From selling programmes to saving his boyhood club, working on a film set and inventing a sporting phenomenon, John Croot’s lifetime in football deserves a crowning glory.
Chesterfield’s promotion back into the Football League mainstream, after six years below stairs, is imminent - and nobody can match Croot’s joyride from flogging matchday magazines to becoming the club’s chief executive.
Like the town’s famous crooked spire, there have been a few bends in the road. But anyone who loves football will welcome the Spireites’ return to EFL orbit if they collect the point required to start a month-long pub crawl in Derbyshire against Boreham Wood.
Manager Paul Cook was so gracious in defeat at last May’s play-off final against Notts County, when his heart was breaking for the better side on the day, that running away with the National League title this season is the least he deserves. And for Croot, the return journey from here to austerity will be a special moment when - not if - it happens.
“I went to school about 20 yards from our old ground at Saltergate, literally across the road from the away end, so I was a captive audience from a young age,” he said.
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“I used to find an excuse to go in the club shop every day after school until, one day, they asked if I wanted to sell programmes, and for years I would stand with a pile of them at the bottom of the centre stand steps.
“I sold loads when we beat Rangers 3-0 in the quarter-finals on our way to winning the old Anglo-Scottish Cup in 1981. As the last club to win the trophy it’s still in our boardroom cabinet.”
Before Chesterfield moved to their new stadium, Saltergate was the location for football scenes in The Damned United, Michael Sheen’s acclaimed portrayal of Brian Clough.
You won’t see Croot’s name when the credits roll, but you will see his desk and chair in the film. “Clough’s office in The Damned United was actually my office, and filming was still going around us on non-matchdays,” he said.
Michael Sheen played Brian Clough in The Damned United“I was working in a room down the corridor when they shot the scene where Jim Broadbent, who played the Derby chairman Sam Longson, was telling Cloughie he was out the door. I could hear Michael Sheen banging the table shouting, ‘You can’t get rid of me - it would be a disaster for the club. For the whole of Derby.’
“When the film came out and they got to that scene, I thought, ‘I’ve heard those lines before. All 12 takes, or however many times it was.’ But it was a surreal experience to feel part of a movie set.”
In real life, Croot has helped to save the Spireites from going under - twice. He was a ringleader of the supporters’ society that saved them from being kicked out of the League in 2001.
And when the pandemic came calling 20 years later, he orchestrated a takeover by the Chesterfield FC Community Trust which rescued them again. “The club was not in a good place during Covid, and the decision to try and do something about it wasn’t based on business reasons,” said Croot. “People thought we were crackers and letting hearts rule our heads.
“But it gave us a unique opportunity to embed the club in the community. Billionaires and nation states might be able to buy a club, but I’m not sure they ever truly own them. Clubs like Chesterfield will always belong to the fans.”
National League leaders Chesterfield are on the verge of promotionTwin £500,000 loans from Chesterfield council and Derbyshire county council gave Croot’s rescue plan breathing space, and now the club is in rude health with local businessmen Phil and Ashley Kirk lining up a £2m investment for a majority stake.
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Once the party gets started at the SMH Group stadium, it could go on all summer. Croot said: “We are hosting the IWFF Walking Football world championship in May, which is gratifying for someone who is credited with inventing it.
“Sport England tell me 100,000 people play walking football regularly in Britain now, and it’s probably the most rapidly-expanding sport in the world.
“We’ll have 18 nations coming to Chesterfield for their version of the world cup. You could say walking football’s coming home.”
And darts royalty John Lowe, a Spireites fan and three-times world champion who lives in the town, is doing an exhibition night at the club, taking on allcomers.
“You can tell the players are taking it seriously,” said Croot. “In the last couple of weeks a dartboard has appeared in the dressing room, and they have even put a light above it, so they obviously mean business.”
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