Hill delight at joining "great" Yeltz (From Dudley News)

Hill delight at joining "great" Yeltz

1:08pm Thursday 27th September 2012 in Sport Exclusive By Matt Maher

JOHN Hill says he has joined a great club after being appointed the new manager of Halesowen Town.

The 44-year-old was named as Shaun Cunnington’s successor at the Grove this morning.

Hill has been out of management since 2011 after leaving Tipton Town, following an illustrious 10 years in which he got the club promoted to the Midland Alliance and reached the first round of the FA Cup.

He said: “Everybody in the Midlands involved in non-league football knows with just how high a regard Halesowen Town are held.

“It’s a great club and I’m really happy to be joining.”

Hill will officially take charge on Monday but will attend Saturday’s FA Trophy first qualifying round clash with Gresley, where club chairman Colin Brookes will complete his stint as caretaker boss.

The new man confirmed he already plans to add a couple of new faces but believes the work of Brookes, physio Neil Barnfield and skipper Neil Barnfield has left the existing squad in good shape.

He said: “I will probably make an approach for a couple of players at the moment.

“But the team is now five games unbeaten. I’ve watched three or four of those games and there is a definite togetherness in the squad. It would be wrong to go in and start ripping that apart.

“That’s testament to what Colin, Pete and Barney have done over the past few weeks.

“Usually when a new manager comes in there is plenty to sort out but I’m taking over a club in a healthy position and it makes my first days in the job a lot easier.”

Hill’s knowledge of the local non-league scene was one of the things which appealed to the Yeltz commitee and he added: “You must know the league below and you must know the league above.

“Ninety-nine per cent of the time that is where you get your players from.”

A four man panel including Brookes, club owner Steve Lynch, vice chairman John Russell and secretary Andrew While interviewed six candidates for the job earlier this week.

Brookes said: “John has a very impressive CV and ticked all the boxes for us.

“We are lucky in that we had a number of excellent candidates interview for the job and it’s been hard letting the others know they have been unsuccessful.”