Player Profile : Dean Spink

Signed by Graham Barrow prior to Chester's first season in the Nationwide Conference, the vastly experienced Striker cum Defender has endured a spell at the Deva Stadium plagued by injury. A serious injury sustained during the pre-season build up to the 2000-2001 campaign saw Deano sit out almost the entire season. Then, when Barrow was relieved of his duties, in came new Director of Football Gordon Hill to take over first team affairs. Describing Spink as a "senior statesman" one of Gordon Hill's first moves was to appoint Dean as his assistant, a job the former Aston Villa player still holds under caretaker boss, Steve Mungall. But Deano will be the first to admit he's on a learning curve towards a future career in management, "yeah, I'm really enjoying it. I've done a lot of training sessions under Gordon Hill and now the scouting trips for Steve Mungall," said Spink.

Dean endured a nightmare start to his Chester City career, having sustained a serious injury, one that contines to rule Spinky out every now and again. "I'm just getting back now. I ran over on my ankle at Scarborough and landed on my ankle ligament. At the moment for me, things aren't really going that well with injuries. But things like that happen once you've had one big injury, little things seem to happen but hopefully now I'll be raring to go."

Despite all these injuries, Dean Spink is still intent on getting down to business on the pitch, pulling on his Chester City shirt and actually playing. "Oh definitely. I love playing football you know. There's nothing better than training all week and actually playing on the Saturday. There's a lot of talent in the team, the talent is there but I think the average age is only around 21. They're young lads and they're learning all the time, we've got three senior pros and it's good, it gives the lads a bit of experience and they look up to it. But the best thing is they'll do all the running!"

The vastly experienced player who was signed from Wrexham on a two year contract in July 2000, has been quite surprised by the speed in which improvements and changes have taken place since caretaker boss Steve Mungall arrived at the Deva Stadium. "Things have taken a turn for the better. It's almost like starting the season again but we can't get carried away. But when you're winning the confidence gets up and we plan to go on winning. There's a lot of confidence in the lads and everyone's got that winning feeling. We'll just take it day by day. There's a lot of respect for the manager at the moment. He's putting his side out, he's working hard with players, he's working for the team and these things are really paying off."

But everyone knows now that the difficult thing to do, is to keep the show on the road and hopefully build on what has been achieved. A view shared by Dean Spink, "The manager has come in, he's explained the situation with the chairman. He's here as the caretaker manager for a period and the lads are responding well to him. Fair play to the manager he's worked really really hard and I think he's getting his just rewards now."