Lawrie Sanchez

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Lawrie Sanchez
Personal information
Full name	Lawrence Philip Sanchez
Date of birth	22 October 1959 (1959-10-22) (age 49)
Place of birth	Lambeth, England
Height	6 ft 2 in (1.88 m)
Youth career
1974–?	Southampton Thatcham Town
Senior career1
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1978–1984 1984–1994 1994 1994–1995	Reading Wimbledon Swindon Town Sligo Rovers	261 (28) 270 (33) 008 0(0)
National team
1989	Northern Ireland	003 0(0)
Teams managed
1994–1995 1999–2003 2004–2007 2007 2009-	Sligo Rovers Wycombe Wanderers Northern Ireland Fulham
1 Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. * Appearances (Goals)

Lawrence Philip Sanchez (born 22 October 1959 in London, England) is a football manager and a former player. He is the son of an Ecuadorian father and a Northern Irish mother, and went to Presentation College, which was a local grammar school in Reading (now called The Elvian School). The defining moment of his playing career came in the 1988 FA Cup Final, where he scored the winning goal for Wimbledon, producing one of the biggest Cup upsets against the might of Liverpool.

Contents 1 Playing career 1.1 Club career 1.2 International career 2 Managerial and coaching career 2.1 Sligo Rovers 2.2 Wimbledon 2.3 Wycombe Wanderers 2.4 Northern Ireland national team 2.5 Fulham 3 Honours 4 Managerial stats 5 References 6 Notes 7 External links

[edit] Playing career

[edit] Club career

Sanchez had first played for Reading, between 1977 and 1984, before moving to Wimbledon for £30,000. He scored the goal that got the Dons promoted to the First Division in 1986. His most famous moment as a player came in 1988, when he scored the goal that won Wimbledon the FA Cup in 1988 against Liverpool, a match widely believed to be one of the biggest cup final upsets in history. In April 1994 Sanchez left Wimbledon for newly promoted Swindon Town

He is believed to be the first player to be sent off for a professional foul, after committing a deliberate handball in a Football League Trophy match against Oxford United in 1982.^[1]

[edit] International career

Sanchez won three international caps for Northern Ireland, qualifying by virtue of his Northern Irish mother. He had also been invited to try out for the Ecuadorian national team, but declined on the grounds of distance.

[edit] Managerial and coaching career

[edit] Sligo Rovers

He became player-manager of League of Ireland club Sligo Rovers in 1994 [1] and in his first season led them to the semi-final of the 1995 FAI Cup.He also managed them in the Cup Winners' Cup against Bruges FC

[edit] Wimbledon

In 1995, he returned to Wimbledon and became reserve team manager, winning the Football Combination in his first season in charge.After two years with the reserves he then stepped up to 1st coach under Joe Kinnear.

[edit] Wycombe Wanderers

Sanchez became manager at Wycombe Wanderers in Feb 1999,and with only 18 games left he rescued the team from imminent relegation. It was on the way to the last game of this season at Lincoln that the club bought The Comanche.In 2001 he guided the club (then in the Second Division) to its greatest moment, playing Liverpool in the FA Cup semi-finals; Wycombe lost 2–1, having held Liverpool to 0–0 for most of the match.

After finishing 12th in 2002 and 11th in 2003, the upward progress came to an end with collapse of the OnDigital TV deal and the subsequent loss of both revenue and subsequently players. After a poor start to the 2003–04 season Sanchez left the club on 30 September 2003^[2].

[edit] Northern Ireland national team

Sanchez was appointed manager of Northern Ireland in January 2004. At that point the side was ranked 124^th in the world, had a 1,298 minute-long goal drought, and had not won a game for nearly three years. Northern Ireland improved markedly under Sanchez. By the time he left Northern Ireland were top of their Euro 2008 qualification group and reached an all-time high position of 27th in the world.

Notable results during his tenure included a 1–0 victory against England in a World Cup qualifying match, a 1–1 draw against Portugal, who went on to reach the World Cup 2006 semi-finals, a 2-1 win over Sweden and a 3–2 win against eventual Euro 2008 winners Spain in a Euro 2008 qualifying match, with striker David Healy scoring a hat trick. A book about his achievements with Northern Ireland was published in November 2007.^[3]

[edit] Fulham

While still manager of Northern Ireland, Sanchez was named as caretaker manager of Fulham following the sacking of Chris Coleman in April 2007.^[4] Having achieved his 32 day task of maintaining Fulham's Premier League position he was given the manager's job on a longer contract having first to resign from his position with Northern Ireland.^[5] His tenure at Craven Cottage came to a close in December 2007.

In May 2009 Lawrie Sanchez was seen at Barnet's last game of the season versus Port Vale which sparked rumours that Sanchez could take a huge paycut to take over at league two side Port Vale. But Vale chairman Bill Bratt has already said that Sanchez would be on option but only if affordable.^[6]

[edit] Honours

Wimbledon

• F.A. Cup winner – 1988

[edit] Managerial stats

Team	Nat	From	To	Record
				G	W	L	D	Win %
Wycombe Wanderers		5 February 1999	30 September 2003	255	87	97	71	34.11
Northern Ireland		21 January 2004	11 May 2007	32	11	11	10	34.37
Fulham		11 April 2007	21 December 2007	24	4	12	8	16.67

[edit] References

• "Sanchez to stay in N Ireland job" BBC News Online September 9, 2006, retrieved September 9, 2006.
• "Sanchez stays on as N Ireland coach" Teamtalk.com September 9, 2006
• "Statement From Lawrie Sanchez" Irishfa.com September 9, 2006

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

• Lawrie Sanchez management career stats at Soccerbase
• Lawrie Sanchez Biography on the Irish Football Association website
• Lawrie Sanchez at the Internet Movie Database

v • d • e Wycombe Wanderers F.C. – Managers McCormick (1951–52) · Cann (1952–61) · McDonald (1961) · G. Adams (1961–62) · Welsh (1962–64) · Darvill (1964–68) · Lee (1968–76) · Powell (1976–77) · Reardon (1977–78) · Williams (1978–80) · Keen (1980–84) · Bence (1984–86) · Gane (1986–87) · Suddaby (1987–88) · Kelman (1988–90) · O'Neill (1990–95) · Smith (1995–96) · Gregory (1996–98) · Smillie (1998–99) · Sanchez (1999–2003) · T. Adams (2003–04) · Gorman (2004–06) · Lambert (2006–08) · Taylor (2008–)

v • d • e Northern Ireland national football team – Managers Doherty (1951–62) · Peacock (1962–67) · Bingham (1967–71) · Neill (1971–75) · Clements (1975–76) · Blanchflower (1976–79) · Bingham (1980–94) · Hamilton (1994–98) · McMenemy (1998–99) · McIlroy (2000–03) · Sanchez (2004–07) · Worthington (2007–)

v • d • e Fulham F.C. – Managers H. Bradshaw (1904–09) · Kelso (1909–24) · Ducat (1924–26) · J. Bradshaw (1926–29) · Liddell (1929–31) · McIntyre (1931–34) · Hogan (1934–35) · Peart (1935–48) · Osborne (1948–49) · Dodgin, Sr. (1949–53) · Osborne (1953–56) · Livingstone (1956–58) · Jezzard (1958–64) · Buckingham (1965–68) · Robson (1968) · Dodgin, Jr. (1969–72) · Stock (1972–76) · Campbell (1976–80) · Macdonald (1980–84) · Harford (1984–86) · Lewington (1986–90) · Dicks (1990–91) · Mackay (1991–94) · Branfoot (1994–96) · Adams (1996–97) · Wilkins (1997–98) · Keegan (1998–99) · Bracewell (1999–2000) · Riedle (2000) · Tigana (2000–03) · Coleman (2003–07) · Sanchez (2007) · Lewington (2007) · Hodgson (2007–)