BOTD: MIKE DODDS

On this day in 1986, three time interim head coach of Sunderland, Mike Dodds, was born.

Mike began his coaching career at 18, joining Coventry, ew, as a youth coach whilst acquiring his coaching badges.

After seeing the light and getting away from Coventry he headed to Birmingham’s academy where he has since been credited with playing a large part in developing eventual top flight players, such as Nathan Redmond, Demarai Gray and no other than the Bellingham brothers.

Following on from over a decade at Birmingham, Doddsy headed up north to Wearside as head of individual player development. He was reportedly one of the key factors in Sunderland signing Jobe Bellingham from Birmingham too, and we’ve certainly reaped the rewards of that one.

Aside from bringing in Jobe, and helping nurture the depth of talent at the Academy Of Light that we have seen come into the first team effortlessly over the past couple of seasons, Dodds was pushed into the hot seat of interim head coach on three separate occasions.  

The first time he was made interim boss was after Lee Johnson was rightfully given the boot during our League One spell, we lost both games 2-1, one at home against Doncaster, the other away at Cheltenham.

The next time he was in charge of setting the lads up was after Tony Mowbray was sacked. This time in the Championship, in three games he picked up six points out a potential nine. We had back to back home games against promotion hopefuls West Brom and Leeds, followed by a trip to Ashton gate against Bristol City. Against West Brom we won 2-1, and then came the biggest test which was Leeds. Dodds had us set up in a different way to how we usually set up, operating with a back three/five and perhaps that caught Leeds off guard as we grabbed an unlikely 1-0 win with the only goal of the game coming from Jobe. We then followed that up by falling to a 1-0 defeat to Bristol.

After that we brought in Michael Beale and the less said about that the better. He was quickly dispatched and Dodds was given control of the squad until the end of the season as we began to fall down the table all the way to 16th. This spell wasn’t as exciting as the previous one, but at that time all we needed was some stability in the dug out whilst the club took their time to find the right candidate for the following season. Despite it being a poor run, which saw us lose eight games, draw three and win two, it's been said by the players that the lessons learned from that experience helped them for the 24/25 season.

We spent a long time reviewing our options and brought in the footballing scientist that is Regis Le Bris, with Dodds remaining on as assistant head coach, passing on his information on the lads to the boss. We were enjoying a great first campaign under Regis and people were taking notice.

Wycombe needed a new head coach and thanks to his pedigree of working well with young players, they decided that Dodds was their man and they brought him in during the run-in. Our results and performances following his departure had seemed to tail off as we fell further away from the top three in the Championship, with some thinking it had to do with Dodds no longer being here. That said, we had essentially claimed a play off spot so the desire to play at 110% had diminished.

Wycombe and Dodds also secured a play off spot of their own in League One, but they were knocked out of the semis by Charlton, who went on to win the final and gain promotion to the Championship. It remains to be seen whether this step up in coaching will be a success for Doddsy, but the majority of everyone at Sunderland will be wishing him the best. Everyone speaks of him highly, not only as a great mind at nurturing young talent, but also as a genuine nice bloke.