Player Profiles 2007-8: Gary Jones

He came as a twenty year old central midfielder, and was pretty much a bit part player during his first eighteen months at the club. He spent time both in and out of the first team line up and came very close to being released at the end of the 1998-99. With manager Graham Barrow sacked the week before, the rumour mill had it at the time that it was only the personal intervention of coach David Hamilton who persuaded the Dale board to retain the services of Jones.

And that later proved to be one of the most crucial decisions in the recent history of this football club. For when new manager Steve Parkin took over, Jones became more and more one of the most integral players within the team.

It was Parkin's second season, where Jonah really cemented his place at the club. He proved himself to be one of the best central midfielders in the division, scoring plenty of goals along the way. He was given the captaincy, such was his impact at the club.

However, that success eventually counted against us. When Steve Parkin departed for Barnsley, Jonah was his first signing in a transfer worth £200,000. Many supporters feel that it was the departure of Jones which contributed to our failure to secure automatic promotion that season, missing out by a point. Certainly it was a transfer that the club wasn't happy about, but it was good money in the last year of his contract, and given the old adage about not being able to keep an unhappy player at a club, you could argue they had little choice.

His time at Barnsley was mixed. He made a good start and was named as their player of the season, but the departure of Parkin from Oakwell left Jones isolated and a nasty foot injury coupled with a fall out with their Icelandic manager, left Jones firmly on the sidelines.

And so then Dale boss Alan Buckley stepped in to bring him back to Spotland on loan. It was clear that the injury was still hampering him to an extent, as you could see from many of the facial expressions at the time, but despite Buckley's quick departure, returning manager Parkin had no second thoughts about making Jones' return a permanent one as well.

His second spell has seen Jonah regain his central midfield spot and also the captaincy. He's now at a position where he's made more appearances in his second spell as his did in his first spell. If we're being overly critical, he hasn't contributed as many goals second time round, but given he's no longer penalty taker, I guess that's inevitable.

His strengths as a central museful in the tackle when required and can come up with that decisive pass as well. And being of the Scouse persuasion, he's got a gob on him as well.

Arguably, Jonah's biggest challenge lies ahead of him this season. He missed most of the second half of the season in 2007-8 after breaking a bone in his knee earlier this year. He made good progress with this, and should see no ill effects by the time pre-season begins.

However, the emergence of David Perkins, and the continued good form of John Doolan will give Jonah serious competition for his starting place when 2007-8 starts. Doolan's two match ban will see Jonah get the nod for the first two games, but after that the pressure will be on all three to perform if they wish to get one of those two central berths.

Gary signed a two year extension to his contract in February 2007 which will ensure that he remains at Spotland until the Summer of 2009. Given that, it is widely expected that Jones will go on to make more appearances for Dale than any other player in our history.

At time of writing, he stands with a total of 312 appearances which is just 33 appearances behind current record appearances holder Graham Smith. Given he is contract to the club until July 2009, only injury can stand his way.