sale, by then I had moved on, moved away from Hereford as well, and managed to have a little bit of success in business and thought I might look into that. So I did make an enquiry of Graham and Joan Fennessey, went across and met them. Hereford being Hereford the first person I dropped into was an old school mate Dave Benjamin, Benjamin the fish, in Church Street and had a chat to him. He said if you've got any money you should put it into the rugby club. And then walking from there into the football club I bumped into Richard Prime so you knew straight away that you're not going to get away with anything on the quiet in Hereford.

"I spoke to Graham and I felt I can't value it in the same way as they were hoping to receive so I left it and then a short time later I had a call from Joan Fennessey to say that somebody else was interested and that turned out to be a chap called Tim Russon who I didn't know but we got together and had a chat. We felt that sharing the cost of it we could go in and give it a go. So that's how it started."

How did you get on with Tim at the start?

"Tim was very pleasant, very positive TV journalist, talked a lot about football. He felt he could get into the communications, marketing side of it. Looking at research told us that the football club was a bit distant from the community to say the least at that time and maybe Graham was living in that pure football world, not least because it was hand to mouth and if that didn't work it was looking very difficult. 

"We thought we could approach it almost like off the field, take the club to the Hereford community as well as recognising the importance of on the field results. And that's how we intended to go into it."

Simon Davey was your first manager, what made him the stand out candidate?

"Graham was very helpful in the chats that we had and in this regard he had a file of about thirty candidates who had applied for the job, I think it would take you back to  John Trewick being sacked, March time towards the end of that season in 2010. Of course Graham stepped in to make sure they stayed up. So he had a folder of applicants and he said the best one in there after sifting through it himself was Simon Davey. But you won't get him because he's gone to Darlington.

"So we spoke to a few other people in the next week or two. And through a different route, Tim was quite pally with Steve Coterill who had been manager at Cheltenham, Tim was reporting over there, and he was at Notts County. And this chap called Simon Davey had been asking about a couple of players and in the conversation that he basically relayed to Tim was that Davey said he would walk to Hereford for the job. So I managed to make contact with him and established he was actually under contract at Darlington which was seven days notice either way. That was because they had had a big pay-off to a chap called Steve Staunton who had been manager there and it had cost a lot to make the change.

"Simon said he goes to the United States every summer for a six week coaching committment that he had, that they had honoured. Basically we worked something out that he would resign from Darlington while he was away on this coaching course and was available to a new club on his return to the UK. That's how it worked. And the Darlington chairman at the time, can't remember his name, gave me allsorts of grief in the press. But he gave seven days notice and was available."

The Darlington chairman was called Raj Singh so that was kind of your first introduction into how controversial football could be? 

"Yes, yes, I guess so. You would be a bit naive to think everything is above board and to the letter of the law."

Davey's first game was at Crewe. We win 1-0. The second game we played Gillingham and drew 0-0. So four points out of six games and so not a bad start but then it went wrong. What do you think went wrong in those remaining eight games that he had? 

"I think to be fair to Simon we have to go back to the fact that Tim Russon and I got involved on the 4th of June. Pre-season training was set for the 1st of July. Graham had moved on and we had four players plus young Tyler Weir. I personally, without a manager, contacted Kenny Lunt and Ryan Green. I caught Ryan just before he was going to top-up his tan in Portugal and they signed so the new manager walked into six players plus Weir and Simon started probably not much more than a week before pre-season.

"So when you read about managers feeling you need two or three transfer windows to get to grips with your squad, he did remarkably well to get us up and running for when we went up to Crewe for the first game. I remember we took about 900, I think it was 905 supporters went to Crewe and you had the sense of a new beginning for Hereford United. And better still we managed to pinch a 1-0 win. In terms of introductions to football I asked their chairman could I put out a tannoy thank you to the travelling support and he said I've been doing this for about 25 years and I've never had that requested before. So that shows how green I was. But the tannoy went out thanking the travelling support. I don't know if anyone heard it. Then Simon Davey told me that was the first time he had ever won the first game of the season in his whole career.

"But next game we were home to Gillingham and they were favourites to get promoted. I've got to say I was disappointed that we didn't quite get 3,000 in the crowd. May be that was a tell-tale sign looking back but we got a 0-0. It was August, the window was open, there were a few players coming in, chopping and changing, and the first ten games we won one, drawn two and lost seven and we were bottom with five points.

"It was not what we wanted to do, not what we came in to do. And the game at Burton yet another system and O'Neil Thompson played in the middle of the back three and Burton pulled us apart there so we did have conversations in the boardroom. My personal view was that I wanted to continue with Simon, I got on with him. Tim, I'm probably talking out of turn here, but I don't think Tim and maybe Grenville had quite got on with the chap and I lost the vote 2-1 to dismiss him.  But when you look back a young chap called Colin Addison got us into the Football League back in 1972 and his first games were identical. Won one, drew two and lost seven and he got out and out a bloke called Eric Redrobe and took off. So who knows.

"Quite recently Newport County were adrift at the bottom of the Football League and  I think it was Mick Flynn who went in and they stayed up. So you can't tell. Ten games, 42/46 matches it's a long way to go. But we made that decision, Simon Davey left us after ten games"

With Simon Davey and Andy Fensome's pay-offs, did you have to pay-off, I think they were on two year contracts, them in full or was there an early settlement clause?

"The whole thing about management contracts, player contracts, was a key paragraph, I would have said, was what is the settlement. I'm sure ordinary people looking on the outside, we all think well he's just signed a five year contract and he's gone to another club next year. I'm not saying it's not worth the paper it's written on but the key paragraph is what is your agreed position for settlement and that might be, as it was, six months pay when you've got a two year contract. As I said earlier he' had signed a contract which said seven days at Darlington so if he been sacked there he would have had seven days pay.

"You hear on TV that Mourinio had signed a five year contract but the world of football doesn't seem to follow the contractual situation very closely. If they want a move, they move. Players, agents etc, there's a way of settling things and moving on."

So there was a settlement with Simon?

"Yes, you've got to settle and they pushed as hard as they could and we ended out having to agree a figure and settle for six months."

So you had to pay Simon a six month settlement, the crowds had dropped. Stevenage I think was 1400 and we lost 4-1. So that money is not coming in. You then go to Jamie Pitman who was the physio and he did turn things around briefly? 

"Initially we had a game the very next night, I think a League Cup match against Exeter City, so it was a matter of can you just hold the fort tomorrow Jamie. Russell Hoult was in the background with him and we lost that match I think. But we set off and just wanted a bit of stability again. The thinking was, I think we were in October by then, let's have a look again around Christmas and see how it is going.

"He was a young lad with no experience, Hereford background but we had to see how it goes. We progressed, we were picking up points and the season just unfolded and there was no desparate need to change we felt. And in the context of that is that we got up to about fourth/fifth bottom with a six or seven point cushion. Not comfortable but then later in that season because of lack of experience in the office, lack of experience in the boardroom, we end up getting a three point penalty for quite a bizarre transfer window issue involving Rob Purdie.

"We were playing a game down at Torquay on a Tuesday night and the transfer deadline ended on the Monday and the standard transfer deadline was 2.30pm. You had to get your fax off to the FA by 2.30pm and what we learnt to our three points cost was that the exception to that is if you are taking on a player currently on loan and transferring his contract into a full contract with the club, the deadline is 12.30pm. I didn't know that and the office obviously didn't know that and we got our stuff in in time for 2-30pm but we were in the dock for not sending the paperwork in on time. Rob Purdie had been with us for about three months by then, it was Oldham he came from, and we were just confirming that we had agreed with Oldham he had joined us. We were right back in a relegation threat because of that."

How did that mistake come out? Was it something the FA pointed out to you afterwards?

"Yes I'm pretty sure it would have been. And in actual fact within a month or two that was taken out of the rules and they came up with a single time deadline on transfer day so it probably gave them the opportunity that it was a bit unrealistic. But it was in the book of rules and it should have been picked up."

Lennie Lawrence was at the club for six or seven weeks. He seemed to be a positive influence but then he went to Crystal Palace.

"We had taken Jamie Pitman on and we felt, he ultimately agreed although I don't think he felt he needed it, an older hand in the background to advise would be a good move. Lennie Lawrence was available and he came in, it was probably about December by then, I remember meeting him at Wycombe. We played down there and we sat together in the stand and chatted and we managed to get back Mathieu Manset who scored with about eight minutes to go to get it to 1-1. 

You could physically see them relax because job done. As you here now on the wonderful Hereford FC radio commentary it's about football management and game management and you should be able to hang on to a 1-1 for the last eight minutes. But we lost 2-1 because we kept flying forward or whatever.

"So that was the meeting with Lennie Lawrence and he came here. He was very good. It was a bad winter, we couldn't get on the pitch. We went to Ludlow and I remember him saying it was probably the best surface that he had actually coached on at Ludlow. He was enjoying himself. The only thing he could do with was a car so I bought a black BMW from Phil Powell's car-lot and he loved it. Even though he moved on, he teamed up again with Douggie Freeman. He rang me, he didn't know how to start, he was very apologetic but he said he had had this offer financially at a level that we wre nowhere near and it was 20 minutes from his back door. He said I've really got to take it. He hadn't come in and signed a contract or anything like that, he had come in to help us or help the manager. So we parted company on good terms and he paid me for his black BMW over the next nine months."

We had a good FA Cup run that season, Sheffield Wednesday in the fourth round. What do you remember from that run?

"It didn't have the glamour of any big clubs. We played Hyde, we played Lincoln at home and got a draw and we went up there and Stuart Fleetwood and Mathieu Manset were scoring a lot of goals at the turn of the year and we won 4-3 up there. We went to Wycombe and pinched another win there. That was a Tueday night for some reason. So there was no glamour of a Ronnie Radford run but we had a great trip up to Sheffield Wednesday. We took about 2,500 people up there I think and we pinched the first goal. But it wasn't to be, we were over-run in the end 4-1."

We managed to stay up that season, we drew with Bradford 1-1 in the penultimate game, Stuart Fleetwood with a free kick. How you do assess your first season as chairman?

"A roller-coaster, whirlwind. We didn't expect to be going into it having to sack a manager, delighted to have an FA Cup run which is what Hereford United was all about in many ways. The sillyness of the admin thing, three points, put us back into danger and I suppose relief at the end  that we had got through it and were still in League Two. The whole financial plan was predicated on a belief that we wre a League Two club with the funding football league clubs get compared to non-league. Yes, job done in the end.

"But fairly swiftly in football it's onto the next season. We made a decision that Jamie Pitman had come through it and we extended the contract for him to carry on. And them we started the second season, we had the identical start in the first ten games, we won one, drawn two and lost seven. The second season was not positive and obviously the conclusion was relegation It was not positive from boardroom through to management in many respects. I must admit that on the same start as Simon Davey had, we ought to have been looking at the management. But for some reason in discussions everything seemed to be okay. 

"On a personal front I wasn't so close to the club. Just for the record my wife Lorraine had had kidney failure and so my appearances were a little bit in and out. I remember she was in hospital one weekend and I missed Gillingham at home game and we lost 6-1. Yet on the Monday it was described as a game in which they had seven chances and scored six and we had seven chances and scored one. Could have gone either way. But I was a little bit conscious that we ought to be thinking of where are we going. An identical start to the previous season. That probably was the main cause of not working so closely in the boardroom. We managed to extend the board from three people to five around October time and I can remember in October we again decided that the manager needed more expeience above him and we apponted Gary Peters. 

"I liked Gary Peters. I think he had a passion for football and a work ethic that Jamie Pitman probably didn't have as a manager. I'll give you a description where Gary Peters would probably go out and watch two or three matches a week, evening matchs, I can remember him sleeping in the manager's office on the settee to save driving to North Shropshire where he lived to come back the next day wheras young Jamie had to go and pick his children up at 3pm from school. That experienced head in the football world, he was a Graham Turner like experience.

"We went to Swindon Town one day and Harry Pell scored a header and we got a 3-3 draw late on. When the whistle went I've got this image of Gary Peters running down this cynder track like a young kid in front of the 200 or so Hereford supporters and Jamie was just ready to go down the tunnel. And I just thought yes that's what we need. But I lost that vote 3-2 in the boardroom. The two people who cam on board at that point were Dave Preedy who was Hereford United through and through and Nic Nemaditch who had been on the committee of the Vice-Presidents. Difficult for Dave Preedy, it may have been his first or second board meeting and I'm saying I think we should make a change, Dave was godfather to Jamie's two children. Very difficult for him to not support him. So I lost that 3-2.

"Then there was a bit of a dividing of the ways between Gary Peters and Jamie Pitman. Jamie was difficult to advise, give advice to. I did speak to Gary Peters at Christmas. We went to Saxty's in Widemarsh Street for a drink and a meal with the people in the office and I spoke to Gary and I said how do you think it is going you tell me when the right time is, I've got my views, and at the time, and we've spoken since and he regrets it, his first job was to look after the manager. He said he's doing okay.

"I would have put Gary Peters in as manager and I think we would have avoided relegation. In his view we didn't have the players to play football. It dragged on too far with hindsight. We went to Gillingham in February. We went 2-0 up in no time with Barkhuisen scoring, back to 2-2 by half time. We went 4-2 ahead with ten minutes left. Gary was sat up with me. He had a system where he would call the dug-out. I remember him saying there were 17 missed calls where he was just ignored. 4-2 play it out, game management. As we know they came back, Purdie missed a penalty and we were down 5-4. The trip back on the coach that night I didn't have to push the discussion much further and we met the next day. So with only about twelve matches left I managed to make contact with Richard O'Kelly who had done a great job at Hereford in years gone by and he did come in and help us out.

"Despite starting to turn the players, turn the results, it was just last day, too little too late.”