When Alan Lewer joined the club in May as Jimmy Quinn's assistant he said he was excited by the potential at the club. He is no less excited now after United's club record-breaking start to the season, but urges people not to get carried away.
The former Aldershot, Bournemouth and Woking player has a wealth of experience of football at both league and non-league levels, having previously assisted at Woking, Chester (twice), Doncaster, Boston, and managed at Nuneaton Borough, Telford and Forest Green Rovers.
Last season 51-year-old Lewer was assistant to John Hollins at Crawley and finished the season involved in scouting and player recruitment at Grays Athletic.
Born in Guildford, Alan started out as a 16-year-old player with Aldershot and spent seven years there when they were in the Football League, also playing for Bournemouth and Woking during his playing career.
His managerial career began at VS Rugby in 1996 when they were struggling in the old Southern League. He had been player-coach under famous non-league manager Geoff Chapple at Windsor & Eton, but moved to live in Rotherham and was offered the chance to take over at VS Rugby.
"You don't usually get jobs in football unless a club is struggling but I kept them afloat and kept them in the division and took them to the final qualifying round of the FA Cup," recalls Lewer.
"Then I was approached by Telford in the Conference and went there as Jimmy Mullins' assistant before getting the job myself. It was Jimmy who told me to stay and take the job when he left; I believe that if a manager brings you in and puts his trust in you then you do the honourable thing and leave with them. I've done that everywhere else I've been, like Chester with Mark Wright and at Crawley with John Hollins, but Jimmy felt it was a harsh decision when they let him go and he told me to stay and try to build the club.
"So I stayed on and saved them from relegation and took them to the semi-final of the FA Trophy. Funnily enough, when I was there we played Cambridge United in the FA Cup at Telford; Cambridge won and I remember Trevor Benjamin scored."
But events at Telford overtook him and he had to move on: "It was their best season for something like 18 years but they told me I didn't have any full-time experience as a manager and they wanted to bring in someone who had managed full-time.
"So I went up to Doncaster Rovers to be assistant manager to Steve Wignall, and he later went on to manage at Colchester United so we went our own ways and I moved to Chester City to be assistant to Mark Wright."
Alan helped Wright to assemble the team that went on to win promotion from the Conference in 2004 before being approached by Nuneaton Borough to take over as manager and try avoid relegation from the Conference.
"We didn't quite do it and I managed them for a year in the Doc Marten's League before Mark Wright asked me to go back to Chester City to help them in the Football League, and then I moved on again when Forest Green approached me to take over there.
"They were in a dire situation when I took over, with no points after ten games, but I don't mind saying that Mike Davis and myself did a fantastic job there and we finished third from bottom, although the club got a reprieve from relegation that season because another club went down. We only got beaten ten times in the last 36 games, and there were a lot of draws in those games but when you're struggling it's very hard and we had to change about 20 players during that season, so that was a massive achievement.
"But at the end of the season they decided to take another direction so I went to Crawley with John Hollins and we saved them from relegation, and then we started last season with a ten point deduction because of administration. I thought we did a fantastic job there and we soon made up the ten points, but then the owners came in and said they couldn't afford to pay us so we had to move on last October."
Lewer joined Grays early in 2007 and was involved with scouting and recruiting players, but didn't have to think hard about Jimmy Quinn's request to join Cambridge United as his assistant in May 2007.
"Anyone who knows the Conference knows that Cambridge United has a fantastic fanbase and I just feel that the club is ready to move on and go back into the Football League," he said at the time.
"Jim and I have known each other through football and been in touch for several years, although we've never worked together before. He took Shrewsbury up a couple of seasons ago, I was in the background at Chester for the success there, and hopefully that's where we can take Cambridge United.
"The potential is here to go back into the League and this club reminds me of Doncaster Rovers years ago; they were a big club coming down to the Conference and it took a little while to get it moving and get out, but if we do get out of the Conference I think we can kick on further again, and that's what we're here to do.
"There's massive potential here and I feel the club is ripe to move on. I know Jim and what he has achieved before, and it's my job to make sure I help him in the right way and try to relieve some of the pressure by taking on some of the little things that he doesn't need to deal with day to day.
"I think once you've managed yourself you know what those things are, and it's a matter of taking a little bit of pressure off at the right time."
Alan explains that one day is never the same as the next and the nature of his role means that he and the manager work closely together for the good of the club.
"We're together or talking to each other every day, we eat together at night two or three times a week and we're discussing everything all the time so it's a case of doing whatever needs to be done at the time. If the Gaffer asks me to do something, I'll get on and do it.
"He might say to me 'Can you do this today, or do that, or go and watch this player and I'll watch this one?' so there aren't any defined duties as such; we just split the jobs between us. The Gaffer needs to have trust in someone and to know that if he asks for something to be done, it will get done.
"Sometimes on the sidelines you might see something and suggest it, but it's the Gaffer's choice at the end of the day because he lives and dies by his own decisions.
"When this position came up he phoned me about it and we spoke in depth because he had a lot of people he could have brought in, and we seem to have struck up a great working relationship and long may it continue."
Having been in the role for five months and with the first quarter of the season behind us, Alan is pleased with the start but also cautious about getting carried away.
"It's been fantastic so far. The club's gone in the record books for its best unbeaten start, and I think the players deserve all the credit for that. The Gaffer did his homework over the summer on the players he brought in and it's one of the best camps that I've seen.
"They're all fantastic in training. There are a lot of characters in there and a lot of people that the younger players look up to because of where they've been and what they've done, and that's a good thing and a good blend of youth and experience within the side.
"There are no 'big time Charlies' here, they all get on well and everyone's pulling the same way - if someone's having a bad time they try and pull them through. If people are out injured they try to keep them around and involved and I think it's been fantastic, and I think the Gaffer deserves a lot of credit for that.
"For the last eight years Cambridge have been on a downward spiral and we wanted to achieve a better performance than last year, and hopefully we're on our way to doing that.
"I think people do get carried away because of where we are now," he adds. "We're only a small squad and when the FA Cup and the Setanta Cup and the FA Trophy games kick in that will test us to the limit."
Alan concludes with a message for the supporters, saying, "I hope the crowds stick with us. I'm sure they will and I hope we can give them what they want within the next couple of years. I'm sure that will be possible.
"Obviously we hope that happens this year, but certainly over the next couple of years hopefully we can do something."
Andrea Thrussell
web@cambridge-united.co.uk
*An edited version of this interview was published in the programme for the match against Halifax on Saturday 6th October, 2007.
A Q&A of supporters' questions done at the same time can be found in the Q&A part of the News section.
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