Anthony Hudson really wanted to coach, and he was willing to do it for free.
The future could wait. Certainty and stability mattered less in the moment than simply being on the field that day. So during the 2011–12 English soccer season, shortly after being fired by fifth-tier Newport County, the 30-year-old was spending time as a volunteer coach at Dagenham & Redbridge, a club in east London that would finish its campaign just six points above the League Two relegation zone.
“It was just an amazing opportunity,” says Hudson, who lasted six months at Newport. “I used to drive in every day, do some work with the first team, finishing, help out where I could.”
