Mariners boss saw first hand the dangers of making bad choices as a kid – now he’s aiming to win an A-Leagues title with a team full of young talent, writes Tom Smithies.
Nick Montgomery always understood what hard work meant, because it was there in front of him every day.
Raw sporting talent provided a schoolboy from Leeds with the opportunity to take his life in one direction; the hard work that his parents modelled allowed him to take that opportunity, and avoid the choices that led some of his classmates to prison.
Every morning, as he leaves his house a few minutes from Terrigal Beach on the NSW Central Coast, the contrast is extreme with Halton Moor, the suburb of Leeds in the north-east of England on whose doorstep Montgomery grew up.
Decades of deprivation have long blighted a housing estate cruelly dubbed The Zoo by UK media, and which was the scene of riots in 2020. Football gave Montgomery the chance to avoid falling prey to the wrong influences as a boy, and the example set by his family persuaded him to take it.
To understand the drive and motivations of the A-League Men’s second-youngest head coach, now standing 90 minutes from the Grand Final in just his second year in the role, the fruit and veg stall at Leeds market run by his grandfather plays its role too.
Montgomery spent hours there each week in his childhood, while his parents were working long days to provide for the family. It doesn’t take a psychologist to understand how the example set by his parents and grandparents continues to drive Montgomery, more than three decades since the day he walked into Leeds United’s academy as an eight-year-old.
There isn’t a hint of melodrama in his description of those early days, but the reminder of the paths his life could have taken make it obvious why in his view life is too short for messing about, for playing boring football or for playing disingenuous games with the footballers in his care.
“I came from a working-class background where my mum and dad worked 6am to 6pm every night,” he tells KEEPUP.
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“We used to walk to school every day, me and my brother. Rain, hail or shine. I spent most of my childhood in an area where there was a lot of crime and stuff going on, a lot of people stealing cars.
“Friends I went to school with got done for armed robbery and crazy things which my kids can only think is written in a book.
“I tell them that all the time, but I also think that gave me the determination, the resilience, to come through a really hard system – Leeds schoolboys, Leeds United and then obviously moving on to Sheffield United as soon as I left school. I knew that all I wanted to do was finish school and go straight into full-time football.
“Sheffield United gave me that opportunity and I grabbed it with both hands and I never really looked back.”
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Maybe that all explains his understanding of young players and his belief in them; the teenage Montgomery almost fell from the high-wire in his pursuit of a career in professional football more than once, losing the first eight months of a two-year scholarship at Sheffield United to injury, and then more time to meningitis.
His players now speak privately of Montgomery as an honest coach, whose message is always straightforward, because that was all he ever asked of those in charge when he was making his own way at that age.
“If you go through the coaches I had, the best ones were the most honest,” he says. “I spent seven years with Neil Warnock and what I remember the most was how honest he was.
“I was always honest as a player and now I’ve become a coach, I’ll tell the boys whether they’re playing or not, I’ll tell them why they’re playing, why they’re not playing.
“I’ll never just go in and the teamsheet is up on the board and everybody’s shocked that there’s three changes. I’ll pull them in before I tell the team and explain because that’s how I wanted to be coached.
“The players respect you for that and you don’t want them to be happy when you leave them out, but even if they’re pissed off, if there’s an explanation behind it they can accept that.
“But you know then that they’re sat on the bench wanting the team to win and wanting to come on and perform, instead of sitting there thinking: ‘You just f***ed me over, I thought I was playing and I don’t care if the team loses’.
“Because that’s what you get with the wrong culture, I’ve seen it many times.”
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Culture arguably matters most at a club like the Mariners, where everyone from the CEO to the groundsman is working to a very limited budget. In the absence of luxurious surroundings or big rewards, the drive for success has to come from the strength of the collective.
That’s why Montgomery wanted the job of head coach even after the club’s years of bumping along in the foothills of the league table, and before Alen Stajcic was brought in to try to arrest that decline in 2019, because he could see the supply line of young talent as head of the club’s academy.
The latter role had been an obvious transition after his retirement as a player, a career ending with five years at the Mariners, but Montgomery was in a hurry to progress.
“I wanted the job before Staj took it to be honest, because we had all the young players coming through and I knew that they could play in the A-League,” he says. “To be fair to Staj, he put Alou Kuol in the team (from the youth team) and I knew he was a natural goal scorer. He was top scorer in the league after 15 games of that season.
“I’ve got a lot of time for Staj, he’s a good guy, an honest guy. When he moved on, a lot of names put in for the job but I was just like, give me the chance, there’s no one better equipped than me. I knew I was ready.”
Montgomery always knew that blooding young players successfully would inevitably mean some leaving – it’s the business model the club operates on. The thrilling thing for the neutral has been the way he has given his team licence to press forward at every opportunity – so long, of course, as it’s underpinned by hard work.
“I don’t think it matters whether I’m here or, or somewhere else, I’ve always wanted to play attacking football,” he says. “I was a defensive midfielder, but there was nothing I loved better than playing in attacking teams.
“When I look back at when I started out (at Sheffield United), we had players like Peter Ndlovu in the team, you know, just unbelievable on his left foot, right foot, just a top, top player.
“I used to be a defensive midfielder with some top attacking players and I loved that. So as a coach I wanted to play attacking football, score goals.
“It’s exciting, the fans are excited, you want everybody off their seats.”
Now that brand of football is tantalisingly close to success this season – but really this is just the start for Montgomery who is as blunt about his personal ambition as he is about the days of growing up in such a deprived area.
“My ambition as a player was to play in the Premier League, we used to watch Match of the Day (as a boy),” he says. “People doubted me, I went through a lot of ups and downs and bad injuries and illnesses and stuff.
“But I was at a fantastic club like Sheffield United, we actually got promoted to the Premier League, and I played there. So to do that as a player, (now) my ambition is to coach in the Premier League.
“How I get there and what that journey looks like, I don’t know. I’m not in a rush, I think this is a very good league and massively underrated.
“I enjoyed playing here, I’ve enjoyed coaching here and who knows where I’ll end up – on this side of the world, you’ve got the whole of Asia as well, whereas when you’re in Europe, it’s like just a bubble.
“I’ve already had a lot of interest in the last year or two, but I love this club, I love what we’ve done here. It’s not easy to build what we built here. So that’s why I’m not in a rush to jump out.”
Ultimately, he’ll be governed by the same message he gives the players. “It could take 10 years (to get to the Premier League). I know it’s not easy. Just keep your head down and just focus on every game.”
Central Coast Mariners (2) v Adelaide United (1) – second leg
Saturday, May 20 2023
Industree Group Stadium
Kick-off: 7.45pm AEST
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