Lee Clark says he “tortured” himself with the decision to leave leading scorer Jordan Rhodes out of his 2011 play-off final team.

In his autobiography ‘Black or White, no Grey Areas’, which is published by Mojo Risin’ Publishing, the former Huddersfield Town boss insists it wasn’t a defensive move in any way.

He says of the 3-0 defeat to Peterborough at Old Trafford: “There was criticism from a few over my team selection for the final because I didn’t start with Jordan Rhodes.

“The reason behind that was simple. I played a different system when we were away from home.

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“It had been very successful during our unbeaten run. We did the double over Brighton that season and they went on to win the league comfortably.

“I went for this away mindset at Old Trafford, which meant Rhodes didn’t play. Instead I selected 18-year-old Benik Afobe, who got transferred to Bournemouth for £10m in 2016.

“I was open for criticism after the game because Rhodes was our top goalscorer.

Lee Clark shows a copy of his autobiography

“Had we won, it wouldn’t have been mentioned. No-one complained when the system was previously successful on our travels. It wasn’t as if I went out to play defensively, I didn’t. I played three attackers but two of them were wide men.

“This was one of the decisions I tortured myself with. Rhodes was on the verge of making an appearance as a substitute when Peterborough scored a second goal, which made it look even worse for me.”

Clark firmly believes his team were worth automatic promotion that campaign.

“I still maintain to this day that had Anthony Pilkington been fit, we would have achieved automatic promotion,” he says.

“A play-off defeat to Peterborough and heartache would have been avoided.

“He was the best player in League One and we didn’t have him for the final three months of the campaign. Our talisman was that good, a Premier League team (Norwich City at the time, he is now with Town’s next opposition Cardiff City) was prepared to take him despite recovering from a dislocated ankle and broken fibula bone above the ankle.

“It was quite an introspective period of my life.

“I was asking whether there was anything I could have done differently. Was it my fault?

“Without realising, looking back, this is probably what Kevin Keegan was going through in 1996 when we finished second to Man United – and Peter Reid when Sunderland lost to Charlton in the 1998 play-off final.”