Lee Clark has described his sacking by Huddersfield Town as a “hammer blow”.

In his autobiography entitled ‘Black or White, no Grey Areas’, Clark reflects on Town’s play-off final defeat to Peterborough and his dismissal the following campaign.

The book is penned by Geordie ghost-writer Pavel – Will Scott – and is published by Mojo Risin’ Publishing.

Picking up after Town’s 3-0 loss to Posh in the 2011 League One promotion showdown at Old Trafford, Clark reflects:

“We started the new campaign as we finished the old one, unbeaten. We extended that run in the league to a record-breaking 43 games before suffering a 2-0 reversal at The Valley to promotion rivals Charlton Athletic.

“We’d been knocked out of all cup competitions in the early rounds but no-one had managed to beat us in the league in eleven months of that calendar year.

“We were in and out of the top two automatic promotion places with Chris Powell’s Addicks, who were flying as well.

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“Everything was geared up to swap League One for the Championship when I took a call from our chairman (Dean Hoyle) to say he was relieving me of my duties following a 1-0 home defeat to Sheffield United. Shocked wasn’t the word. It was a hammer blow.

“The conflicting emotions were coursing through my veins. It was: who, what, why, where, when, how? It was all questions and I didn’t have any answers.

“We’d beaten the Blades, quite convincingly, 3-0, at Bramall Lane earlier in the season and that defeat was only our third loss of the new term.

“I was astonished. The staff saw my reaction after I put the phone down. They couldn’t believe it.

“I called a lunch meeting with the players and all of the staff to talk about the game because I didn’t want to make them aware of what had just happened at first. But you know how it is in

football and it wasn’t long before the story had been leaked in the media.

“England’s greatest ever goalscorer, Wayne Rooney, tweeted something along the lines that most managers must be under pressure if Lee Clark has been sacked after that record-breaking run.

“It was quite a compliment that a player of his magnitude and stature was keeping an eye on a team two leagues below his.”

Lee Clark at Kilmarnock Football Club Open Day.

Clark says he was inundated with messages of goodwill from other managers and from members of his squad – who he insists he had not ‘lost’.

Continuing in the book, Clark said: “The Huddersfield chief (Hoyle) felt he had to make this decision to move the club forward.

“Our relationship never deteriorated in all my time at the West Yorkshire outfit. Obviously I was disappointed and angry for a few months after. I disagreed with the reasons why he let me go.

“But when I return (to the stadium) now, I’m a guest of his, and we still speak regularly.

“Hoyle often calls asking my opinion on different players. I know he’s recommended me for other jobs and given me a glowing reference. He’ll always be a man I’ll have the utmost respect for.

“He’s often told me that his biggest regret was not making the leap into the Championship together.

“We would have kicked on even further because we’d built this momentum and it would’ve carried on.

“We could have heated debates without falling out. That is how strong our relationship was.”