Windass Agrees To Go As McCall Starts Work

Dean Windass is having two weeks in Spain after agreeing to re-join Hull City from the Bantams on the day that Stuart McCall returns from his stay in the sun and starts work at Valley Parade.

McCall will be unveiled as Bradford City gaffer on Monday and is already looking at players to signing having moved on £175,000 worth of wages n Windass and Marc Bridge-Wilkinson. Would McCall’s plans have been different with Windass? In truth he has never had much of a chance to retain the services of a guy called back to his hometown club and McCall himself will understand that more than most.

Windass’s exit is reportedly worth £100,000 to City now and £1,000 for every game the 29 year old plays. One can only hope that suspensions count as plays and not sit outs and that the next time Dean has a fall out in a car park City do not end up £5,000 worse off.

I for one will miss Windass from Valley Parade. In final reckoning for all the issues that come with him he was a fantastic footballer with brains in his feet not between his ears. The drop off and volley against Scunthorpe United in a 4-2 win last season was for me the classic Windass goal. Movement in the head making young the legs.

McCall will find him irreplaceable and probably will not try. Colin Todd could never really find a partner for Windass nor could he decide if the striker was a line leader or a drop off man. Windass fitted neither role perfectly and was best left to his own devices to hit goals from where he wanted. McCall’s time at Sheffield United suggests he will favour a big guy/tricky guy combination and be hunting the services of Billy Paynter or someone very much in the Billy Paynter stylee.

McCall finds holes all over his team. The building block in place is a back triangle between Donovan Ricketts, David Wetherall and Mark Bower. Central midfield is the province of the next generation of City player in Craig Bentham and Tom Penford and one suspects that McCall will strengthen that position first but managers are made and broken on the strength of the strikers and Windass – for all his faults – could have been a quick route to the making of McCall.