A City youth academy graduate and former England U21 international, Edghill retired in 2008 after a stint with Macclesfield following spells with Birmingham City, Wigan Athletic, Sheffield United, QPR and Bradford City. Edghill now coaches for City's soccer school and works the lounges at the Etihad on matchday. Terry Cooke Pre-season expectations on Joe Royle and his squad of players, therefore, were high with promotion very much expected. But despite being favourites to go straight up, City finished below Fulham and Walsall sending them into the play-offs.

And no-one at Loftus Road will be more motivated to cause an upset than the one-time England under-21 international who was perched on the brink of giving up the game after leaving City.

On life for Swales after Reid’s dismissal

On 3rd May 1998, Manchester City were relegated to the third tier of football for the first time in their history.

Richard Arlon Edghill (born 23 September 1974) is an English football coach and former professional footballer.I am sure there are quite a few City fans and likely a large slice of the Bluemoon massive who never saw Richard Edghill play, or indeed know who Richard Edghill is. Boyhood Manchester City fan Richard Edghill lived the dream – rising through the youth team to become first team captain and on the brink of an England call-up. We're just like any other company. If a factory goes under, there's no insurance there to bail them out. It doesn't worry me any more than it does an ordinary factory worker. Obviously it's a concern. We're ordinary workers really. I think that often gets forgotten. We are doing a job, just like any person in a factory would do a job.

He was offered the manager’s role by Franny Lee but turned it down. Asa was always a big influence on me and I later worked with him at Macclesfield Town. Steve Coppell He has a thigh problem but is confident it will heal before the Blues arrive in the capital for the middle leg of their long distance, one-week `tour' that will also take in Chelsea and Southampton. Unfortunately for Edghill, leaving City coincided with the most concentrated period of down-sizing the English game has ever witnessed, and despite brief stays with both Leicester and Sheffield United he found himself out of work for a whole season. It was only after a trip to see the Professional Footballers' Association - where former teammate Richard Jobson was one of the advisors - and a chat with former City chief Joe Royle, that Edghill decided to give it one last go. Then Wetherall finished his chemistry degree (he got a first) before joining Leeds as a full-time professional and playing nearly 250 games for them, mainly in the Premiership. He joined Bradford in 1999. Are we now at a stage where a City manager simply has to buy talent for the first team rather than blood a youngster for fear of a bad performance and the fans turning on a young lad?In the second of MEN Sport’s three-part serialisation of the book, today we look at his views on the three City chairmen he played under, Peter Swales, Franny Lee and David Bernstein. On Peter Swales during the Peter Reid era Following his release Edghill had short unsuccessful spells with Wigan Athletic and Sheffield United before joining Queens Park Rangers in August 2003. In the 2005 close season Edghill joined Bradford City on a free transfer. At Bradford he scored twice; against Tranmere Rovers in the league [5] and Barnsley in the FA Cup. [6] He was one of ten players released by Bradford in May 2007 following the club's relegation from League One. [7]