It’s not often you get to listen to one former Lincoln City player interviewing another, but on Kyle Perry’s podcast this week, that’s what you get.
It surprised me that Perry had a podcast, and perhaps then even more so that he got to interview former City midfielder Sam Clucas. Sam played either side of Perry’s spell with us, starting in the 2008/09 season, before being cast aside by Chris Sutton. He finished with us last season, playing a handful of games in our League One campaign.
Perry, not the focus of this article, came to us in 2011/12 and has the odd distinction of being one of the very few (if not only) players to score past us while on our books. He went on loan to Telford and netted against us, as we allowed him to play for them in exchange for us having Robbie Williams on loan. No, not that one.
Anyway, Sam was chatting to Kyle about his career, and it is well worth a watch here.
Speaking about his time with City, Sam explains how he got offered a role as player-coach, believing the club looked after him, but that not playing as much as he wanted ‘killed him’.
“I did get offered a player-coach role at Lincoln last year,” he said.
“I hadn’t got as many opportunities as I wanted at Lincoln, especially going back to my hometown. That killed me, to be honest with you.
“They looked after me and tried to give me a player-coach role, but I was like, I’m not really playing this season. Am I going to play next season? And I’m getting offered opportunities elsewhere. A couple of clubs came in straight away and said, if you’re not doing anything next year, come here.”
Clucas bagged once, away at Mansfield, but struggled for regular minutes. While we wanted him to coach this season and ultimately bring an end to his career, he felt there was more to come. Michael Appleton, former Imps’ head coach, felt the same and wanted to take him to Shropshire.
“Shrewsbury came in and spoke to the manager. He just said, I want you to come and play. Use your experience. You’re going to play loads of games for us if you’re doing well. Obviously if you’re not playing well, you won’t play.”
He has played – despite Salop being in dire straits, Sam has been a revelation for them, notching two goals and adding five assists, with more than 2700 competitive minutes in the bag. That’s more than any other Shrewsbury player, and according to FotMob, he’s also been their best player.
That has seen him extend his career, and he’s also spoken about his desire to perhaps keep playing after this season, abroad in Australia or somewhere like that. None of that would have been possible had he settled for a coaching role with us.
“If I’d taken that (the Lincoln) move, I probably wouldn’t be playing this season, and then I’d be done. I wasn’t ready to take that step yet. It wasn’t the right time for me. I’ve still got that hunger to play. I played a few games for Lincoln in League One and I know I could still do it at that level.”
His ambition now is to see out a playing career which took him from the National League to the Premier League, and possibly back to the National League, the way Salop are playing. When he does conclude, he wants to come home and open an academy here in Lincoln.
“I’m still going to play football until I can’t, because I can have a long career coaching when I finish. That’s certainly something I’m going to look into. Like I said, I want to start an academy in Lincoln. I’ve wanted to do one for years, but I was always torn because I was living away.
“I didn’t want it to be a token gesture where I just put my name to something. I want to be present and hands-on. I don’t want loads of local lads doing the coaching and I’m never there. I want my name on it and I want to actually be there.”
One thing is for sure – whatever we think of Sam and what happened last season, he is right. He wouldn’t have played much during this campaign, and to extend his career, he did need to move. Interestingly, given the timing of the podcast, he might well have got 45 minutes against Luton this weekend!