Timothy David Flowers (born 3 February 1967) is an English

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a government bodies through business administration, nonprofit management, or the political science sub-field of public administra ...

and former player who manages

Alvechurch Alvechurch ( ) is a large village and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Bromsgrove (district), Bromsgrove district in northeastern Worcestershire, England, in the valley of the River Arrow, Worcestershire, River Arrow. The Lickey H ...

. He played as a

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

from 1984 until 2003, notably in the

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

for

Blackburn Rovers Blackburn Rovers Football Club is a professional football club based in Blackburn, Lancashire, England, which competes in the , the second level of the English football league system. They have played home matches at Ewood Park since 1890. Th ...

where he was part of the side that won the

1994–95 FA Premier League The 1994–95 FA Premier League (known as the FA Carling Premiership for sponsorship reasons) was the third season of the competition, since its formation in 1992 as the top division of professional football in England. Due to the decision to ...

. He also played in the top flight for

Southampton Southampton is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. It is located approximately southwest of London, west of Portsmouth, and southeast of Salisbury. Southampton had a population of 253, ...

and

Leicester City Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area, and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest city in the East Midlands with a popula ...

as well as a brief stint at

Manchester City Manchester City Football Club is a professional association football, football club based in Manchester, England, that competes in the Premier League, the English football league system, top flight of Football in England, English footbal ...

that yielded no appearances. He also played in the

Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional association football, football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, it is the oldest football league in Association football around the world, the w ...

for

Wolverhampton Wanderers Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club ( ), commonly referred to as Wolves, is a professional association football, football club based in Wolverhampton, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football league s ...

Swindon Town Swindon Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Swindon, Wiltshire, England. The team, known as the "Robins", currently compete in , the fourth level of the English football league system. Founded as Swindon A ...

, Stockport County and Coventry City. He earned eleven caps for

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

and was part of their

Euro 1996 The 1996 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as Euro 96, was the 10th UEFA European Championship, a quadrennial football tournament contested by European nations and organised by UEFA. It took place in England from 8 to 30 ...

and 1998 World Cup squads. Following his retirement, Flowers has largely worked as a goalkeeping coach in the professional game or as a manager in Non-League. He has managed Stafford Rangers, Solihull Moors, Macclesfield Town, Barnet, Stratford Town, Gloucester City, Bromsgrove Sporting, Redditch United and

, as well as working on the coaching staff at Leicester City, Manchester City, Coventry City,

Queens Park Rangers Queens Park Rangers Football Club, commonly abbreviated to QPR, is a professional association football club based in Shepherd's Bush, West London, England. The team currently compete in the EFL Championship, the second level of the English f ...

Northampton Town Northampton Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Northampton, England. The team competes in EFL League One, League One, the third level of the English football league system. Founded in 1897, the c ...

, Kidderminster Harriers,

Nottingham Forest Nottingham Forest Football Club is a professional association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football league system, English football. Founde ...

, and

Cheltenham Town Cheltenham Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. The team competes in EFL League Two, the fourth level of the English football league system. Founded in 1887, ...

Club career

Wolverhampton Wanderers

Flowers was born in

Kenilworth Kenilworth ( ) is a market town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Warwick (district), Warwick District of Warwickshire, England, southwest of Coventry and north of both Warwick and Leamington Spa. Situated at the centre of t ...

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It is bordered by Staffordshire and Leicestershire to the north, Northamptonshire to the east, Ox ...

, and began his career with

in 1984. He quickly broke into the first team, becoming their regular goalkeeper by his 18th birthday, but his breakthrough came at the bleakest time in the club's history, as the two seasons he spent there both ended in relegation (in 1984–85) to the Third Division and in 1985–86 to the Fourth. After Wolves fell into the Fourth Division to complete a hat-trick of successive relegations, they had to sell Flowers as part of the effort to avoid bankruptcy.

Southampton

Flowers joined First Division club

for £70,000 in June 1986. He was understudy to

Peter Shilton Peter Leslie Shilton (born 18 September 1949) is an English former professional association football, footballer who played as a goalkeeper (association football), goalkeeper. His 31-year career included spells at 11 clubs and he has the uni ...

in 1986–87, but managed nine league appearances (the first in a 5–1 defeat to

Manchester United Manchester United Football Club, commonly referred to as Man United (often stylised as Man Utd) or simply United, is a professional association football, football club based in Old Trafford (area), Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, Engl ...

in mid September) and also played a further nine games on loan to Swindon Town in the Third Division. He made another nine league appearances in 1987–88 (by which time Shilton had joined

Derby County Derby County Football Club () is a professional association football club in Derby, England. They compete in the EFL Championship, the second level of the English football league system. One of the 12 founder members of the English Football ...

) and returned to Swindon for a five-match loan spell, before becoming Southampton's regular goalkeeper in the 1989–90 season. Within a couple of years of becoming Southampton's first choice goalkeeper, Flowers was regarded as one of the best goalkeepers in the English league and inevitable rumours of a transfer to a bigger club began.

Blackburn Rovers

Flowers left Southampton on 4 November 1993 when a £2.4 million move to

made him the most expensive goalkeeper in Britain. His excellent goalkeeping was not quite enough to win Blackburn the

title in the

1993–94 FA Premier League The 1993–94 FA Premier League (known as the FA Carling Premiership for sponsorship reasons) was the second season of the FA Premier League, the top division of professional football in England. Manchester United won the league by eight points ...

, but they did finish second to Manchester United, and went one better the following year when they won their first top division title since

1914 This year saw the beginning of what became known as the First World War, after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austrian throne was Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip ...

. He remained at

Ewood Park Ewood Park () is a Association football, football stadium in Blackburn, Lancashire, England, and the home of Blackburn Rovers F.C., founding members of the English Football League, Football League and Premier League, who have played there since ...

for another four seasons before Blackburn were relegated in 1999.

Leicester City

Flowers was transferred to Leicester City, where he collected a Football League Cup winner's medal in his first season. In August 2002 he went on loan to

to provide cover for Carlo Nash after injuries to Peter Schmeichel and Nicky Weaver. He stayed with Leicester for one season after their relegation to Division One two years later before retiring as a player. His final appearance for Leicester City was against Wolverhampton Wanderers at Molineux in May 2003. It was the final game of the season, and with Leicester 1–0 down, Flowers came on as a late substitute for Ian Walker. Leicester were awarded a late penalty, and despite shouts from the travelling Leicester fans for Flowers to take the penalty, and Flowers himself signalling to the bench, manager

Micky Adams Michael Richard Adams (born 8 November 1961) is an English former professional association football, footballer and football Manager (association football), manager. As a player, he was a Full-back (football), full back, and made a total of 43 ...

ignored the fans and ordered Trevor Benjamin to take it, who scored.

International career

Flowers won 11

caps Caps are flat headgear. Caps or CAPS may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters * Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Java ...

with

between 1993 and 1998. He was in the squads for both

Euro 96 The 1996 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as Euro 96, was the 10th UEFA European Championship, a quadrennial football tournament contested by European nations and organised by UEFA. It took place in England from 8 to 30 ...

in England and the

1998 FIFA World Cup The 1998 FIFA World Cup was the 16th FIFA World Cup, the Association football, football world championship for List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams. The finals tournament was held in France from 10 June to 1 ...

in France. He retired following the 2002–03 season.

Coaching and managerial career

Following a spell as goalkeeper coach for both

and

, on 19 February 2007 Flowers was appointed as assistant manager to Iain Dowie at Coventry City. Flowers left Coventry on 11 February 2008 after Dowie was sacked, before joining him again at

. He left the assistant manager's role at QPR as well after Dowie was sacked again. In February 2010, he was appointed part-time goalkeeper coach at

, as well as mentoring Dean Coleman and Yasbir Singh at Kidderminster Harriers. On 17 March 2010, he re-joined Dowie when he was appointed as assistant manager at Premiership club, Hull City. On 14 October he was appointed manager of

Conference North The National League North, officially known as Vanarama National League North for sponsorship reasons, is a professional Association football league in England. National League North is the second division of the National Leagues and step 2 o ...

team Stafford Rangers. However, Flowers resigned on 11 January 2011 after just nine games in charge. On 22 November 2011, Flowers become manager of his second club, this time being appointed caretaker manager of

on 22 November 2011. He only managed the club for one game, losing 4–1 to Plymouth Argyle, before Aidy Boothroyd became permanent manager at the club, although Flowers remained as goalkeeping coach. When Boothroyd was sacked by Northampton in January 2014, Flowers continued on the coaching staff under caretaker boss Andy King, but he left the club on 30 January 2014 following the appointment earlier that week of Chris Wilder as the new manager of

. On 6 March 2014, he was appointed first-team coach at Kidderminster Harriers. In July 2014, Flowers started working as a goalkeeper coach at

under his former teammate, Nottingham Forest manager Stuart Pearce. Flowers left Forest following the dismissal of Pearce in February 2015. On 11 September 2015, it was reported that Flowers had replaced Gary Whild as manager of Kidderminster Harriers, but he left the club within a fortnight to be replaced by Dave Hockaday. On 20 June 2018, he returned to management with Solihull Moors replacing Mark Yates, who had joined newly promoted

side Macclesfield Town. He left Solihull Moors by mutual consent on 28 January 2020. On 28 August 2020, Flowers was appointed as manager of then newly relegated Macclesfield Town, but the club was wound-up on 16 September 2020, before playing a competitive first team game. Flowers was appointed manager at Barnet on 14 December 2020. He left Barnet by mutual consent on 10 March 2021 after losing 11 of his 12 games in charge. On 25 November 2021, Flowers was appointed manager at Stratford Town. On 19 May 2023, Flowers was announced as manager of

National League North The National League North, officially known as Vanarama National League North for sponsorship reasons, is a professional Association football league in England. National League North is the second division of the National League (English footb ...

side Gloucester City. On 17 September 2023, Flowers left Gloucester City by mutual agreement.

Career statistics

Honours

Southampton *

Full Members' Cup The Full Members' Cup was an association football cup competition held in English football from 1985 to 1992. It was also known under its sponsored names of the Simod Cup from 1987 to 1989 and the Zenith Data Systems Cup from 1989 to 1992. Th ...

runner-up: 1991–92 Blackburn Rovers *

: 1994–95 Leicester City *

Football League Cup The English Football League Cup, often referred to as the League Cup and currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout competition in men's domestic football in England. Orga ...

: 1999–2000 England * Tournoi de France:

1997 Events January * January 1 – The Emergency Alert System is introduced in the United States. * January 11 – Turkey threatens Cyprus on account of a deal to buy Russian S-300 missiles, prompting the Cypriot Missile Crisis. * January 1 ...

Individual *

PFA Team of the Year The Professional Footballers' Association Team of the Year (often called the PFA Team of the Year, or simply the Team of the Year) is an annual award given to a set of 55 footballers across the top four tiers of men's Football in England, En ...

: 1993–94 Premier League, 1994–95 Premier League * Premier League Player of the Month: January 1997, September 2000

References

External links

* * *
Profile on "Sporting Heroes" website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Flowers, Tim 1967 births Sportspeople from Kenilworth Living people Blackburn Rovers F.C. players Coventry City F.C. players English men's footballers England men's under-21 international footballers England men's international footballers Premier League players Men's association football goalkeepers Leicester City F.C. players Manchester City F.C. players Southampton F.C. players Stockport County F.C. players Swindon Town F.C. players Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. players UEFA Euro 1996 players 1998 FIFA World Cup players English Football League players Queens Park Rangers F.C. non-playing staff Cheltenham Town F.C. non-playing staff Coventry City F.C. non-playing staff Northampton Town F.C. managers Manchester City F.C. non-playing staff English football managers Fulham F.C. non-playing staff Solihull Moors F.C. managers Macclesfield Town F.C. managers Barnet F.C. managers Stratford Town F.C. managers Gloucester City A.F.C. managers Redditch United F.C. managers National League (English football) managers Southern Football League managers Association football goalkeeping coaches