History
THE RAINWORTH MINERS’ WELFARE STORY
By Gordon Foster
OPTIMISM ABOUNDS AS KEVIN GEE ERA BEGINS IN EARNEST
IT will be very much a new look Rainworth Miners’ Welfare who take the field for the 2012-13 Evo-Stik NPL Division One South season.
Optimism is high of a much better season after two successive struggles against relegation since the Wrens became the first Miners’ Welfare club to achieve Step 4 status in 2010.
With the club’s former chairman Derek Blow and commercial manager Steve Peat having sought pastures new at near neighbours Hucknall Town during the close season, the Wrens have been busy seeking new funding avenues to enable the club to remain competitive at this level – and none more so than manager Kevin Gee who has drawn on his experience of having been operations manager at Glapwell.
In his capacity as manager Gee will have had the luxury of his own pre-season preparations this season, enabling him to do things his own way for the first time since joining, as manager, the club where he began his playing career during his teenage years.
Rainworth had begun the latest chapter in their history in November 2011 with the appointment of Gee, replacing Lee Wilkinson and Billy Millar who had run the show for a year, although Wilkinson remained with the club as Gee’s assistant until the end of last season when pressure of work forced his resignation.
The change came about after, having won their first two games of that campaign, Rainworth managed just one win in their next 17 and found themselves back in a relegation scrap.
November and December 2010 had marked the end of one era at Rainworth MWFC, when manager Rudy Funk resigned and was replaced in the Kirklington Road hot seat by his number two Millar. He in turn appointed club captain Wilkinson as his assistant, and the pair became joint managers during March.
At the time of Funk’s departure the Wrens were in the middle of their first ever season as a Step 4 club in the Evo-Stik League Division One South. Funk had led the club from the bottom of the Step 7 Central Midlands League Supreme Division to the Evo-Stik League winning three promotions in four years so, although they were finding it hard going and had lost nine successive matches, the manager’s situation was not in jeopardy and his announcement was a bolt from the blue. It was a sad end to a great era, but life went on, and between them Billy and Lee set about a massive repair job. At the time the Wrens looked deep in relegation trouble, but so much did the tide turn under the new management that, although they only finished one place above the relegation zone, there was a 19-point gap over next to bottom Shepshed Dynamo by the end of the season. And, for good measure, the club won the Fair Play award for Division One South.
Unfortunately hopes that that improvement could be carried into the next campaign were unfulfilled. Indeed, between Gee’s appointment and his first match in charge the club slumped to the bottom of Division One South. Gee had been given just one task to fulfil – to avoid relegation. Although the club still struggled to score goals mathematical safety was achieved by the end of March, thanks largely to the best defensive record in the division outside the top three. The previous season’s league placing was bettered by one, and 14 points parted the club from the bottom two.
OUT OF THE SHADOWS WITH FUNK AND MILLAR
In the five seasons leading up to promotion to the Northern Premier League, Funk and Millar had brought about a revolution at the club with those three promotions, to lift the Wrens to their highest ever level of competitive football, making them the first Miners’ Welfare club in the country to achieve Step 4 status, and finally bringing the club out of the shadow of their previous most memorable season in 1981-82 when they won three trophies and reached the FA Vase final at Wembley.
While that was a tremendous achievement, more of which below, it had hung over everything the club had done ever since, over what every manager has striven to achieve, and over every team that has worn the Rainworth colours and had to stand comparison with those great days ... until 2005.
Rudy and Billy arrived during that summer when the club was at a very low ebb. Previous manager, former Mansfield Town favourite Sandy Pate, had led the club from the Notts Alliance into the Central Midlands Premier Division and then won promotion to the Supreme Division in third place at the first attempt.
But midway through that first season in the Supreme Division the club was devastated by the sudden and unexpected death of highly-rated coach Mark Hallas. It was a blow from which they could not recover, they plummeted down the table, and finished in a relegation position - the only time in the club’s history that this had ever happened. Fortunately for Rainworth the failure of other clubs to meet the floodlighting deadline meant that they were reprieved and preserved their Supreme Division place.
A brand new start was desperately needed. Sandy, broken-hearted, stood down from the club he had come to love, and Rudy - a former coach at Rainworth during his predecessor’s period in charge - returned as manager vowing to turn the club around and ultimately bring what was then UniBond League football to Kirklington Road—a promise he fulfilled before his shock resignation.
In their first season Rudy and Billy steadied the ship and achieved ninth place, before going for and winning promotion to the NCEL Division One the following year, finishing third behind Bottesford Town and Barton Town - all three made the step up, fully 12 points clear of the rest of the pack.
A successful first season in the NCEL saw the Wrens finally finish fourth, falling away slightly at the death, largely as a result of an horrendous injury list, after looking likely promotion contenders for most of the campaign. That season also marked the first year back in the FA Cup for over half a century, and they reached the penultimate qualifying stage before very unluckily bowing out at then Southern League Chasetown - who went all the way to the third round proper and lost to eventual finalists Cardiff City.
Missing out at the end of that season made the management all the more determined to go one better next time around, and they won promotion as runners-up to runaway champions Scarborough Athletic - who had risen out of the ashes of the former Football League club and, ironically, where Funk is now manager.
Rudy boldly proclaimed prior to the start of the next season, the club’s first in the NCEL Premier Division, that Rainworth were not in the division just to make up the numbers and, after a slightly uncertain start, they embarked on a club record breaking 16 successive league wins which saw them top the league.
Unfortunately, with the league record of 21 straight wins held by Guiseley in sight, they then hit an indifferent spell and played 10 games in all competitions without a win, before ending the season with another run of seven victories on the bounce to claim runners-up spot behind Bridlington Town.
There was only one promotion place, but Brid, who finished the season 11 points clear after that sticky patch, declined it because of the expense of travelling, so Rainworth gratefully accepted promotion instead.
WEMBLEY AND THE EARLIER HISTORY
Rufford Colliery FC, as they were styled until the 1970s, were founded in 1922, but it was not until 1976 that they really began to take off with the arrival of Brian Phillips, the former Middlesbrough and Mansfield Town centre half, as manager. Phillips succeeded the club’s first ever manager, Tony Porter, whose appointment made Rainworth the first Notts Alliance club to take this step, although it was a move which other clubs in the league soon copied.
Phillips, whose death at the age of 80 was mourned by the club during the close season, led the side to runners-up spot in 1976, and then followed six successive league championships. They also enjoyed consistent success in the League Cup, and won the Notts Senior Cup twice.
The League, League Cup and Senior Cup were all won in 1982, but the icing on the cake came in the FA Vase. It was only the third time the club had entered the national competition, but they went all the way to the Wembley final before losing 3-0 to Forest Green Rovers - who now play at the highest level of non-League. A crowd officially returned as 12,500 (many still believe this was woefully understated) at Wembley included 10,000 who made the journey down from Nottinghamshire, and although in the end they could not lift the Vase itself they did have the honour of being only the second true amateur club, paying subs to play, and the only Miners’ Welfare team, ever to grace the final.
And the spirit of non-League football was epitomised when Rovers manager Bob Mursell handed the Vase to Phillips and told him to go and show it to the magnificent Rainworth following.
The home leg of the semi-final was, in its own way, even more memorable than Wembley itself. After a goalless first leg draw at former finalists Barton Rovers, Dave Hallam popped in two goals in the home leg to give the side a 2-1 victory before a crowd of 5,071, which remains a competition record outside the final to this day.
The 1980s saw Rainworth, with a young Kevin Gee now in the side, reach the last 16 of the Vase on three more occasions, plus further appearances in the Notts Senior Cup final, but after 1983 it was not until 1991 that silverware again graced the trophy cupboard in the form of the Notts Alliance championship, as Rainworth became the club everyone wanted to beat.
As stated above, successive managers had to work in the shadow of that great side. They included former Bolton, Burnley, Birmingham, Oxford and Mansfield forward Neil Whatmore, John Slater - himself a member of that 1982 team - who after leading Clipstone Welfare to three successive titles made it a nap hand by winning the next two as Rainworth manager - and another former Mansfield player, Gary Saxby. In between, Brian Phillips also had another spell in charge aided by Mick Gould and John Wallhead, whose contacts brought a number of new and fondly remembered players to the club.
The arrival of Sandy Pate heralded the dawn of the 21st century, and although his first season in charge saw the club down to 10th place - the lowest position for at least 20 years - the up side of the story was the number of promising youngsters he brought to the club to replace the aging old guard. The following season those young players, aided by a touch of experience, came of age and mounted a serious title challenge before finishing second.
In their final Alliance season before joining the Central Midlands League they finished fifth, and reached the League Cup semi-final before bowing out to eventual champions Radcliffe Olympic.
By this time many of the established Notts Alliance clubs had seen greener grass in the Central Midlands League, and while Rainworth remained faithful to the Alliance which had served them so well for so long, the loss of so many of their traditional rivals to the CML made it perhaps inevitable that they should ultimately follow suit.
THE KIRKLINGTON ROAD STADIUM
At the time of the Wembley season there was no covered accommodation at Rainworth, and the main pitch was merely roped off.
Looking at the ground now it is hard to visualise how such a vast crowd could have been accommodated for that Vase semi-final, but in those days there were huge banks behind the Kirklington Road goal and on the allotments side - which included some rudimentary railway sleeper terracing—and ‘Health and Safety’ was not such a big issue then as it is nowadays.
The ground was essentially three sided, with a cricket square and a second pitch with training lights opposite. Eventually, in 1991, floodlights were put in - the club had a reputation as trail-blazers, having already been the first Notts Alliance club to appoint a manager, enter the Vase, and the joint first to begin producing a matchday programme, and now they were the first to instal lights. New FA Vase requirements meant that covered accommodation was needed so the small stand on the allotments side was put in, at a stroke cutting the ground capacity, and this eventually included seating.
When application was made to join the NCEL a number of grading issues were raised, not least the need for new dressing rooms adjacent to the pitch to replace those which stood some 25 yards away, and enclosure of the main arena which was made possible by the removal of cricket. All this was completed, along with a brand new seated stand, hard standing all around the pitch, a new pitch barrier acquired from Nuneaton Borough’s old ground, turnstiles, hospitality suites, tea bar, manager’s office, and press room. Few visitors to Rainworth fail to compliment the club on their excellent facilities. The old dressing rooms and second pitch continue in use by Sunday and youth sides, while the new dressing rooms are of Conference standard. Capacity is 2,201 with 211 seats (the seating capacity was cut to 159 from 221 at the end of last season when the 62 seats in the Allotments Side stand were removed at the behest of the ground graders to provide more covered standing space. Since then 52 of those seats have been re-installed in a small new stand, still to be covered, adjacent to the pavilion at the Kirklington Road end of the ground ).
THE VILLAGE
Rainworth is a large and growing village some four miles to the south-east of Mansfield in the heart of Robin Hood country. A former hamlet, it grew with the mining industry when Rufford Colliery was sunk, and the population rose to some 9,000. With the closure of the colliery in 1993 the place has become something of a ‘dormitory’ for Mansfield and Nottingham. Apart from the exploits of its football club the village’s main claim to fame is probably as the place where the notorious mass murderer ‘The Black Panther’ was heroically captured and arrested. The popular local pronunciation of the village name is ‘Rennoth’, giving rise to the club’s nickname of ‘The Wrens’.
ALAN WRIGHT - A RAINWORTH LEGEND
No history of Rainworth MWFC could ever be complete without mentioning the immense contribution made over countless years by the late Alan Wright, who served as goalkeeper, committee member, groundsman and secretary (taking over that position just in time to mastermind the administration of that amazing 1981-82 season) as well as being chairman of the Notts Alliance until he sadly died in 2002, and to whose memory and lifetime of service the wrought iron gates at the ground entrance are dedicated.
By Gordon Foster
OPTIMISM ABOUNDS AS KEVIN GEE ERA BEGINS IN EARNEST
IT will be very much a new look Rainworth Miners’ Welfare who take the field for the 2012-13 Evo-Stik NPL Division One South season.
Optimism is high of a much better season after two successive struggles against relegation since the Wrens became the first Miners’ Welfare club to achieve Step 4 status in 2010.
With the club’s former chairman Derek Blow and commercial manager Steve Peat having sought pastures new at near neighbours Hucknall Town during the close season, the Wrens have been busy seeking new funding avenues to enable the club to remain competitive at this level – and none more so than manager Kevin Gee who has drawn on his experience of having been operations manager at Glapwell.
In his capacity as manager Gee will have had the luxury of his own pre-season preparations this season, enabling him to do things his own way for the first time since joining, as manager, the club where he began his playing career during his teenage years.
Rainworth had begun the latest chapter in their history in November 2011 with the appointment of Gee, replacing Lee Wilkinson and Billy Millar who had run the show for a year, although Wilkinson remained with the club as Gee’s assistant until the end of last season when pressure of work forced his resignation.
The change came about after, having won their first two games of that campaign, Rainworth managed just one win in their next 17 and found themselves back in a relegation scrap.
November and December 2010 had marked the end of one era at Rainworth MWFC, when manager Rudy Funk resigned and was replaced in the Kirklington Road hot seat by his number two Millar. He in turn appointed club captain Wilkinson as his assistant, and the pair became joint managers during March.
At the time of Funk’s departure the Wrens were in the middle of their first ever season as a Step 4 club in the Evo-Stik League Division One South. Funk had led the club from the bottom of the Step 7 Central Midlands League Supreme Division to the Evo-Stik League winning three promotions in four years so, although they were finding it hard going and had lost nine successive matches, the manager’s situation was not in jeopardy and his announcement was a bolt from the blue. It was a sad end to a great era, but life went on, and between them Billy and Lee set about a massive repair job. At the time the Wrens looked deep in relegation trouble, but so much did the tide turn under the new management that, although they only finished one place above the relegation zone, there was a 19-point gap over next to bottom Shepshed Dynamo by the end of the season. And, for good measure, the club won the Fair Play award for Division One South.
Unfortunately hopes that that improvement could be carried into the next campaign were unfulfilled. Indeed, between Gee’s appointment and his first match in charge the club slumped to the bottom of Division One South. Gee had been given just one task to fulfil – to avoid relegation. Although the club still struggled to score goals mathematical safety was achieved by the end of March, thanks largely to the best defensive record in the division outside the top three. The previous season’s league placing was bettered by one, and 14 points parted the club from the bottom two.
OUT OF THE SHADOWS WITH FUNK AND MILLAR
In the five seasons leading up to promotion to the Northern Premier League, Funk and Millar had brought about a revolution at the club with those three promotions, to lift the Wrens to their highest ever level of competitive football, making them the first Miners’ Welfare club in the country to achieve Step 4 status, and finally bringing the club out of the shadow of their previous most memorable season in 1981-82 when they won three trophies and reached the FA Vase final at Wembley.
While that was a tremendous achievement, more of which below, it had hung over everything the club had done ever since, over what every manager has striven to achieve, and over every team that has worn the Rainworth colours and had to stand comparison with those great days ... until 2005.
Rudy and Billy arrived during that summer when the club was at a very low ebb. Previous manager, former Mansfield Town favourite Sandy Pate, had led the club from the Notts Alliance into the Central Midlands Premier Division and then won promotion to the Supreme Division in third place at the first attempt.
But midway through that first season in the Supreme Division the club was devastated by the sudden and unexpected death of highly-rated coach Mark Hallas. It was a blow from which they could not recover, they plummeted down the table, and finished in a relegation position - the only time in the club’s history that this had ever happened. Fortunately for Rainworth the failure of other clubs to meet the floodlighting deadline meant that they were reprieved and preserved their Supreme Division place.
A brand new start was desperately needed. Sandy, broken-hearted, stood down from the club he had come to love, and Rudy - a former coach at Rainworth during his predecessor’s period in charge - returned as manager vowing to turn the club around and ultimately bring what was then UniBond League football to Kirklington Road—a promise he fulfilled before his shock resignation.
In their first season Rudy and Billy steadied the ship and achieved ninth place, before going for and winning promotion to the NCEL Division One the following year, finishing third behind Bottesford Town and Barton Town - all three made the step up, fully 12 points clear of the rest of the pack.
A successful first season in the NCEL saw the Wrens finally finish fourth, falling away slightly at the death, largely as a result of an horrendous injury list, after looking likely promotion contenders for most of the campaign. That season also marked the first year back in the FA Cup for over half a century, and they reached the penultimate qualifying stage before very unluckily bowing out at then Southern League Chasetown - who went all the way to the third round proper and lost to eventual finalists Cardiff City.
Missing out at the end of that season made the management all the more determined to go one better next time around, and they won promotion as runners-up to runaway champions Scarborough Athletic - who had risen out of the ashes of the former Football League club and, ironically, where Funk is now manager.
Rudy boldly proclaimed prior to the start of the next season, the club’s first in the NCEL Premier Division, that Rainworth were not in the division just to make up the numbers and, after a slightly uncertain start, they embarked on a club record breaking 16 successive league wins which saw them top the league.
Unfortunately, with the league record of 21 straight wins held by Guiseley in sight, they then hit an indifferent spell and played 10 games in all competitions without a win, before ending the season with another run of seven victories on the bounce to claim runners-up spot behind Bridlington Town.
There was only one promotion place, but Brid, who finished the season 11 points clear after that sticky patch, declined it because of the expense of travelling, so Rainworth gratefully accepted promotion instead.
WEMBLEY AND THE EARLIER HISTORY
Rufford Colliery FC, as they were styled until the 1970s, were founded in 1922, but it was not until 1976 that they really began to take off with the arrival of Brian Phillips, the former Middlesbrough and Mansfield Town centre half, as manager. Phillips succeeded the club’s first ever manager, Tony Porter, whose appointment made Rainworth the first Notts Alliance club to take this step, although it was a move which other clubs in the league soon copied.
Phillips, whose death at the age of 80 was mourned by the club during the close season, led the side to runners-up spot in 1976, and then followed six successive league championships. They also enjoyed consistent success in the League Cup, and won the Notts Senior Cup twice.
The League, League Cup and Senior Cup were all won in 1982, but the icing on the cake came in the FA Vase. It was only the third time the club had entered the national competition, but they went all the way to the Wembley final before losing 3-0 to Forest Green Rovers - who now play at the highest level of non-League. A crowd officially returned as 12,500 (many still believe this was woefully understated) at Wembley included 10,000 who made the journey down from Nottinghamshire, and although in the end they could not lift the Vase itself they did have the honour of being only the second true amateur club, paying subs to play, and the only Miners’ Welfare team, ever to grace the final.
And the spirit of non-League football was epitomised when Rovers manager Bob Mursell handed the Vase to Phillips and told him to go and show it to the magnificent Rainworth following.
The home leg of the semi-final was, in its own way, even more memorable than Wembley itself. After a goalless first leg draw at former finalists Barton Rovers, Dave Hallam popped in two goals in the home leg to give the side a 2-1 victory before a crowd of 5,071, which remains a competition record outside the final to this day.
The 1980s saw Rainworth, with a young Kevin Gee now in the side, reach the last 16 of the Vase on three more occasions, plus further appearances in the Notts Senior Cup final, but after 1983 it was not until 1991 that silverware again graced the trophy cupboard in the form of the Notts Alliance championship, as Rainworth became the club everyone wanted to beat.
As stated above, successive managers had to work in the shadow of that great side. They included former Bolton, Burnley, Birmingham, Oxford and Mansfield forward Neil Whatmore, John Slater - himself a member of that 1982 team - who after leading Clipstone Welfare to three successive titles made it a nap hand by winning the next two as Rainworth manager - and another former Mansfield player, Gary Saxby. In between, Brian Phillips also had another spell in charge aided by Mick Gould and John Wallhead, whose contacts brought a number of new and fondly remembered players to the club.
The arrival of Sandy Pate heralded the dawn of the 21st century, and although his first season in charge saw the club down to 10th place - the lowest position for at least 20 years - the up side of the story was the number of promising youngsters he brought to the club to replace the aging old guard. The following season those young players, aided by a touch of experience, came of age and mounted a serious title challenge before finishing second.
In their final Alliance season before joining the Central Midlands League they finished fifth, and reached the League Cup semi-final before bowing out to eventual champions Radcliffe Olympic.
By this time many of the established Notts Alliance clubs had seen greener grass in the Central Midlands League, and while Rainworth remained faithful to the Alliance which had served them so well for so long, the loss of so many of their traditional rivals to the CML made it perhaps inevitable that they should ultimately follow suit.
THE KIRKLINGTON ROAD STADIUM
At the time of the Wembley season there was no covered accommodation at Rainworth, and the main pitch was merely roped off.
Looking at the ground now it is hard to visualise how such a vast crowd could have been accommodated for that Vase semi-final, but in those days there were huge banks behind the Kirklington Road goal and on the allotments side - which included some rudimentary railway sleeper terracing—and ‘Health and Safety’ was not such a big issue then as it is nowadays.
The ground was essentially three sided, with a cricket square and a second pitch with training lights opposite. Eventually, in 1991, floodlights were put in - the club had a reputation as trail-blazers, having already been the first Notts Alliance club to appoint a manager, enter the Vase, and the joint first to begin producing a matchday programme, and now they were the first to instal lights. New FA Vase requirements meant that covered accommodation was needed so the small stand on the allotments side was put in, at a stroke cutting the ground capacity, and this eventually included seating.
When application was made to join the NCEL a number of grading issues were raised, not least the need for new dressing rooms adjacent to the pitch to replace those which stood some 25 yards away, and enclosure of the main arena which was made possible by the removal of cricket. All this was completed, along with a brand new seated stand, hard standing all around the pitch, a new pitch barrier acquired from Nuneaton Borough’s old ground, turnstiles, hospitality suites, tea bar, manager’s office, and press room. Few visitors to Rainworth fail to compliment the club on their excellent facilities. The old dressing rooms and second pitch continue in use by Sunday and youth sides, while the new dressing rooms are of Conference standard. Capacity is 2,201 with 211 seats (the seating capacity was cut to 159 from 221 at the end of last season when the 62 seats in the Allotments Side stand were removed at the behest of the ground graders to provide more covered standing space. Since then 52 of those seats have been re-installed in a small new stand, still to be covered, adjacent to the pavilion at the Kirklington Road end of the ground ).
THE VILLAGE
Rainworth is a large and growing village some four miles to the south-east of Mansfield in the heart of Robin Hood country. A former hamlet, it grew with the mining industry when Rufford Colliery was sunk, and the population rose to some 9,000. With the closure of the colliery in 1993 the place has become something of a ‘dormitory’ for Mansfield and Nottingham. Apart from the exploits of its football club the village’s main claim to fame is probably as the place where the notorious mass murderer ‘The Black Panther’ was heroically captured and arrested. The popular local pronunciation of the village name is ‘Rennoth’, giving rise to the club’s nickname of ‘The Wrens’.
ALAN WRIGHT - A RAINWORTH LEGEND
No history of Rainworth MWFC could ever be complete without mentioning the immense contribution made over countless years by the late Alan Wright, who served as goalkeeper, committee member, groundsman and secretary (taking over that position just in time to mastermind the administration of that amazing 1981-82 season) as well as being chairman of the Notts Alliance until he sadly died in 2002, and to whose memory and lifetime of service the wrought iron gates at the ground entrance are dedicated.
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