Chapter 10: Shaved Down

Someone’s face was about to get rearranged over this, and for once, it wasn’t Ventham’s turn.

After Saint laid out his read for Sallow, Villa’s form didn’t immediately vindicate him. Villa’s unbeaten start ended in round four, away at Middlesbrough; a tight, scrappy 1–0 defeat, their first loss of the campaign.

It also turned out to be their only loss across the next six matches. Three wins, two draws, one defeat in that stretch. Add the opening rounds together and Villa sat nine games into the season with five wins, three draws, and a single loss; eighteen points, top of the table.

They’d leapfrogged Forest along the way. The division’s other big early story, Forest sat second on seventeen points, with Bolton just behind them on the same total.

Villa were the talk of the Midlands. Ventham, for the moment, could do no wrong; adored by supporters, praised in every corner of the local press. As the only club in the region with real top-flight pedigree still chasing promotion, the whole area’s football coverage had turned its attention squarely on Villa Park.

Media on side, fans on side, board fully behind him; that was where Ventham stood right now. And Pedmore, who’d staked his own credibility on bringing Ventham back, was riding that wave just as hard.

Room for outsiders? Not really. Once Villa hit the top of the table, Saint found himself pushed further from the first team, not closer to it. He was still, in Ventham’s eyes and Pedmore’s both, Sallow’s man; a minor irritant, tolerated only while results demanded caution.

With results this good, caution wasn’t required anymore.

The excuse arrived almost too conveniently. Villa’s U21 head coach had resigned days earlier, poached by a League Two side, and taken his assistant with him on the way out.

Pedmore moved fast; framing the reshuffle as a cost-saving measure, though everyone in the building understood that a youth-team coaching post barely moved the needle on Villa’s wage bill either way.

Sallow had no real counter. With the team top of the table and both Ventham and Pedmore basking in it, this wasn’t a fight worth picking. Better to step back and wait.

"Uncle Derek, I trust my own read on this. Ventham’s side is going to slip." Saint said it plainly, then went and packed up his things for the move to U21s.

It wasn’t a huge step down, physically; the U21 setup trained close enough to the first team that Saint would still see plenty of the senior squad in passing. But it was, undeniably, a step away from where he actually wanted to be.

The U21s had lost both their coaches in the reshuffle, but a replacement had already been brought in the day before Saint’s arrival which put the two of them starting more or less together, a fresh pairing rather than Saint simply slotting into an existing hierarchy.

Villa’s academy setup, like most clubs outside the Premier League’s elite, ran lean: senior side, then essentially two further coaching staffs covering everything below it.

"Saint Maddox... call me Saint, most people do. Looking forward to working together." In the office, Saint sized up the man he’d be sharing a dugout with; mid-to-late forties, young by coaching standards, though not remotely as young as Saint.

"Paul Cadman." The new coach didn’t hide his surprise at how young Saint actually was.

There was something else under the surprise too, a flicker of something closer to dismissal. Young. British-Chinese. English football had spent years hearing, fairly or not, that Chinese football itself didn’t amount to much on the world stage, and some people carried that assumption over onto anyone who looked the part, coaching badge or not.

"Fair enough. Let’s go meet the players; we can talk properly tonight if there’s time." Saint had seen that look plenty of times by now. He’d stopped letting it bother him. He’d rather prove a point on the training pitch than argue one in an office.

The line between U18s and U21s was blurrier than the age brackets suggested; talent moved players across it constantly, up or down, whenever it made sense.

"Oi... Yannick, pinch me, tell me I’m not seeing things." Rocher, spotting Saint walk onto the training pitch alongside Cadman, said it loud enough for half the group to hear.

’Smack.’ Lavelle, ever literal, obliged him without hesitation.

"Ow... what the hell—" Rocher clutched his cheek, more startled than hurt, eyes suddenly damp.

Rocher had recognised Saint instantly, and he wasn’t the only one. Half this U21 squad had come up through the same U18 group Saint once ran, and a handful; Rocher, Lavelle, and Rami chief among them, owed their entire presence at the club to him personally.

Saint had pushed all three up a level once their U18 progress had started to plateau; a deliberate move, banking on the psychological jolt of tougher competition to squeeze out whatever growth had stalled.

"For those of you who already know me, save the commentary. For everyone else; Saint Maddox. From today, I’m your head coach." He raised a hand for quiet before he said it.

Cadman’s eyebrows lifted slightly at the reaction in the room; evidently nobody had briefed him that his new co-coach came with a built-in reputation among half the squad.

"And for the ones who do know me, you know exactly what that means. Don’t test how far my patience stretches, because I promise you it’s shorter than you remember." A few faces in the group visibly straightened at that.

Saint had technically only ever held the title of assistant with the U18s, but Sandford, easing gently toward retirement, had handed him real authority long before he ever got the official promotion.

Running sessions solo, making calls on matchdays; Saint had been doing a head coach’s job under an assistant’s title for well over a year, and Sandford had formally stepped away from the club not long after Saint moved up to the first team.

Whatever residual doubt lingered in the room, Saint’s standing with anyone who’d actually worked under him was rock solid.