‘GOING UP AS A MANAGER JUST FEELS SO DIFFERENT'
WHEN Matt Taylor reflects on the remarkable runin that propelled Exeter City into League One, two pivotal moments loom large.
One was a transformational four minutes during a six-pointer against Swindon at the County Ground in early February.
As darkness settled over Wiltshire, the Grecians trailed 1-0. Supporters, already cold and miserable, eyed the exits and contemplated the long trip home.
Enter Jevani Brown, who had previously scored just two goals all season. On 84 minutes, the midfielder danced past a challenge, then bent it like Bergkamp into the top corner. Then, as Swindon reeled, Timothee Dieng rolled a nonchalant 18-yarder beyond a sprawling Jojo Wollacott. Cue delirium in the away end.
The Grecians would win 13 of the next 18 matches, and on Tuesday night beat Barrow 2-1 at St James Park to seal automatic promotion with two games to spare.
Moments
“There are always moments in any season and that Swindon game felt big,” explains the Exeter boss. “We went 1-0 down, and probably didn't deserve to. To come back and win 2-1 in the last few minutes felt like a big turning point in the season.
“The belief we built from that point on just kept coming and coming, like a tidal wave. There were fightbacks. Late goals. Cheick Diabate at home to Leyton Orient, Jack Sparkes at home to Harrogate. Different people at different times.
“Usually you get two or three big-contribution players in any season, but I can't see a player in the squad who hasn't provided a big moment this year. That collective will has been our biggest strength this season.”
For all their collective strength, though, the other key moment was very much about an individual.
Sam Stubbs, son of former Bolton defender Alan Stubbs, arrived from Fleetwood in January last year nursing a knee problem that was expected to heal within weeks.
Setbacks and surgeries meant it was 11 months before he pulled on a red and white shirt, but he was worth the wait. Of Exeter's 18 clean sheets, 13 came after the 23-year-old central defender made his league bow on New Year's Day.
“Getting Sam back was huge,” admits Taylor. “We knew what he was about. We knew what he could bring. We just needed to get him out on a football pitch, and we'd waited a year for that to happen.
“To see it happen and to see how good he was -it was inspirational. He made us a better team and that's no disrespect to any other defender at the football club. But Sam is a certain level of player and to get him fit was a critical moment.”
Exeter's return to League One after a decade-long absence marks Taylor's third promotion with the Devonian side.
Signed from Team Bath -where he featured primarily as a goalkeeper before converting to centre-back -Taylor was part of the side that beat Cambridge 1-0 in the Conference play-off final of 2008. A year later he skippered Paul Tisdale's men to a second consecutive promotion.
Taylor subsequently played for Charlton, Bradford and Cheltenham before taking over at St James Park, aged just 36, when Tisdale's 12-year reign came to an end in 2018.
It hasn't all been plain sailing. Two years of steady improvement -including a playoff final defeat in 2020 -came to a halt last season when a youthful Exeter side failed to make the play-offs.
There was even talk before the season started that the 40-year-old's fourth campaign would be his last if a top seven finish was not achieved. Did he feel any pressure?
“I didn't, but that's management, isn't it?” he shrugs. “You can be a hero, you can be a villain. You can be a genius or an idiot. It's a game of opinions, and you have to back your own.
“All you can do is trust in what you see. Trust in what you feel and what you think. In football, the one thing you must do is back yourself.
Proud
“You can't die wondering. My dad was big on that -growing up it was always ‘Leave it all out there, give it your best and if your best isn't good enough then so be it'.
“I look back at my four years here and I'm proud of what we've done. We came agonisingly close that first season.
“People forget we lost Jayden Stockley halfway through. That was a big chunk of goals going out of the team and he was irreplaceable at that stage.
“Second season was such a strong squad and such a strong team that -while it's easy to say now -I believe we would have been promoted if not for Covid.
“We had ten games left and we'd been in the top three pretty much the whole time. It was only the week before the suspension that we dropped out. To then lose at Wembley was heartbreaking.
“Then you've got to rebuild a team based on the restrictions caused by the pandemic. Seeing those young players develop and produce the season they have is incredibly rewarding.
“In terms of moments I've been involved in, Wembley in 2008 was huge. Being on the pitch at Rotherham as captain when we went up the next year. Surviving our first season in League One, and playing a part in that. Even getting up to eighth, our highest-ever finish, was such a monumental achievement.
“But the emotional aspect of being a manager, the pressure that is on you, the feeling that comes with winning and losing – to have something to show for that at the end of a season is right up there with any of them.”
Not that Taylor is quite ready to revel in his achievement yet.
“The feeling now, it's totally different,” he says. “As a player, you're in the middle of the celebrations. You're on the pitch, the champagne is flying and there's that instant sense of euphoria.
“As a manager or a member of staff, you're on the outside. You can't express what you want to express because you're a professional person. We've got games left to play and you have to respect the league.
“So I haven't really had time to let myself go yet.
That might be behind closed doors. It might be with my mates or my family. My wife. I might break down in tears. I just don't know. It'll come, but not yet.”
