John Bond Becomes MCFC Manager

On this day (17 October) in 1980 John Bond officially became the Manchester City manager. Back in November 1995 I interviewed the former Manchester City manager. At the time I was researching my in-depth history of the club called Manchester The Greatest City (later updated as Manchester The City Years).

I met John at his home and spent a good few hours with him chatting about the Blues and his career. I loved doing this interview and was always grateful for the time he gave me. He was quite frank, open and honest – which delighted me because he was a great talker. He was also happy for me to quote everything he said in the interview. I did end up quoting him extensively in the book (and in others I’ve produced) but none of the interview has ever been heard by the wider public.

You can hear the interview I did that day. In this first section he talks about the steps taken by City to appoint him; the interview (and the directors involved in that notorious filmed job interview for the City documentary in 1980-81); the signing of Tommy Hutchison, Bobby McDonald and Gerry Gow. As I said earlier, he is quite frank in his comments and that may surprise a few.

This audio recording of the first 17 minutes of the interview is available to subscribers of my blog whether annual or monthly. If you want to hear it then please subscribe below.

Of course as this interview was recorded on my old cassette recorder the quality isn’t the best but I’m sure you’ll appreciate the exclusive nature of this.

The other parts of the interview are available here:

John Bond Interview Part Two

John Bond Interview – Part Three

John Bond Interview – Part Four

John Bond Interview – Part 5

John Bond Interview Part 6 (of 7)

John Bond Interview Part 7 (Final Part)

I’ve also posted an obituary I wrote to John here:

Johnny Bond, Johnny Bond, Johnny Bond