Tony Mowbray talked about an emotional conversation he had with Sunderland assistant head coach Mike Dodds
after receiving a colon cancer diagnosis.
Mowbray, who was in command of Birmingham City after being fired by Sunderland the previous season, welcomed
his former squad to the Midlands for a Championship game. The Black Cats board dismissed Mowbray after the
Blues won the game 2-1, just a few months after Michael Beale had replaced him at the Academy of Light.
However, a few days later, Mowbray shockingly announced that he would have to leave his job at Birmingham City
for a while due to health issues that turned out to be colon cancer. Mowbray told the BBC that he is now on the mend
after having an emotional conversation with Dodds, a Sunderland employee.
According to Mowbray, “Gosh, I remember getting emotional telling Doddsy.”‘Oh, no, buddy, it’s not good,’ I replied
when he inquired about my well-being. ‘What do you mean it’s not good?’ he asked. To be honest, when I informed
him that I had recently been diagnosed with colon cancer and would have to leave, he also became quite distraught.
“I genuinely thought that because I was large and powerful, I would easily overcome this. I could even have surgery
without any issues. But on my emancipation days, I had to get up forty times in an hour, and your body was crinkling
away your voice, making it hard for you to talk because your throat was so constricted from the starvation.”
All I can say is that it’s really awful, but you get through it with the support of your loved ones. My wife would drop
everything and give me a two-and-a-half-hour journey to Manchester when I needed to be there. It was challenging,
even though everything was prepared for me and the physicians and nurses were present.
“I have found Birmingham to be incredibly supportive, the owner is a wonderful person, and the CEO, Gary
Cook,outstanding.” I believed we had a chance to work things out because Craig Gardner, the sporting director, was
so great with me. Though it seemed improbable that they were preparing to be demoted, they insisted that the club
would transform and that they would spend money.
“It’s easy for me to say no, I don’t think we would have been relegated because we just won the last two games
against Sunderland and Blackburn Rovers, and we were on and pushing pretty good, I think,” but listen, things
happen, and Birmingham has now done what they’re doing. In three or four years, they will move into a stadium that
can hold 60,000 people, and perhaps by then, the owners will be discussing their aspirations to join the Premier
League.
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