Dave Hockaday

David Hockaday (born 9 November 1957) is an English professional footballer who is currently Head of Male Football at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College.

He has previously worked as a manager at Leeds United, Forest Green Rovers, Kidderminster Harriers and in a caretaker capacity at Coventry City.

A former professional footballer, Hockaday played for Blackpool, Hull City, Shrewsbury Town, Stoke City and Swindon Town.

as a right-back.

After his playing career ended he helped establish a football academy at Cirencester, as well as spending time as first team coach at Watford and as youth team coach at Southampton.

He also spent four years as manager of Conference Premier side Forest Green Rovers.

In June 1975, aged 17, he joined Blackpool, then playing in the Second Division.

He made his first start for the Tangerines on 25 September 1976, in a 1–0 home loss to Chelsea.

Aside from a League Cup second-round tie against Sheffield Wednesday, he sat out the entire 1977–78 campaign, but the following season he became a more regular first-team player as Blackpool slid down the leagues.

He scored his first goal for the club in a 3–1 loss at Colchester United on 30 September 1978, and, later that season, scored both goals in Blackpool's 2–1 victory at Lincoln City.

Also on 30 September, this time in 1981, Hockaday was amongst the scorers in Blackpool's 7–1 rout of Halifax Town at Bloomfield Road.

In his final season in Lancashire, he made 40 league appearances and scored eight goals, but was unable to prevent Blackpool from finishing fourth from bottom and needing to seek re-election.

In his eight seasons at Blackpool he made over 190 first-team appearances, scoring 27 goals.

In June 1983, he moved on a free transfer to fellow Fourth Division side Swindon Town.

He was a solid, dependable right-back and was part of the team managed by Lou Macari that gained the Fourth Division championship in the 1985–86 season, following this with promotion to Division Two in 1986–87.

In 1988–89 Swindon reached the Second Division play-offs but failed in their attempt to gain promotion to the top flight.

In 1989–90 Swindon won the Second Division play-off final but Sunderland were promoted instead after the Swindon board admitted a series of financial irregularities.

Swindon were initially demoted to the Third Division and replaced by Tranmere Rovers, the division's losing play-off finalists, but this decision was later reversed on appeal.

In September 1990, Hockaday moved to Hull City for a fee of £50,000 having made 308 appearances for Swindon, with 11 goals.

At Hull City he was part of the side which suffered relegation from the Second Division at the end of the 1990–91 season.

He played 15 times for Hull the following season and spent the end of the 1992–93 campaign on loan at Stoke City where he played seven times helping the Potters win the Second Division title.

After a third season at Hull he moved on to Shrewsbury Town.

He was a member of the Shrewsbury team who won the Third Division title at the end of his first season, before he dropped out of league football, moving to Cirencester Town in 1995.

In 1996, Hockaday established one of the first football academies in the country at Cirencester, following the Thorp Arch model that Howard Wilkinson started at Leeds United in 1994.

The Cirencester Football Academy was created in conjunction with the local Sixth Form College.

The academy team soon built up a nationwide reputation by winning the National College Championship.

In 2000, he joined Graham Taylor at Watford as the club's Under 18 coach.

As Under 18 coach at Watford, Hockaday helped develop the careers of players such as Paul Robinson, Hamer Bouazza, Tommy Smith, Darren Ward, Ashley Young and Alhassan Bangura.

In 2005, he was promoted to first-team coach and assisted the Hornets as the club won promotion to the Premier League in 2006.

In January 2007, as Watford struggled to avoid relegation, he was sacked by manager Adrian Boothroyd.

In March 2007 he joined Martin Allen at Milton Keynes Dons until the end of the season, where the team reached the League Two play-offs.

In May 2007, Martin Allen moved to Leicester City and on 6 June it was announced that Hockaday would be joining the Leicester City coaching staff.

On 19 June 2007, it was announced that he would be joining Southampton as youth team coach replacing Georges Prost, he was put on gardening leave by the club in January 2009 and was released from his contract in May of the same year.

Hockaday again linked up with Martin Allen at his new club Cheltenham Town for a very short period on a non-contract basis however left the club when John Schofield was appointed as the club's assistant manager in March 2009.

In June 2014, Hockaday became the new head coach of Leeds United.

On 28 August 2014, his contract was terminated by the owner of Leeds.

During February 2015, Hockaday also had a short spell as caretaker manager of Coventry City.

In October 2015, it was announced Hockaday would take over as head coach at National League side Kidderminster Harriers.

Hockaday was born in Sedgefield, County Durham.

He started his career as a youth player with Billingham Synthonia.