Les Reed, A Proper Football Journeyman | OneFootball

Whether a player, coach, author, or consultant, Les Reed has been entrenched in football for decades, with a career that has spanned multiple clubs, leagues, and continents.

For four days in December of 1952, millions of London residents found themselves shrouded in severe air pollution. A period of unusually frigid weather combined with anticyclone and windless conditions collected airborne pollutants to cause a thick layer of smog to form over the city. Known as The Great Smog of 1952, the smog caused major disruption by reducing visibility and even penetrating indoor areas, prompting a reported 10-12,000 deaths and causing over 100,000 to fall ill.

The worst air pollution event in the history of the United Kingdom, the Great Smog was a catalyst for environmental research, government regulation, and public awareness of the importance of air quality, necessitating the Clean Air Act of 1956.

Three days after the Great Smog finally dissipated following a change in weather, Les Reed was born in Wapping, London. He quickly became enamored with soccer and attended the 1966 FIFA World Cup final with his father, watching England win their first and only major title at Wembley Stadium.

He played for England at the schoolboy level and would be rostered by Cambridge United, Watford, and Wycombe Wanderers as a center forward, though he never registered a league match for any of them. He’d hang up his boots at a young age to coach non-league sides like Finchley and Wealdstone, and while he never quite established himself as a player, he’s nevertheless spent the past four decades cultivating a positive path forward and bringing clearer skies to teams across the United Kingdom and beyond.

“To be lucky enough to go to the World Cup Final with my dad and see my heroes playing out there and see England win…that was what made me want to get into soccer, and it also gave me a very strong passion for the England national team,” said Reed in an exclusive Urban Pitch interview. “I wanted to be that guy, I wanted to be like Bobby Moore, who I was fortunate to have him later in life as a friend. That was one of the things that drove me into the game, but that also gave me that passion and drive to help English soccer grow.”

While he never donned the Three Lions kit as a player, he’d certainly make an impact on English football.

Reed during his managerial tenure with Charlton Athletic. Bryn Lennon/Getty Images

Reed had two stints with the English Football Association (FA), the first starting in 1986 as a development officer. In addition to working with the FA National School where he helped shape future England internationals, he attended his first of three World Cup finals tournaments with England in 1990.

“When I became more sophisticated in terms of coaching and understanding player development, it then became, ‘What can I do to contribute to England winning a World Cup at some point in the future?'” Reed said. “My different chapters at the FA were all really driven by making England better and making the game better in England, as well as developing young English players and coaches.

“When I started, you had all these English coaches like Terry Venables, Bobby Robson, and Roy Hodgson who were in demand all across Europe, and then that demand dropped off, so part of my mission was to make English coaches in demand again.”

He left the FA in 1995 to be an assistant coach at Charlton Athletic, where he’d help the club gain promotion to the Premier League by 1998. Shortly after the promotion, he’d return to the FA as director of technical development, and eventually would become the FA’s technical director.

In his return to the FA, Reed would coach England’s newly introduced U-15 national team, and in 2004, he authored the FA’s official coaching manual, The Official FA Guide to Basic Team Coaching.

However, the FA fired Reed in 2004, and he’d go on to work as a consultant to various clients like the Northern Ireland national football team, who would beat England during his stint with the side, before returning to Charlton as Iain Dowie’s assistant manager in 2006.

He was thrust into the managerial role after Dowie was fired three months into the season, but Reed wouldn’t make it past Christmas, and was fired himself after a six-week stint that saw just one win in eight matches.

A particularly brutal article in The Mirror dubbed Reed “Santa Clueless,” as he was fired on Christmas Eve, as well as “Les Miserable.”

There was still room for Reed in the Premier League, however, as he’d join the Fulham coaching staff in April 2007, and became the club’s technical director for the 2007-08 season.

But while Reed has largely made a name for himself in English soccer, he’s also branched out and enjoyed professional adventures in a number of countries, from South Africa, Hong Kong, China, Thailand, Israel, Ghana, and Zimbabwe.

“I went to Ghana in 1982, worked with their national team, coached the coaches in Ghana’s top-flight, and worked with their U-21 players,” Reed said.”I loved my time in Africa, as it was the 1980s. It was quite underdeveloped and very few African players came overseas and started making a name for themselves like they do now. But there was some incredibly good talent out there, and it was great to get the opportunity to go back and coach a team in Zimbabwe.

“I coached on a kind of ad hoc basis three months at a time, backwards and forwards, for a team called Chapungu for about three years. I went to South Africa to work with the FA on molding their national coaches, national youth coaches, and the under-23 coaches, and helping to set up coaching centers around the country and a program for that.

“I’ve been everywhere, either coaching coaches or doing short-term fixes for national teams or federations, but also working for FIFA and UEFA on their programs. No matter where you are, soccer is soccer, the goals are the same size, and it’s 11 versus 11. I really enjoyed my time abroad and it brought a lot of experience to the role that I play now.”

Photo by Warren Little/Getty Images

Reed was appointed Head of Football Development and Support at Southampton in April 2010, taking charge of a club whose parent company was going through administration amid financial duress. He later worked as the Vice Chairman, overseeing four main areas: the youth academy, scouting and recruitment, sports medicine and science, and kit and equipment management.

Over the next eight years, Reed oversaw a meteoric ascent for the Saints as they won back-to-back promotions in his first two full seasons at the helm and consolidated their presence in the Premier League, in addition to reaching the 2017 EFL Cup final. He departed the club in November 2018, and returned to the FA as Technical Director, before returning to a club role, this time in Wales. Wrexham were about to finish a momentous 2020-21 season that, despite a middling eighth-place finish, brought plenty of excitement.

In November 2020, Wrexham received a desperately needed financial injection after the takeover of actors Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds through Wrexham Holdings LLC. This, combined with the FX series Welcome to Wrexham, has launched the club to the international stage and helped them gain the kind of widespread fame and popularity that many Premier League clubs can’t even afford. Wrexham turned to Reed in the summer of 2021 and offered him a position as an advisor to the board, giving him the opportunity to replicate his successful Southampton stint. Nearly 50 years after playing for Watford under the ownership of musical superstar Elton John, Reed was now going to be working directly under two Hollywood celebrities.

With Reed pulling the strings, Wrexham have been able to spend effectively and skyrocket through the divisions, becoming the first team in the history of England’s top five leagues to earn three consecutive promotions. The Red Dragons have zoomed from the fifth tier all the way to the second, kicking off their time in the Championship with consecutive defeats to Southampton and West Brom and a stalemate against Sheffield Wednesday, before prevailing with a 2-0 win at Millwall.

Wrexham have made strides in the EFL Cup after edging Hull City and Preston North End and setting up a date with Reading in the third round. A 3-2 victory over Norwich City has the club on a three-match winning streak, and it’ll look to continue that success throughout its debut in the Championship.