DES Buckingham has hailed the job Chris Wilder did at Oxford United, saying the U’s might not be enjoying second tier football had it not been for Wilder’s spell at the club.
Between December 2008 and January 2014, the 57-year-old led United to promotion from the Conference in the 2010 play-offs, capping the club’s four-year absence from non-league competition.
Buckingham holds Wilder in high regard, having promoted him to the U’s first-team coaching staff at the start of the 2013/14 season, and is looking forward to facing his Sheffield United side tonight at Bramall Lane.
“Chris Wilder was the first manager who brought me into the senior professional coaching space,” according to Buckingham.
“He was the one that gave me my first opportunity in the game, and it’s developed into what it is.”I have a lot of time for Chris for that, but now that I’m the head coach of this football club, I look back and see what Chris achieved for this football club at a critical period in 2010, to bring us back into the Football League.
“There was a point when this club may not be where it is today if we hadn’t risen in the way we did.
“I’m not sure where we would be right now if he hadn’t done what he did in that place.
“I owe him a lot for getting me into what my career has progressed into, and this club has been able to go on and do what it’s done off a lot of the work he did to get us back into the Football League in 2010.”
Buckingham added, “We fell into a situation where we had six or seven managers in two or three years before he arrived.
“He helped to steady the ship after we dropped out of the League. There was an anticipation that we’d return straight up, but we discovered that the Conference wasn’t as simple at the time.
“He came in over a five-year period and allowed us as a club, when there was a lot of uncertainty, to get back into the Football League and ensure our professional status.
“It was recognised at the time, and you could see Chris’s celebrations down the touchline at Wembley when the third goal was scored, which I’m sure we can all relate to and remember.
“That was a huge moment for this football club, and allowed that story and that history to continue in the way it has done.”
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