Bobby Saxton

Bobby Saxton

Personal information
Full name	Robert Saxton
Position(s)	Central defender

Robert "Bobby" Saxton (born 6 September 1943 in Doncaster, England) is an English former footballer, manager and coach, now working as a scout for Sunderland F.C..

Biography

He managed Blackburn Rovers for five seasons after a playing career as a utility defender with several lower division clubs. During his managerial career, he also took charge of Exeter City, Plymouth Argyle and York City.

From 1995 until 2002 he was assistant manager to Peter Reid at Sunderland, twice helping the Wearside club to the Division One title and promotion to the Premiership. He left at the end of 2001–02 retiring from the game (temporarily it now turns out), just a few months before Reid was sacked. His successor was Adrian Heath, who lasted just a few months on the club's payroll before he was sacked along with Reid.

He spent a brief spell thereafter scouting for Bolton Wanderers on a freelance basis as the Trotters made their way into European football for the first time ever but his involvement at the Reebok Stadium was much more low key than his previous jobs.

Saxton came out of retirement in 2006 to become assistant to Niall Quinn during his time as acting manager of Sunderland. The inexperienced Quinn had played under Reid and Saxton during his days at the Stadium of Light, so he knew that Saxton's guidance and experience would suit his own ambitions for the club. Saxton reportedly asked "are we going to run the club right?" before accepting the position. When Quinn stepped back from the management role and brought in Roy Keane on 28 August 2006, Saxton agreed to stay on briefly as part of his coaching staff, before becoming Director of Scouting at the club two weeks later. He was later sacked as Keane brought in his own backroom staff.

When Sam Allardyce became manager of Newcastle United in May 2007, Saxton was brought in as a scout, but left again when Allardyce was sacked in January 2008.

Managerial stats

Team	Nat	From	To	Record
				G	W	L	D	Win %
Exeter City		1 January 1977	5 January 1979	95	40	27	28	42.10
Plymouth Argyle		5 January 1979	31 May 1981	116	43	41	32	37.06
Blackburn Rovers		31 May 1981	30 December 1986	246	90	85	71	36.58
York City		9 June 1987	30 September 1988	62	11	36	15	17.74

External links

• Bobby Saxton management career statistics at Soccerbase

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