Some clubs in the classic NASL went through managers like most baseball teams did in the seventies for their teams. The Strikers on the other hand had only four in their time. Some went on to do other things, and then there were some who went on to become one of the greatest managers in that specific type of soccer. Of course, if you have read this far, you know it’s Ron Newman. You also know how important he was to the outdoor game as well as the indoor game.

Since it’s correct to start out in the earliest days of anything historical, we do have to bring up Ron Newman. He had a playing career that included stints with Portsmouth, Leyton Orient, Crystal Palace, and Gillingham. When he was nearing the end of his career in England, Ron figured he’d go abroad to South Africa or in the States. While Newman was in England, he was living in a house formerly owned by Phil Woosnam, who was at Leyton Orient before Ron and was getting some of his mail. Ron brought the mail over to Phil and struck up a friendship. While Woosnam was thinking about playing and coaching in America, he asked Ron to come with him.

While it took very little for Woosnam to convince Ron to come with him, what Ron was worried about was that Americans didn’t know how to play the sport. What Woosnam did to convince Ron to join him in America, was that they could teach the citizens to play the sport. And boy did they! Newman helped start youth soccer in Atlanta and Dallas, along with his children Guy and daughter Tracey officiating youth soccer. Along with Ron Griffith they founded the North Texas High School League. He even in 1976, while his paychecks sometimes didn’t come, directed the LA Skyhawks to the American Soccer League Championship.

After winning the 1976 ASL title, he was hired by the Fort Lauderdale Strikers in 1977. That was a big year for the Strikers, pulling off road wins at Team Hawaii, and the LA Aztecs with only one day between the two. They also got trampled in the 1977 Eastern Conference Soccer Bowl playoff quarter finals, 8-3. However, they played in front of an American soccer crowd of 77,691 at Giants Stadium. That record has been broken many times.

Ron also helped the club through tough times. When FIFA denied George Best from playing in the Strikers’ 1979 home opener, due to Fulham claiming he didn’t fulfill a contract stipulation. Once the ban was lifted, Best was put into the second half. George Best was so mad at only having one half to play that he threw his shirt at Newman as he walked off after the match. Ron just smiled and went on with his business, making a joke of it saying that George knew that Ron wanted one of Best’s shirts, so he was giving one to him. There was another side of Ron that many people would see, where he would have to put his foot down, like when Bobby Bell kicked the stuffing out of Rochester forward Mike Stojanovic in a 3-1 loss in 1977. Ron had corrected the behavior and wasn’t so nice about it.

Ron was also the manager who saw the need to grow the game in South Florida, so he instructed the Robbie family to find as many top stars as they could acquire. That led them to bring in former English National Team Goalie Gordon Banks, Ray Hudson, Telifo Cuballis, and Tony Whealen. Despite all of that, in 1979 at 44, he was forced after nine years of being retired from playing, he had to register himself. In the final half hour of the 4-0 loss to the Washington Diplomats. It was a rare opportunity in sports for a son to play with his father.

In the 1980 season, when he was fired by Bob Lemieux, he was quickly hired by the San Diego Sockers. This was where he won a massive amount of hardware and helped revolutionize the indoor game. Later in his career he became the first coach to sign with an MLS, Kansas City Wizards in 1995. He delivered the Western Conference title in 1997. He was fired from his job just before Y2K. Ron died in Tampa at 84 years old, on August 27, 2018.

The man who took over for Ron Newman, was a former Dutch football player, and manager in Cor van der Hart, who was at the time of his hire was in his early fifties. He had played on eight championship teams and coached three more in Europe. Cor was also an assistant on the 1974 Dutch National team with Rinus Michels. This was the side that brought Total Football to the world. Sadly, he was a well-known drunk, and it cost him jobs all around the world, but with Fort Lauderdale, he was worth it. For a while.

Though he did feud with his general manager Bob Lemieux over personal decisions. They never played consistently, even after an early season winning streak. This was even with Gerd Muller in the side. However, they caught fire in the 1980 season and made it to the Soccer Bowl. That’s where they lost to the Cosmos, this was the same season that Cor brought a bunch of players over from Holland. They did have to fill one major spot, goalkeeper. Gordon Banks finally hung up the gloves in 1978 and went back to England. In his place was PSV goalkeeper Jan van Beveren.

The Strikers had a tough American Conference playoff season. They won their first match on the road against the California Surf. The second match, they lost, so it was off to an eleven round shootout victory after a scoreless minigame. They moved onto the next round to play the Edmonton Drillers. The second round followed the same script, a win on the road, and a loss at Lockhart Stadium. This forced a mini game, where the Strikers got a pair of Cubillas goals.

That put them through to the next round against the San Diego Sockers with former coach Ron Newman. Unsurprisingly, the third round was the same, a road win, followed by a home loss, and goals in the mini game by Ray Hudson and Cubillas gave the Strikers a berth in the 1980 Soccer Bowl. Unfortunately, it was against the overpowered Cosmos, who beat the Strikers 3-0.

Even with all that good done in the playoffs, Cor was fired. In came German Eckhard Krautzun, a former Kaiserslautern player for the 1981 season. This wasn’t the German’s first job in NASL, he was the former Vancouver Whitecaps and Houston Hurricane manager. Also, in 1972 he helped Kenya qualify for their first African Cup of Nations. The manager wasn’t the only thing changing at the club, gone were Francisco Marinho, and David Irving. In as replacements were, future Strikers head coach Thomas Rongen, and Branko Segota.

The Strikers finished Second in the NASL’s Southern Division behind Atlanta with a 18-14 record. They also had a cool feat, with Cubillas and Jan van Beveren named to the same All-Star team. That was the first time two Strikers were honored in the same season. Branko Segota had a very good playoff season, scoring eleven goals in six games. They beat Calgary and Minnesota in the first two rounds without a loss. The Cosmos again dumped out the Strikers, this time in the league semifinals.

At the end of the 1981 season Gerd Muller retired. To replace him, the Atlanta Chiefs, and Manchester City star Brian Kidd joined the club. This time, the club was picked to finish behind the Tampa Bay Rowdies for the Southern Division. It would be the Tulsa Roughnecks who would give the Strikers a challenge for the division. In the end the 18-14 record was good enough to win them their second division title in six years.

They beat the Montreal Manic in the first round of the playoffs in three matches. That put them in the semifinals against the Seattle Sounds. Away in Seattle, the Strikers won 2-0, to take it back to Lockhart with one win to advance to Soccer Bowl 82. With forty-three seconds left to play, and a goal lead it looked like the Strikers were going to the finals. However, the Sounders scored and won the match in overtime. Back to Seattle for the deciding match, saw Seattle in overtime beat the Strikers.

The last manager in Fort Lauderdale was David Chadwick in 1983. He was a former striker on the first edition of the team and was the fourth coach in seven seasons. It was a bad year for the team. They fell to a 14-16 record but still made the playoffs. The Strikers did sweep the Tampa Bay Rowdies but lost all four regular season matches to the Tulsa Roughnecks. The same club took the Strikers out of the playoffs and existence. In December, the Robbie family moved the team to Minneapolis. A year later the league folded.

Being a manager in football isn’t a long-lasting career. There are a few who can stay at one spot for a long time. The Brazilian league gets a lot of flak, justifiably so for going through managers like people go through shoes. Fort Lauderdale had its fair share of managers and really didn’t show much for the amount they had. Next time, we will dive into the best players, the underrated players, and what they all did after they left Fort Lauderdale.

- by Stephen Brandt