In Praise of a (Semi) Professional Bench Warmer

Graham James, possibly our most prolific guest writer (admittedly not a large group) looks at the slight Poppies career of Saul Milovanic which might just take longer to read than he spent on the pitch!

When we next get through to a televised FA Cup game they will look back at our history and discover the initial shirt sponsorship and FA Cup goalscoring records. What they might also discover is our recent record-breaking speed in starting rumours and criticism of a manager within 24 hours after the end of a much better than expected season. (oh, just seen that he has left!)

To deflect my disappointment of this I started to look at the player-of-the-season awards. Which must be the only one where there seems to be as many awards as there are who attend. However, my expectations in this ceremony were totally misplaced when I discovered that Saul Milovanovic did not pick up even one award.  

His ‘journey’ started here just before Christmas 2021 when players were coming and going with a mystifying regularity. One new signing by Paul Cox stood out though as we discovered that we were signing a Serbian.  He was given the usual welcome and given the normal platitude of hoping that he has a happy and successful time here and was described as being a good addition to the squad.

I am sure that many of us quickly made our normal searches on the endless statistics- based websites to find out all about him. It was not difficult to see that he had promisingly played for Huddersfield and Norwich under- 23s and we already had some players from similar teams. In fact, he was signed by Norwich as a coach moved there from Huddersfield and recommended him. He was described as a defensive midfielder (apparently) and had played numerous games for Norwich u-23s but without ever making the first team, not even as a late substitute in an early round Carabou Cup game.   

Possibly the only photograph of Saul
in a red top.  Not a Poppies top.  Still....

His er… “career” with Kettering Town Football Club got off to a very slow start with the games both before and after Christmas being called off due to covid in the ranks. He sort of started with us on January 2nd by starting on the bench in the 3-1 win against Brackley (not many teams did that). He did not actually come on but he had the honour of replacing Kyle Perry on the bench. His stuttering beginning continued with the next game also called off. The following game was the reverse fixture at Brackley. 

He made his debut there with him coming on after 62 minutes. I don’t think it is too much of a spoiler to say that this was to be his longest appearance. Looking back, it did not really show that Cox was convinced about him yet. The team still had some players out with covid. We only had 4 substitutes and one of them was Ed Cook who had been called back from his loan at Grantham, because they did not have a game, Sherriff had come on at half time and the other substitute was Davies, a goalkeeper. Not only that but George Cooper, a young centre -half, was selected as a defensive midfielder ahead of Saul. The match report did not mention any contribution by him.

Luke Graham did not use him in his one and only game but then came the arrival of Culverhouse. With him having strong Norwich connections, it is quite likely that he was aware of Saul, or at least knew people who knew him. He did get 15 minutes to impress in Cully’s first game though we were  behind and he was the third substitute used , of the 4 on the bench. Obviously he didn’t impress though as he then started his first run of non-appearances which included games where club stalwarts such as Diakiesse and Joshua were picked ahead of him and O’Connell was brought off the bench instead of him at Telford, despite him being an on loan centre half, with the score at 2-2. The signing of Jack Smith did not help his chances and then some good performances by Calder denied him further opportunities.

He had a cameo appearance of 3 minutes at Spennympoor with us being 2-1 down and the others keeping him company on the bench that day being 2 youth team players and an injured goalkeeper. It was a similar situation the next week at Chester with suspensions, injuries and some players not fully fit but playing. At least he played for 21 minutes, albeit coming on we were 4-0 down.

So the 19^th March was to be the last time we saw him in a Kettering shirt that was not covered by a tracksuit. His total playing time in just 4 games was therefore the grand total of 67 minutes spread over 4 months, always coming on when we were losing and only 15 minutes of them at home. He was not mentioned as making any contribution in the match reports and did not even get on the bench so much towards the end of the season when the injury list shortened.

He must be either the most patient or the most unambitious player we have ever had. I don’t suppose that he will get to see the normal thanks for his contribution and we will only know that he has gone when somebody notices his name appear probably at a Southern League team. If his photo ever comes up in the Poppies quiz in the programme, will anyone ever remember him, even though he was here for half a season?  Let’s just hope he starts the first game next season.