Cambridge United are pleased to announce Gary Waddock has been appointed as the Football Club's new Assistant Head Coach.
The 58-year old joins United bringing a wealth of valuable playing and coaching experience to assist Head Coach Mark Bonner in charge of First Team matters.
Formerly a player for Queens Park Rangers, Millwall, Bristol Rovers and Luton Town among others in a career with over 530 professional appearances, the midfielder also featured in the 1982 FA Cup Final for QPR and represented the Republic of Ireland internationally 21 times.
Since hanging up the boots in 1998, Waddock has moved on to a successful coaching career in assistant, head of coaching and full managerial roles at QPR, MK Dons, Oxford United, Barnet, Portsmouth and most recently at Southend United. He successfully achieved promotion from the Conference with a record points total of 101 with Aldershot Town in 2007, and also has a promotion from League Two on his C.V during his time managing Wycombe Wanderers.
Pleased to now be on board at the Abbey, Waddock commented: "Speaking to Mark [Bonner], I like his ideas and I'm excited about what he wants to do with the team to take the Club forward. Having also been in discussion with Ben Strang, I liked the way they both spoke about the picture of the Football Club.
"Mark's an extremely enthusiastic young coach with great ideas, and I feel with the experience that I've gained over my career, both playing and in different coaching roles, we can be a very good match for each other. His thinking is very much aligned with the ideas I have, and I believe I can help Mark to the benefit of everybody at the Club.
"I'm a coach who enjoys being out on the grass, getting ideas across to the players. Whenever that first day on the training pitch happens, given the current situation, I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully it will be sooner rather than later, so that we can begin with a positive frame of mind to build for a successful season."
Cambridge United Head of Football Ben Strang added: "During the process of Mark’s appointment, it was felt that we needed to support Mark with a high calibre Assistant Head Coach, in his first Head Coach role. We had a defined specification of the type of person we wished to recruit for the role and shortlisted a select few candidates that Mark and I met. Gary perfectly fulfils the criteria we set out to recruit and he has established a positive initial relationship with Mark already. We’re confident that Gary will offer terrific value and experience to our staff.”
