Peter Taylor

Peter John Taylor (born 3 January 1953) is an English former footballer who was most recently manager of Maldon & Tiptree.

During his time as a player with Crystal Palace during the 1970s, Taylor became one of the few players to have been selected for the senior England team when not playing in the top two flights of a domestic league.

Taylor enjoyed a successful playing career as a winger.

He began his youth career with Canvey Island, and had trials at Tottenham Hotspur and Crystal Palace before signing as a junior with Southend United in 1971.

Southend gained promotion to the old third division in 1972 and Taylor's part in their success brought him to the attention of Crystal Palace manager, Malcolm Allison, who signed him on 11 October 1973 for £110,000.

The 1975–76 season was a high point in Taylor's career as Palace reached the FA Cup semi-final, Taylor scoring two goals in the quarter-final in a 3–2 away win at Chelsea and he also made four appearances for the full England team, scoring twice.

However, Palace's season tailed off after the semi-final and they did not achieve promotion to the second tier.

Palace were relegated to the third tier at the end of that season, but Taylor was named Player of the Year and remained at the club for two further seasons, becoming player of the year again in 1976.

At the end of the season Allison resigned and was replaced by Terry Venables, and on 30 September 1976 Taylor was allowed to depart for top-flight Tottenham Hotspur for a fee of £400,000.

Taylor scored on his debut in a 4–2 defeat at The Hawthorns to West Bromwich Albion.

He had a mixed career at Spurs; the club suffered relegation in 1977 but was promoted in 1978.

Taylor did not make another England appearance and in 1980 moved on to Leyton Orient, having made 123 appearances for Tottenham during which he scored 31 times.

He played 56 times for Orient, scoring 11 times in three seasons, and had a brief loan spell at Oldham Athletic.

Taylor made his England debut as a substitute versus Wales and scored the winning goal in the 80th minute of that game.

He scored his second international goal against the same opponents in the next match that he played.

In 1983–84 Taylor made eight appearances for Exeter City before moving into non-league football with firstly Maidstone United, and then Chelmsford City, Dartford and Enfield.

He spent two years between 1993 and 1995 as manager, but quit at the end of the 1994–95 season after failing to get them beyond the middle of the Division One table.

Taylor took on the job as manager of Conference club Dover Athletic in 1995–96 season and guided the club to 20th, enough to stave off the threat of relegation as only two clubs were relegated that season.

He agreed and signed a two-year contract at Dover in May 1996 but was to leave the club only two months later after being asked by then England boss Glenn Hoddle to manage the England under-21 side.

His record (for competitive matches) was 15 played; 11 won, three drawn and one defeat.

In this time, England finished ninth in 1998 European Championship and qualified for the 2000 finals comfortably, winning every match without conceding a goal.

But with three matches to play, Taylor was replaced in a controversial manner by Howard Wilkinson, who won the next two matches.

The three goals conceded in the 3–1 defeat to group runners-up Poland were the only blemish on the team's qualifying record.

England under Wilkinson later got knocked out in the group stage of the finals, winning against Turkey but losing to Slovakia and champions Italy.

Taylor returned to club management at the beginning of the 1999–2000 season with Gillingham, and at the end of the season guided them to victory over Wigan Athletic in the Division Two play-off final which marked the Kent club's promotion to the upper half of the English league for the first time in their history.

During this season he also guided the Gills to the quarter-finals of the FA Cup after impressive wins over Premiership opposition in Bradford City and Sheffield Wednesday (a brace of 3–1 home wins), before losing 5–0 away to Chelsea in the last eight.

A few weeks later he left the club to take charge at Leicester City in the Premier League.

He had an excellent start at the East Midlands club and they went top of the league on 1 October 2000.

They stayed at the top of the league for two weeks (Taylor having been voted Premier League Manager of the Month for September 2000) and were in contention for a UEFA Cup place for well over half a season, but nine defeats from their final 10 games sucked them down to 13th place in the wake of a shock defeat by Wycombe Wanderers in the FA Cup quarter-final.

In November 2000, whilst managing Leicester, Taylor was appointed caretaker manager of England for one match.

After a terrible start to the 2001–02 season, Taylor was sacked on 30 September 2001.

He managed the England under-20 team in 2013.

Outside England, Taylor was the head coach of the Bahrain national football team.

Taylor was the last English footballer to score two goals in his first two international games before Rickie Lambert repeated the feat in 2013.

After his playing career ended, Taylor embarked on a career as a coach and manager.

Taylor became player manager at non-league club Dartford.

In his four seasons there, club attendances rose from 400 to around 1000, he won the Southern Cup twice and each season he was there Dartford scored more than 100 goals.

Taylor's first managerial role in the Football League was at Southend United.

He was previously manager at Dartford, Enfield, Southend United, Dover Athletic, Leicester City, Brighton and Hove Albion, Hull City, Crystal Palace, Kerala Blasters, Stevenage Borough, Wycombe Wanderers, Bradford City and (twice) Gillingham, leaving the last role at the end of 2014.

He also had two spells as head coach of the England under-21 team and took charge of the England national team as caretaker manager for one game against Italy, for which he made David Beckham captain of England for the first time.