Having possibly not seen him play at all It is difficult to comment but Wikipedia writes "After catching the eye of cross channel scouts with his subsequent displays for
Longford Town and
Athlone Town, Place was signed by
Damien Richardson for
Gillingham on 21 October 1989. He made his debut two days later against
Chesterfield, but a promising career with the English third division club was cut short when he incurred a serious neck injury, which kept out of the game for six years". He appears to have had a decent career in coaching youth players in Ireland even at national level. Rumoured to have been at Hibernian in 2016.Possibly proving that you don't need to be able to play to be able to coach football.