Stoke City cult hero makes it 11 games unbeaten after taking new manager's job

Stoke Sentinel · Peter Smith

Lee Grant has continued his brilliant start to life as Walsall manager with a 3-0 win over Oldham Athletic, which means he is yet to be beaten in a league game.

Grant started dipping his toe into coaching when he left Stoke City for Manchester United in 2018. He took on a coaching role at Ipswich Town under Kieran McKenna and then got his first manager's role with Huddersfield Town last year. He won 15 of 36 games and his side was sixth, in the play-off places, when the board lost patience. They ended up in ninth.

He took over at Walsall in the summer and had a busy transfer window to re-shape the squad. They have now gone 11 games in League Two without defeat, winning four and drawing seven, scoring 16 and only letting in seven. They knocked Bristol City out of the Carabao Cup too and were only knocked out on penalties by Leyton Orient.

The 43-year-old has been rotating his starting XI and is confident they can keep picking up results, even when they go down to 10 men, as they did after an hour against Oldham when Elicha Ahui was dismissed.

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"I have just trusted my whole group - we had our best performance of the season at Swindon on Saturday and I made four changes tonight," he said at full-time last night.

"And I don't know whether the lads are thinking, 'Is the gaffer all right?' but I just trust them all. We got to see both sides of the group tonight - a team really going after the game first half, lots of control, shots, opportunities and threat, and two excellent goals.

"Then we see the other side, which is becoming a clear trend in terms of the character of the group, the fight and determination, and in some ways that feels sweeter."

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