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Stoke City are delighted to announce the appointment of the highly-rated Steve Cotterill as the club’s new manager. Steve, 37, has signed a three-year contract and takes up his new post at the Britannia Stadium with immediate effect. His official title will be team manager and he will work alongside our Director of Football John Rudge and first-team coach Dave Kevan.

Steve is regarded as one of the brightest young coaches in English football and has a UEFA A coaching licence. He is currently studying for the prestigious UEFA Pro Licence – the highest qualification in Europe – after being personally selected by the Football Association’s Technical Director Howard Wilkinson.

Steve joins us from Cheltenham Town, where he enjoyed significant success. He guided them from the Dr Martens League into the former Vauxhall (now Nationwide) Conference in 1997 and two years later they were promoted to the Football League Third Division after winning the Conference title. Cheltenham also won the FA Trophy in 1998 and in that year, aged 34, Steve became the youngest winner of the Nationwide Conference Mail on Sunday Manager of the Season Award – an honour he collected again the following season. Earlier this month, in only their third season as a League club, Cheltenham won promotion to Division Two after defeating Rushden and Diamonds in the Second Division play-off final at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium.

Steve, a striker, began his playing career with Cheltenham, his home-town club, in 1982, and went on to Alvechurch and Burton Albion before breaking into professional football with Wimbledon in 1989. He also played for Brighton and AFC Bournemouth before being forced to retire from full-time football through injury in 1995.

His first job in management was with League of Ireland outfit Sligo Rovers and he took them to third place in 1995/96 as well as reaching the FAI Cup semi-finals and the FAI League Cup final. The following season the club competed in Europe, in the Intertoto Cup. Steve returned to Cheltenham in December 1996, initially as a player, but took over as caretaker manager in January 1997 and was appointed full-time following promotion to the Conference at the end of that season.

Confirming his appointment today, City’s Chief Executive Jonathan Fuller said: “We are delighted to welcome Steve to the club. “There is no doubt he is one of the most highly-rated and sought-after young manager/coaches in the country. He is very well-regarded within football and his name has been linked with a number of vacancies. “We interviewed a several top-class candidates for the job, but Steve’s credentials, qualifications and achievements to date stood out.”

Steve is under contract to the club until 2005, with the Chief Executive adding: “We thank Cheltenham Town for the way they reacted to our request to talk to Steve and their co-operation after he was offered the job.”