Huddersfield Town have added English know how to their new German coaching team in the shape of Mike Marsh.
And experience doesn’t come much more varied.
Now 46, the former Liverpool player and coach went straight from pub football to Anfield as a teenager.
The midfielder was spotted while playing his Saturday football for the old Kirkby Town club and turning out for local league side Railway on Sundays.
Marsh, who will work alongside head coach David Wagner and his assistant Christoph Buhler at Town, made his Reds debut under Kenny Dalglish in the 2-0 top-flight home win over Charlton Athletic in March 1989.
It was the first of 101 appearances (six goals) for a player who was an unused substitute in the 1992 FA Cup final win over Sunderland at Wembley.
His most memorable moment came in the UEFA Cup second-round tie versus Auxerre at Anfield in November 1991.
Liverpool had lost the first leg 2-0 but Marsh scored his side’s second in a 3-0 win.
Marsh was transferred to West Ham United along with David Burrows in a swap deal to bring Julian Dicks to Anfield in September 1993.
“I actually asked to leave Liverpool, when it came to not getting into the side when I thought I was better than the one who was in,” he later explained.
Marsh played 61 time for the Hammers before Coventry City splashed out £450,000 for his signature in December 1994.
But within six months, he had linked up with his former Liverpool manager Graeme Souness at Galatasaray in a £500,000 deal.
The same figure was paid by Southend United to bring him back to England in September 1995.
Marsh was a regular for the Roots Hall club, playing against Town in what is now the Championship, before suffering a bad knee injury in October 1997.
He accepted an insurance pay-out which meant he wasn’t allowed to play in the Football League again.
So despite winning the Conference (now National League) twice with Kidderminster Harriers (in 2000) and Boston United (2002), he was unable to go up with them.
Marsh also played for Barrow, Southport and Accrington Stanley, with whom he won the Northern Premier League in 2003.
Having ended his playing career, he remained in non-league football as a coach and manager, serving Burscough, Bradford Park Avenue and Northwich Victoria.
He rejoined Liverpool as an academy coach, working with Town’s head of football operations Stuart Webber.
Marsh stepped up to first-team level under Brendan Rodgers in May 2013 and he helped the Reds claim runners-up spot in the Premier League and therefore Champions League qualification in 2014.
However, he departed Anfield this summer alongside assistant manager Colin Pascoe as part of a backroom reshuffle under which Sean O’Driscoll and Gary McAllister arrived.
Liverpool, of course, are now managed by Wagner’s friend and former Borussia Dortmund coaching colleague Jurgen Klopp.
