A slap round the face, pre-seasons with Venables and Gazza – and getting put up for sale on eBay: Guy Butters goes down memory lane

“Our manager David Pleat had been working on TV for the Mexico World Cup so was away, but his assistant, Trevor Hartley, pulled the whole squad, first team, reserve and youth team, into the changing rooms, all the big hitters were sat on chairs whilst us youngsters were sat on the floo,” he recalled.

“Trevor’s telling us what he and David Pleat expect from everyone and then suddenly he points at me and say ‘stand up’, he then promptly walks towards me and slaps me hard around the face, the room goes quiet, I naturally just stand there, and then he says, ‘Brilliant, no retaliation, that’s what we like to see!’, we then all go outside with everyone looking at me whilst we’re training because I’ve got this big hand mark on my face... different times, can’t imagine Pep trying that now.”

“Under Pleat, there was lot of cross country running, they used to take us by coach to Cuffley Woods, and the worst runner of the lot? Ossie Ardiles! The coach driver would always be waiting for him, he’d emerge from the woods muttering about just wanting a ball! But then in the afternoons with the ball work session, he’d be like the Duracell bunny, maybe it was the distance that did him?”

DID YOU READ? Mark McGhee on Sir Alex Fergsuon’s pre-season secret to success.

When Pleat left Spurs and Terry Venables arrived from Barcelona, Butters saw a huge change in the focus of the training the next summer.

“With Terry it was more ball work than running almost from the outset, it was one drill after another, but he also introduced the ‘Fartlek’ programme at the end of each session which was basically 20/30minutes of endurance running, walk, jog and then on the final whistle, sprint, it’s very common now back then it was innovative.”

Playing at Tottenham in the late 1980s meant pre-season with Gazza – and Butters has some fond and quite unforgettable memories of the Geordie Genius.

“He was, and still is a lovely lad, but never had a chance, there was always someone lurking in the shadows looking to buy him a beer or two, hoping for a story. We went to Northern Ireland at the height of the troubles and played Derry City in a ‘friendly’, the security was immense, machine guns the works, even after they game there was an atmosphere.

"Gazza nearly caused an international incident, we were all keen to get going, but he’d invited a couple of young kids on to the bus to get autographs, the kids were still on the bus when started moving away, and were ‘keen’ to get off, they thought Gazza was abducting them!”

After Spurs Butters moved on to Portsmouth to be managed by another legend of the game, Jim ‘The Bald Eagle’ Smith, before joining Gillingham.

Butters’ next boss, Tony Pulis, went down an extreme route – taking the Gills to a military base for their preparation.

“To be fair with Tony, pre-season wasn’t that much different to during the season, he ran us hard for nine months. When we got to the base, he had us all in this drill hall with a blackboard and on it was ‘6am Stand by your Beds’ and that effectively set the scene for the whole training camp.

“He had us training four times a day some days, then one morning he set up a game against the camp team, we won 14-0, and he said that wasn’t challenging enough so we trained for two sessions in the afternoon, on the way back to our barracks we all ended up going into the mess for a couple of beers – when Tony walked past, he stuck his head in and said “Like it boys, all sticking together”, then he ran us ragged at 6am the following morning!”

The 2002 had him leaving Gillingham and joining the Albion – and that had a very telling impact on the next season for him.

“I basically didn’t have a pre-season that summer, so by the time I signed for the Albion I was nowhere near peak fitness, when Steve Coppell came in in the October, he dropped me and Virgs (Adam Virgo) for the Palace game, the one we lost 5-0, probably a good game to miss but a lot of fans still think I played in that one. He loaned me out to Barnet and Virgs to Exeter.”

“I eventually came back after seven games and whilst we gave it a go, the Albion got relegated. We regrouped that summer, hoping to bounce straight back.”

It was when getting picked up near his home in Southampton by the team coach that he was alerted by teammates, that a ‘fan’ had placed him for sale on eBay – with a not very flattering description.

“Don’t get wrong, when it comes to banter you have to be able to catch as well as throw, and basically, I’d grown up with the nickname ‘Fatty’, but it had made the papers, which my family had to see, which was the only thing that annoyed me.”

After related media coverage, eBay removed the listing and Butters clearly had the last laugh as he won Player of the Year as the Albion returned to the Championship via a Millenium Stadium play-off victory under new boss Mark McGhee, who had replaced the departing Coppell mid-season.

“I’ve no doubt Mark McGhee and his pre-season training programme, then the sessions throughout the season, extended my career by three to four years, and had he not departed the Albion I reckon I could have played ‘til I was 40.”

So, in Butters’ opinion what has changed regarding pre-season training and footballers’ fitness in general since that 16-year-old apprentice got slapped round the face in 1986?

“Sports science was virtually unheard of back when I started, and talking to new players coming in at the Albion, modern medicals are light years away from what clubs did when buying players. Back in the day it was basically, sprint on the spot, cough and touch your toes.

“Are footballers now fitter? Not that much, everything has radically changed, playing time for a start. With only one sub, unless someone got injured at least 10 players got 90 minutes, now you can change half of your outfield during a game. And we played more games, the Leagues were bigger obviously, but the cups weren’t disrespected like they can be now, even in the early rounds you played your strongest side.

"I remember Mark McGhee telling us when Aberdeen were flying in Europe and doing well in Scotland, he played from early August something approaching 70 games in a season, that just wouldn’t happen now.”

Read more of Ian Hart’s interviews with former Albion favourites about pre-season and associated memories on this website in the next few weeks.