Yeovil Town and Portsmouth meet this coming Saturday and we profile a man who is considered a legend on the south coast but who began his career at the Huish.
Guy Whittingham only spent one season with Yeovil Town but in earning the nickname ‘Corporal Punishment’ during his stay here gives you the kind of idea what impression he made.
Whittingham joined Yeovil in 1988 and played a full season scoring 19 goals, he’s often regarded as one of the most talented individuals to play for the club.
He joined Yeovil after a stint in the British Army; he was living locally to Portsmouth and playing just down the road in Waterlooville.
The Glovers finished in the top half of the Conference during Whittingham’s stint in Somerset and had hoped to progress with him scoring the goals to fire them up the league.
However, his home town club of Portsmouth had other ideas and snapped him up during the off season.
He was quickly settling in at Fratton Park and would go on to spend a total of three spells with Pompey.
In his initial spell, which lasted over three years, he played well over 150 times.
During his final season at Fratton Park he would break the Pompey scoring record notching an incredible 42 times during the 1992/93 campaign.
That would alert Premier League side Aston Villa who took him to the midlands.
Villa would not be the only Premier League side he would play for when he signed for Sheffield Wednesday in the middle of the 1990’s.
During another successful stint, he would actually return to Portsmouth on loan, dropping two tiers to help save the club from relegation with seven goals in a 10-game spell.
As the millennium came to an end, Whittingham was coming towards the end of his career and his five-year spell at Wednesday was scattered with loan stints at Wolves and Watford.
There was only one natural place for Whittingham to go once he left Hillsborough, Portsmouth came calling again, but his appearences were limited despite being back on the south coast for two more seasons.
Loans once again came in handy with Peterborough and Oxford coming along before he eventually signed for Wycombe which would be his final professional side in 2001.
He would be part of the famous Wanderers side that made it to the FA Cup Semi Final in 2002, ten years after losing at the same stage of the competition with Pompey.
A leader on the pitch, it was only natural that coaching would follow his career, he became player-manager of Newport (Isle of White) in 2005 and it wasn’t long before … yep, you guessed it… Portsmouth came knocking.
Initially he joined as a first team coach but when the opportunity came to take over as Caretaker Manager he took it with both hands.
That Caretaker position became permanent in 2012 and he helped oversee the club’s transition through to a sound financial position.
In late 2013, he would be relieved of his position when it was announced that Crawley’s Richie Barker was being lined up for the job at Fratton Park.
In an ironic twist, with Barker heading south, Whittingham actually went on to take a coaching role with Barker’s old club, Crawley.
He would spend just shy of six months with the Red Devils before leaving just before the end of the 2013/14 season.
That would be his last role with a club but his coaching days haven’t ended, he was announce as an FA Coach Mentor and Educator in August 2014.
He is a legend on the south coast and was inducted into the Pompey Hall of Fame in 2009.
Added to that, he is considered one of the most gifted players to wear the green and white.
His two former employees meet this coming Saturday and you can be there by buying your tickets from the ticket booth situated at the away end.