New Stags’ boss Steve Evans says he will 'give everything' to the club’s fans after being appointed as manager earlier today.
The nine-time promotion winner put pen-to-paper on a deal at One Call Stadium this afternoon before being presented to the media in the Kevin Bird Suite.
And 54-year-old Evans, speaking exclusively to mansfieldtown.net, said the he will 'give his life' to the club’s fans.
“The fans will get everything. They’ll get Steve Evans' life and if you go and ask Massimo Cellino, the owner of Leeds United, if you go and ask Tony Stewart, the owner of Rotherham, you can’t ask Bruce Winfield who is sadly no longer with us, the guy who led the revolution down at Crawley Town along with the Carter family, then they would say you get my life,” said Mr Evans.
“I literally live and breathe it, so that’s what they get plus a wealth of experience now across the years and someone who’s very focussed.
“It’s important for me that the supporters turn up on Saturday. There’ll be no miracles, there’ll be no major changes – they can’t see nine new faces because of where we are and they won’t see that going forward, but turn up and get behind the team and let’s be in it together; win, lose or draw because the roller-coaster, as I described it at Rotherham, it starts today.”
After meeting chairman John Radford earlier this week, Evans said the owner ‘sold the club to him’.
“When I went from Crawley when I went from virtually out of League One to League Two to join Rotherham United, I met a man call Tony Stewart, the chairman, and he sold a vision, he sold a plan and said certain things that he was going to do and he did every one of those - I met a man in the last 48 hours in John Radford who reminded me so much of that previous conversation.
“I didn’t want to go in somewhere that was fire-fighting in the leagues above and fighting against supporters and trusts and different people – I wanted to join a football club like I joined previously where everyone was pulling together and it’s fair to say that the chairman sold himself and the football club in a very admirable fashion and it didn’t take me long to want to be here.”
Looking at the squad which Mr Evans has inherited at the club, the new boss says he will assess the squad fairly and give everyone an equal opportunity.
“I think anyone looking in would say they’ve got some top players, they’ve got some average and they’ve possibly got some players that are a little bit short but the one thing that I’ve always prided myself on is myself and Paul Raynor, we come in and assess and we give everyone an equal opportunity.
“It doesn’t matter to me whether you’re 33 or whether you’re 16 – if you’re good enough you’ll go in to the team. We’re going to have a good look, we’ll meet with the rest of the staff, we’ll take opinions and we’ll take issues [if] there are any there – we don’t expect any because I think what I’ve been told, it’s a very positive group in the dressing room and we have to continue that.”
Supporters can view Steve Evans’ first interview as Stags’ boss on Stags PlayerHD.
