Former Tottenham Hotspur player Jamie O’Hara enjoyed a successful career in the professional ranks — and now he is seemingly as happy as ever with his role as boss of Billericay Town.
O’Hara was making good progress in shaping his squad with an eye on next season at the National League South side when the Covid-19 pandemic meant that the entire non-league football diary was wiped through concerns over the coronavirus crisis. But despite the disappointment of seeing their season come to a shuddering and unexpected halt, O’Hara has lots to like about the prospect of the club as they set about preparing for the return of football. Fans will soon be deciding whether or not Town are worth a punt to get promotion next season and bookies will be busier than ever. Bookies know one of the most important decisions they will make as a bookie is choosing a pay per head company and using score and stats is always a winner.
Of course, O’Hara’a main concern is retaining the valuable players he has assembled at the club but off the pitch there are some exciting things happening that will make the environment at the club one that is pleasing to onlookers.
Billericay, who have previously hit the national media outlet headlines during the time that multi-millionaire Glenn Tamplin owned the club (from 2016 through to 2019), have embarked on a huge project to transform their existing grass pitch at their New Lodge home to an all-weather 4G surface. O’Hara says he is delighted that the club’s new investors chose to install the new surface and be says that he believes the new pitch will be a great investment.
Speaking to the Yellow Advertiser newspaper, he said:
“It’s a great investment — fantastic for Billericay as a whole, really — not just the football club. It will bring the whole community together. With everyone being able to use it, it’s going to be fantastic for the club — it shows great ambition, especially in these tough times. The owners still went ahead with it, even though they knew there wasn’t going to be that much football played on it this year.”
At time of the season coming to an unexpected close, Town were in 18th spot in the league table standings but it is fair to say that it looked unlikely that O’Hara’s side would be sucked in to any threat of relegation as the season looked to run its course. This time of asking, O’Hara is very much tasked with seeing his side trouble the other end of the table and fans of the club remain very confident that he can do this. Of course, time will tell – one way or another, they will be able to play some attacking, expansive football on their new state-of-the-art pitch!
