It is the middle of July and as players at EFL clubs return to training grounds for pre-season, Billy Clarke heads off to his local Nuffield gym.
The 33-year-old forward has spent most days in the last three weeks either at the gym, putting in the hard work on football pitches near to his Yorkshire home or on the golf course taking his mind off his in-limbo career as he waits for his next move after being released by fourth division Bradford City at the start of the month.
Life as a footballing free agent is often a waiting game.
Weeks can pass without much for players in Clarke’s situation to do except keep themselves fit and ready because a move can materialise from nowhere in a matter of days. This summer is perhaps the toughest yet after 18 months of COVID-19 impacting club finances across the UK and beyond, which has limited what those teams lower down the pyramid are realistically able to offer players.
Short-term contracts, particularly for those later in their careers, offer little stability and so for a lot of players like Clarke, who has almost 400 games worth of experience in the EFL over the past 15 years, this summer has been a grind. Again.
“It’s rubbish to be in a cycle of one-year deals,” he tells The Athletic. “To not know where you’re going to be and you’re chasing it, you don’t feel appreciated really anywhere — so it’s basically just a job. It goes from doing it for the love of it to it becoming just a job that you have because you just happen to be OK at football. At Bradford, it was a lot more than that because I had been there a long time (four and a half years across three spells) and I care about the club, so I wanted to do well and felt it was my home.
“But you go to other places and you see players drive two hours there and two hours back every day and it’s not great, really. I know people will say we earn great money and that’s the case, but you would sacrifice a lot of that to have stability, be settled at home and have foundations.”
Clarke is pragmatic about his situation as he speaks — after all, he has been here before and seen plenty in his career.
After breaking through at Ipswich Town, where he was part of the team that won the 2004-05 FA Youth Cup while also featuring for the Republic of Ireland’s age-group sides, Clarke scored 18 goals across three loans at Darlington, Northampton Town and Brentford in 2008-09 before moving to Blackpool, where he was part of their 2010 promotion to the Premier League under Ian Holloway.
Clarke celebrates a goal for Ipswich in 2006 – having been handed his debut at 17 (Photo: Jamie McDonald/Getty Images)
He scored a goal inside 20 seconds against local rivals Preston North End in that 2009-10 campaign and is still in a WhatsApp group chat with other Blackpool players from that season. Clarke missed all of Blackpool’s season in the top flight after an ACL injury in pre-season, then the same happened to his other knee in December 2017 when he was at Charlton Athletic.
Last summer, he returned for a third spell at Bradford after short stints with Plymouth Argyle — 300 miles from his family home, which presented its own challenges — and Grimsby Town in the previous, pandemic truncated lower-league season.
Moves happen quickly and accommodation has to be sorted fast as medicals are completed in the blink of an eye.
Clarke jokes that it is a far cry from the world of VO₂ max machines and heart monitors often shown strapped to elite players who cost leading clubs millions of pounds when deals lower down are only worth “a bag of balls and a packet of Haribo” in comparison.
“I ended the season before that (2018-19, when he became a free agent as his second Bradford spell ended) not wanting to move away from home but I ended up going to Plymouth, which was the furthest away in the country. I signed in October and that was done in pretty much three or four days. I had a phone call from (Plymouth manager) Ryan Lowe and three days later I was down there. You’re living in a hotel for three months away from your family then, and it is difficult.
“There are loads of factors why (a player might choose a certain club). It might be that it’s the only option or people need the money or they just love playing. It’s only the last couple of years where I’ve been in a situation where I have been out of contract. Before then, everywhere I had gone I had three or four clubs to choose from before I went there — except for Charlton, where they bought me and it was a progression in my career. That didn’t work out through injury but, up until a few years ago, I had plenty of options to weigh up. When you’re 30 or 31 and there’s one club interested, then it’s either that or retire.”
Having celebrated promotions with Blackpool and then Crawley Town in 2012 during a career that’s taken him to 12 English clubs plus Falkirk in Scotland, Clarke is under no illusions as to why certain players will be more appealing to League Two clubs — those young enough to have potential resale value are most likely to land moves early but typically the first few weeks of a window are quiet while clubs assess their plans and budgets.
Agents will put feelers out as soon as they know what is happening with their player at his present club. In Clarke’s case, that came about after Bradford’s change of manager in June, with Derek Adams replacing the double act Mark Trueman and Conor Sellars shortly after steering Morecambe to victory in the League Two play-off final.
“I found out through a phone call and I was obviously disappointed — I felt that I could have added something there but it obviously wasn’t meant to be,” says Clarke. “It was a bit more complicated than normal because of the changeover of manager.
“With Derek coming in, he obviously wants his own players and his own people around him in his own style and when that was happening I wasn’t too expectant on what I would get. If I had got something, it would have been a major bonus. I hoped that they would keep someone who has done well for the club and who has been there for a while.”
Clarke played 32 times in all competitions last season as Bradford, for whom he has scored 30 of his 84 career goals, finished 15th in the 24-team fourth tier. He combined that with some coaching in their academy, which is a key part of his focus as he moves towards the end of his career. Continuing to work in football is his passion as he works through his UEFA A Licence with “an eye on what I’m going to do after and if what I am doing now is going to benefit that”.
A role combining playing and coaching would be his ideal move this summer, although wages and location will be important factors to consider as he wants to keep his family settled near Bradford.
On average, players in League Two can earn from about £300 to £3,000 a week which at the lower end equates to just over £14,000 a year to be a full time professional. That allows for little time to prepare for life after football while playing part-time as a semi-professional can prove more fruitful.
“When you’re away every day for 10 months of the year, you wonder if it is worth it for the money; which is not even that good — there are lads earning more money playing part-time in non-League than a lot of players in League Two,” says Clarke.
“You have got to do it for the love of the game. If I was 19 on a League Two wage then you can view it as a stepping stone, but when you have got a family and bills to pay then there’s actually, other than pride, little benefit in doing it when you are sacrificing your family life.
“I’m fully invested in playing for another season but if there’s no coaching role (involved) then it means putting my next career on the back burner and this time next year, I might be in the same position again.
“That’s the real side of football, especially in League Two. People have bills to pay so it’s a normal job that they love doing but one that pays their bills. People see it as a glamorous thing but you tell anyone to live away from their family for four months and they’ll start to understand the sacrifice.”
(Main image: Clarke left Bradford at the end of last season. Photo: George Wood/Getty Images)
The 33-year-old forward has spent most days in the last three weeks either at the gym, putting in the hard work on football pitches near to his Yorkshire home or on the golf course taking his mind off his in-limbo career as he waits for his next move after being released by fourth division Bradford City at the start of the month.
Life as a footballing free agent is often a waiting game.
Weeks can pass without much for players in Clarke’s situation to do except keep themselves fit and ready because a move can materialise from nowhere in a matter of days. This summer is perhaps the toughest yet after 18 months of COVID-19 impacting club finances across the UK and beyond, which has limited what those teams lower down the pyramid are realistically able to offer players.
Short-term contracts, particularly for those later in their careers, offer little stability and so for a lot of players like Clarke, who has almost 400 games worth of experience in the EFL over the past 15 years, this summer has been a grind. Again.
“It’s rubbish to be in a cycle of one-year deals,” he tells The Athletic. “To not know where you’re going to be and you’re chasing it, you don’t feel appreciated really anywhere — so it’s basically just a job. It goes from doing it for the love of it to it becoming just a job that you have because you just happen to be OK at football. At Bradford, it was a lot more than that because I had been there a long time (four and a half years across three spells) and I care about the club, so I wanted to do well and felt it was my home.
“But you go to other places and you see players drive two hours there and two hours back every day and it’s not great, really. I know people will say we earn great money and that’s the case, but you would sacrifice a lot of that to have stability, be settled at home and have foundations.”
Clarke is pragmatic about his situation as he speaks — after all, he has been here before and seen plenty in his career.
After breaking through at Ipswich Town, where he was part of the team that won the 2004-05 FA Youth Cup while also featuring for the Republic of Ireland’s age-group sides, Clarke scored 18 goals across three loans at Darlington, Northampton Town and Brentford in 2008-09 before moving to Blackpool, where he was part of their 2010 promotion to the Premier League under Ian Holloway.
Clarke celebrates a goal for Ipswich in 2006 – having been handed his debut at 17 (Photo: Jamie McDonald/Getty Images)
He scored a goal inside 20 seconds against local rivals Preston North End in that 2009-10 campaign and is still in a WhatsApp group chat with other Blackpool players from that season. Clarke missed all of Blackpool’s season in the top flight after an ACL injury in pre-season, then the same happened to his other knee in December 2017 when he was at Charlton Athletic.
Last summer, he returned for a third spell at Bradford after short stints with Plymouth Argyle — 300 miles from his family home, which presented its own challenges — and Grimsby Town in the previous, pandemic truncated lower-league season.
Moves happen quickly and accommodation has to be sorted fast as medicals are completed in the blink of an eye.
Clarke jokes that it is a far cry from the world of VO₂ max machines and heart monitors often shown strapped to elite players who cost leading clubs millions of pounds when deals lower down are only worth “a bag of balls and a packet of Haribo” in comparison.
“I ended the season before that (2018-19, when he became a free agent as his second Bradford spell ended) not wanting to move away from home but I ended up going to Plymouth, which was the furthest away in the country. I signed in October and that was done in pretty much three or four days. I had a phone call from (Plymouth manager) Ryan Lowe and three days later I was down there. You’re living in a hotel for three months away from your family then, and it is difficult.
“There are loads of factors why (a player might choose a certain club). It might be that it’s the only option or people need the money or they just love playing. It’s only the last couple of years where I’ve been in a situation where I have been out of contract. Before then, everywhere I had gone I had three or four clubs to choose from before I went there — except for Charlton, where they bought me and it was a progression in my career. That didn’t work out through injury but, up until a few years ago, I had plenty of options to weigh up. When you’re 30 or 31 and there’s one club interested, then it’s either that or retire.”
Having celebrated promotions with Blackpool and then Crawley Town in 2012 during a career that’s taken him to 12 English clubs plus Falkirk in Scotland, Clarke is under no illusions as to why certain players will be more appealing to League Two clubs — those young enough to have potential resale value are most likely to land moves early but typically the first few weeks of a window are quiet while clubs assess their plans and budgets.
Agents will put feelers out as soon as they know what is happening with their player at his present club. In Clarke’s case, that came about after Bradford’s change of manager in June, with Derek Adams replacing the double act Mark Trueman and Conor Sellars shortly after steering Morecambe to victory in the League Two play-off final.
“I found out through a phone call and I was obviously disappointed — I felt that I could have added something there but it obviously wasn’t meant to be,” says Clarke. “It was a bit more complicated than normal because of the changeover of manager.
“With Derek coming in, he obviously wants his own players and his own people around him in his own style and when that was happening I wasn’t too expectant on what I would get. If I had got something, it would have been a major bonus. I hoped that they would keep someone who has done well for the club and who has been there for a while.”
Clarke played 32 times in all competitions last season as Bradford, for whom he has scored 30 of his 84 career goals, finished 15th in the 24-team fourth tier. He combined that with some coaching in their academy, which is a key part of his focus as he moves towards the end of his career. Continuing to work in football is his passion as he works through his UEFA A Licence with “an eye on what I’m going to do after and if what I am doing now is going to benefit that”.
A role combining playing and coaching would be his ideal move this summer, although wages and location will be important factors to consider as he wants to keep his family settled near Bradford.
On average, players in League Two can earn from about £300 to £3,000 a week which at the lower end equates to just over £14,000 a year to be a full time professional. That allows for little time to prepare for life after football while playing part-time as a semi-professional can prove more fruitful.
“When you’re away every day for 10 months of the year, you wonder if it is worth it for the money; which is not even that good — there are lads earning more money playing part-time in non-League than a lot of players in League Two,” says Clarke.
“You have got to do it for the love of the game. If I was 19 on a League Two wage then you can view it as a stepping stone, but when you have got a family and bills to pay then there’s actually, other than pride, little benefit in doing it when you are sacrificing your family life.
“I’m fully invested in playing for another season but if there’s no coaching role (involved) then it means putting my next career on the back burner and this time next year, I might be in the same position again.
“That’s the real side of football, especially in League Two. People have bills to pay so it’s a normal job that they love doing but one that pays their bills. People see it as a glamorous thing but you tell anyone to live away from their family for four months and they’ll start to understand the sacrifice.”
(Main image: Clarke left Bradford at the end of last season. Photo: George Wood/Getty Images)
