“It’s like the woman who bakes a cake. She could make it rise and it’s lovely and light. Then, another woman, because she’s ham-fisted, gets the wrong mixture and the cake is flat and heavy. Tranmere is built for the future, not just for Johnny King. We’re not building with bricks and straw but on a strong foundation. The mixture of youth and experience makes the team.”
Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of Johnny King, Tranmere manager and raconteur supreme.
Welcome to his training-ground office, anyway. Norman Wilson, Tranmere’s long-serving club secretary, walks in to discuss the possibility of the postponement of a game due to international commitments. It’s a far cry from the dark days of the early ’80s when the club’s only international thoughts were centred around the odd schoolboy game at Prenton Park. Yes, times really have changed.
“People always relate us to Wimbledon,” sighs King. “But forget it! They charge twice as much as Tranmere and they’ve got a very wealthy chairman. They buy and sell in the top bracket and they get the top prices simply because they never have to sell.
“For Tranmere to go any further, they have to get into the Premiership. The only way to fill the ground is with away supporters and maybe 10,000 of our own. I’ll guarantee now that Peter Johnson wouldn’t have left Tranmere if we were a viable concern.”
Johnson was once the sugar daddy of Prenton Park but is now being told to distribute his hampers anatomically by the Rovers faithful after his departure for Everton.
“Seven years ago, when Peter Johnson first came here, I originally said no to coming back as manager,” reveals King. “But an ex-manager, Dave Russell, told me:
‘This is the best chance Tranmere will ever have. These people want success and you’re the man to do the job.’
“There was a path made that I’d take Tranmere through to the top and I said I’d do that for Peter Johnson and Frank Corfe. We shook hands on that, but he hasn’t seen it through. He jumped off the ship and I keep saying to him: ‘Well, you jumped off!’”
Corfe, Johnson’s vice-chairman and a “shrewd operator”, has since taken over. But King has never been totally alone, not with Bill Shankly there to guide him. The great man’s picture hangs on the wall in such a way that you could envisage King having a conversation with his mentor.
“Shanks will always be the inspiration. He’s never far away, really. You’ve got to have the feeling that he’s very, very proud of what we’ve done. And if I ever feel a little down, I just think of him. He called me one of the best young managers in the game when I was just starting out and he’s never wrong.”
As it stands, Rovers are still in with a shout of top spot and Middlesbrough, among others, still have to come to Prenton Park. “It’s going to be a full house nearly every time,” smiles King.
“What we have managed to do is stay in the top half of the division. Like a racehorse, if you’re at the back of the pack, people know you’re never going to make it, so you’ve got to make sure you’re in a good position to make a run. And the race starts now.”