AFTER a lengthy and solid career as a lower-league defender, playing around 500 games for various clubs across the country, came a first taste of management with Hereford which included a Wembley final. Josh Gowling’s football CV is solid if not spectacular. Ordinary, perhaps.

His background is far from ordinary, however.

Because, as well as playing for Bournemouth, Gillingham, Lincoln and others, he has been a Guardian columnist, worked in a special educational needs school, trained to be a counsellor and, during his playing days, completed a five-year psychology degree. “It was a long slog!” he says.

“When I got to my mid-20s I started to look at what I was going to do after football,” Gowling explains. “I was looking at where football was going and man-management is key, so I thought psychology would be ideal for me. I embarked on that for five years with the Open University.”

Gowling is different. He’s also rock-bottom of the National League North.

Appointed manager three weeks ago by Darlington, seven months after leaving Hereford, it’s a return to the game for the Grimsby-based 39-year-old, who played for 11 clubs though not often against Quakers.

There was an encounter five years ago, however, playing for Alfreton at Blackwell Meadows, and he is not likely to forget it.

“I damaged my voice box playing here! I got an elbow in the throat,” he says. “I don’t know who by, it was probably Mark Beck! So now, after two or three minutes of shouting my voice goes and it was from that game.”

Unfortunately, for Gowling, he is likely be shouting on the sidelines, at least for the time being, helping to cajole and encourage a team at a low ebb.

He’s got a tough task on his hands. Darlington’s decline began midway through last season and it’s now three victories in the last 28 league games, a dismal run which led to his predecessor, Alun Armstrong, being axed.

Gowling’s had three games - drawn one and lost two - including last Saturday’s punishing 4-0 defeat at Tamworth.

No team in the division has conceded more goals, and no team has scored fewer – Quakers have hit the net once in their last five league games, and that was a penalty by Will Hatfield.

But Gowling backs himself to steer Darlington away from danger.

“There’s 30-odd games left,” he says. “I’ve come into the football club and the reality is we have not won many games since February. The fans are experiencing hurt and doom and gloom, and I completely understand that and I understand there’s fear there.

“But I’m not fearful. I know what’s at the club and I know what we can do. I know the people behind the scenes and I know my own ability. We will turn it around, I’ve got no doubt about that.

“I know the league very well, I was in my last role for four seasons, I’m no slouch if I can stay in a job for that long given the average lifespan of a manager now.

“In my first season at Hereford, we won something like one of the first ten games, but after the next ten we were three points off the play-offs. So I’ve been in this situation before, I get it.”

Quakers’ slide began in February, the same month Gowling left Hereford by mutual consent, where he became interim boss in January 2020, taking the role on a more permanent basis the following summer.

Partly due to Covid interfering, Gowling only had one full season in charge at Edgar Street, finishing 12th in 2021-22, which is also the year he penned a monthly column for the Guardian. Wembley was the previous year, defeated in the FA Trophy final by underdogs Hornchurch, who had overcome Quakers in the quarter-finals.

Of his time at Hereford, also a fan-owned club, he adds: “It was a good first job for me, it was difficult as we went through Covid, but a lot went on over the four seasons and it was a really good learning curve.

“We got to an FA Trophy final, we had a big FA Cup run last year and finished in their highest league position with pretty much a relegation budget.

“I’ve turned down a few roles this year. The environment I was going into had to fit. My next job had to meet my expectations and what I wanted to do. I had been at Hereford for four years, and unfortunately promotion wasn’t something that they wanted.

“There were ten or 11 players that we developed and moved onto higher levels.

“It became difficult to kick on. But here, speaking to David Johnston (chief executive) and the board about their vision for the club - I want to be at a club that I can grow with and they want to grow too.”

Gowling is thinking long-term, of the bigger picture. He talks optimistically about creating a pathway from the youth section to the first team, about the importance of the academy and becoming engaged in the community.

“I want to build a club. It’s not just a job, it’s my life,” he says. “I think I can be a beast at a football club with a structure in place and with people that want success. There’s going to be hurt along the way, and when a club is in transition there’s normally a bit of chaos before it smooths out.”

The beast of Blackwell? Sounds good. Three points against King’s Lynn Town today would sound even better, though he knows an improvement on last Saturday is required.

There has been focus among supporters on Gowling’s switch to playing with wing-backs and preference for playing from the back, particularly as attempting to do so gifted Tamworth their second goal.

“We played out from the back and sometimes it was excellent, but we didn’t look so good when the second goal was scored,” he admits.

“We want to win games in a certain way, but we’ve got to make sure the level of information is right.

“We need to be solid, organised, shut up shop and grind games out.

“We need a clear structure. It’s important we have a structure and an identity. Once that it is imprinted, when things go wrong you can tweak and change things.

“Saturday was a new one for me, I’d never lost 4-0 before. We’ve come into an environment where we’ve been losing matches for a long time, not just this season.

“I don’t like the idea of the new manager’s bounce, as that means you have a lift and then back down again. For me, it’s about steady progression and that means the mentality of the group has to change.”

As well as talking tactically, Gowling talks a lot about mentality, perhaps unsurprisingly for someone with an interest in psychology.

“The reality is, from February to now we have been on a losing streak,” he adds. “The mentality of the group doesn’t just change when a new manager comes in. There’s work to be done behind the scenes to make sure their confidence is at a good level.

“It’s about changing the mentality, building the confidence to get to a position where we are more consistent and the whole group is different.

“Speaking to the players after the game, they were frustrated. But the good thing about that is they’re angry about what’s been going on and that’s because they care.

“You sometimes hear, after losing a few games, people saying the players don’t care – I can tell you now that all of these players care about this club and want to be here.

“The players are a bit low at the moment, so we need them to be positive and we need the environment to be positive because behind the scenes things are going in a good direction.

“We’re going to have a game plan to try and win on Saturday, that’s the main thing. But even if we don’t win, we’re going to be fine.

“I’ve come into the club and fans will have been thinking, ‘We need wins straight away’. It hasn’t happened yet, but it will happen and we’ll get away from the situation we’re in.”