Marc Pugh: Shrewsbury Town exit paved way for amazing Cherries journey

If it was not for the decision by then boss Paul Simpson to look elsewhere, meaning the final year of Pugh’s three-year deal was paid up, then the attacker may not have gone on to experience life as a Premier League player, writes Lewis Cox.

Pugh, now 33 and with more than 500 senior games under his belt, could never have foreseen a rise to the top flight with Bournemouth was only around the corner after his two years with Shrewsbury came to an end, leaving him without a club.

“It was really difficult, I was actually on my honeymoon with my wife and I got a phone call saying I was going to be paid up the last year of my contract because they didn’t see me in their plans,” said Pugh, who returned to Town as a free agent last month and is set to continue in Sam Ricketts’ starting line-up for a crunch league clash with Swindon tomorrow.

“It was a little bit of an eye-opener – luckily a few days later Hereford called me saying they wanted to give me a year’s contract.

“At the time that was make or break, it was really difficult because I was really loving my football. I felt like I was playing well and in a good place.

“Making that trip from Shrewsbury to Hereford every day I had to knuckle down and work hard because I knew that was the pivotal moment of my career. I needed to make something of the one-year contract.”

Pugh was brought to Town by Gary Peters just a month after his 20th birthday. A former Burnley youngster from Lancashire, Pugh’s dynamic and skilful displays in 37 league games that season ensured he was a hit with fans.

But, the following season, Pugh found himself not fitting into new boss Simpson’s plans. Loans to Luton and Hereford United, then of the division above, confirmed as much.

Town legend Graham Turner had stepped down as Bulls boss in 2009 but stayed on as chairman and director of football and would have played his part in offering Pugh a lifeline at Edgar Street.

The winger admits his ‘face didn’t fit’ under Simpson but, while his departure left a sense of what could have been at the time, more than 11 years on it feels like a sliding doors moment that led to him catching the eye of a certain Eddie Howe.

“The manager had brought a couple of wingers he’d had in mind and I fell down the pecking order,” Pugh said of Simpson.

“I was training really well, Grant Holt was here, he was asking why I wasn’t involved, sometimes your face doesn’t fit and obviously I didn’t fit the way the manager wanted to play.

“Looking back it was an absolute blessing because if I didn’t make that move to Hereford I might not have scored those three goals against Bournemouth and gone on the amazing journey.

“It was a difficult time, you have to be mentally strong and deal with the setbacks in football and I felt I did that really well. You need to be in the right place at the right time sometimes and that season I scored three against Bournemouth and Eddie Howe took a liking to me and the rest is history.”

Pugh’s amazing Cherries journey under Howe took him from the bottom of League One to the Premier League in five seasons – he would play 67 times in the top flight, scoring five goals.

The winger, like former Cherries and current Salop team-mate Charlie Daniels, earned legendary status for his achievements at Dean Court, a nine-year spell that eventually came to an end with a free transfer to QPR in the summer of 2019, after 312 appearances.

Fast-forward a year and Pugh is back in Shropshire under Ricketts, having signed a short-term deal until January, at a time when the Salop boss is under scrutiny to turn League One results around at Montgomery Waters Meadow.

Pugh, who is a student of nutrition and healthy living, added: “The league is the most important thing, we’re under no illusions as to where we are in the table at the moment.

“I remember at Bournemouth, we were 19th in League One when Eddie Howe came in November and we went on an 18-game unbeaten run, anything is possible in this league.”