Hodgson throws in his side of the story

We tempted Heaney to Darlington FC. He came for £72,708.33 basic salary; very high, I must add, but less than half his salary at Manchester City.

He agreed to come because George had taken over the club and pointed us in a direction we thought we would never go.

We had to make up bonuses by achievement only, nobody gets a bonus unless they play, nobody gets a win bonus unless we are sitting in the top three, or unless the team is in third to seventh position. Nobody gets appearance money unless they enter the field; the ones sitting in the stand don't get money unless they play.

So we had to build up a bonus system which would tempt Heaney to gamble on losing £154,000 a year.

If he broke his leg in the first game, and never played again, he would only be entitled to six months' salary, he'd sacrifice an awful lot for his wife and family.

So Heaney had a bonus system put in place. Some he achieved, some he didn't, so at the end of the season his total package came to £139,251.33.

Still a deficit, the best part of £15,000, but to achieve that he had to work week in week out. I got 43 matches out of Heaney. Before he came to Darlington his total career was something like 60 games in seven or eight years.

At the end of it, the public were entertained by Heaney, there's no doubt.

ON DARLINGTON'S PROMOTION BID LAST SEASON: We gambled no doubt because no one has a divine right to be promoted at the end of the season. We have to go and win more matches than anyone else and we failed by a point, but it was a gamble George was prepared to take. George never wanted to take money out of the club, but he was prepared to put it in to get success.

If Dave Hodgson made decisions that were wrong then I have to accept that. That's the way it will be.

ON WHETHER OR NOT PLAYERS RECEIVED A CAR: No player had a car. One, it's a taxable problem for a player. Our players own vehicles with a deal set up through a major motor company in the area, and they pay for their own vehicles. No player has a car in the contract.

ON GEORGE REYNOLDS: George is two things. He is a genius at money. I have never in my lifetime known a man who was so good at money.

The second thing George was a genius at, and this was part of the build-up when he took over the club, is hype. George sold a product at Darlington FC better than anyone else, and I was delighted to be part of it.

ON PLAYERS' SALARIES: The News of the World published an article about George, and I sat with every single player individually and as a group and I asked who had put it out. Every player denied doing it, so how did it get in there?

Did someone plant it there to get a response? We'll never know the answer to that question.

If I'm entitled to have an opinion, the public were starting to turn a little bit on George because they thought we should buy players, but I say we didn't have to buy any players.

We had made a policy, we did not buy one single player - Neil Heaney free, Nogan free, Marco Gabbiadini free, and so on. We didn't buy anybody, but we fell just short.

So in my opinion The Northern Echo article about salaries which George put in was a little on his behalf a case of "Why are you having a go at me?"

George cannot accept the fans are only interested in what takes place on the pitch. If it's going fine, but this year, unfortunately, they are not in the same position.

When it went in The Northern Echo I was distraught. I didn't know it was coming, he never told me what he was going to do. He just said "I'm going to put something in". I wished he'd spoken to me because the implications are still rolling on nine months down the line.

Some people might agree with George, others might not agree with him. When the salaries became public knowledge it caused unrest. I had to take Neil Heaney away from everyone else because he was the one who was singled out. I had to let him train on his own. Afterwards the best thing was for him to leave the club.

ON THE ATMOSPHERE AT THE CLUB: It is unfortunate for me personally, whenever a problem occurred in the club I tried to solve it. I was the man in the middle and I would not let players make public comments or vent their anger on what they'd seen, others take advice from their unions. At the end of the day the players took advice from me and I told them silence, we're not happy with it, let me sort it out and get to the bottom of it. There never was a bottom to it, unfortunately.

I respect those players immensely. Not one of them through that article demanded a transfer, not one went on and publicly slaughtered their chairman. You have to give respect for that and I do to the players.

ON LEAVING: What you've got to see is that it is George. There are no rules for George, George is George and they who have the gold rule. I only say that because our working relationship right up until, say Wembley, at times was not smooth, but at times was brilliant.

There were more better times than bad times, but George is a hands-on man and it became more evident that running the club was maybe getting taken away a little bit.

That relationship we had started to crack and I was mentally tired, and that was the end of it.

But when I left I shook his hand, sent a letter explaining, and we went our own way. But unfortunately for me it hasn't because for the last nine months since I left the club all that's ever happened is getting thrown back in my face.

ON LOSING THE PLAY-OFFS FINAL: Unfortunately, the moment the whistle went I knew personally everything was caving in compared to what we set out with the season before. I knew that certain players would be leaving the club, whom I had great respect for.

Gary Bennett sat in the dressing when everyone had gone and we discussed a lot of things, how important football was to me.

I don't think George really understood, it was the end game. I met George in the tunnel and he said "We've had a magnificent year, we're moving to a new stadium, we've been to Wembley, don't be down".

But I was down because I knew how important it was to be part of Darlington FC and it was my job to get them promoted.

George didn't feel the same as me on the night, he went in to speak to players, I couldn't go in; the players were disappointed because everything was over, but after a defeat like that you can't just go on.