Ray Williams: Adams Blades bet paid off

Columnist Ray Williams discusses the time when Micky Adams left for Sheffield United and a potentially lucrative tip-off from the horse’s mouth…

By Ray Williams
April 15th 2012

Micky Adams would always be found in the room that I shared with Geoff Horsfield. Most of the internal organisation went on in there. You can imagine how often his mobile would ring, but he would always answer it in front of us and was happy for us to listen.

Rumours started going around that he was in the running for the manager’s job at Sheffield United. About this time he started to go out of the room when his phone rang, but not all of the time. I put two and two together and decided to ask him point-blank if he was going. He smiled and winked but said nothing.

I asked him to let me know so that I could get a bet on him as the next manager of Sheffield United.

A couple of days later he went missing for a day and when he came in the next day I gave him a knowing smile. He said to me “How much have you got in your wallet?” I opened it up to count £160 in front of him. Again he didn’t say another word but I knew what he meant.

Later that day I said to him in front of a couple of players “£160 at 7/1. How much will that bring in?” Word got round but Mickey was appointed and the book was closed.

Poor Adam Yates couldn’t get over it. Marc Richards and Lee Collins were calling me for not giving them the tip. Nobody knows to this day whether I put the bet on. What do you think?

Next: Ray spills the beans on “busgate”…