Where Hughes ranks among City's longest-serving managers since 2000

Next Friday will be day number 337 since Mark Hughes first made himself comfortable in the Valley Parade hot-seat.

So what? You may ask. It’s hardly rivalling the longevity of League Two Yorkshire neighbour Simon Weaver, well into his 14th season in charge.

Arsene Wenger’s two-decade record at Arsenal will not be threatened for a good while yet.

But in City circles, the free weekend from the Walsall game being called off will signal an achievement of sorts for Hughes.

He will overtake Gary Bowyer as the eighth longest-serving Bantams boss this century.

Reach March 31 and Hughes will have moved past Peter Taylor and Jim Jefferies into sixth.

At a club where the last manager to start the season and still be in the post beyond February was Stuart McCall part two in 2017, that is definitely milestone territory.

By the end of next week, Hughes will be the longest-lasting (or should that be surviving, given the club’s track record) gaffer of the seven since that McCall reign was ended the following year.

That, more than anything, spells out the record of underachievement that has held City back in recent years.

Mark Hughes has been City boss since February 24, 2022 (Image: Thomas Gadd)

Although, considering only four managers have lasted more than 13 months in the job this century - McCall did it twice - it suggests the Valley Parade revolving door has been in operation for a lot longer.

Phil Parkinson stands head and shoulders above the rest with a stay of nearly five years - and he is the only one to leave the club of his own accord.

One meeting with new chairman Edin Rahic convinced him that it was time to call it quits after a reign that produced two magical cup runs, two Wembley appearances, promotion, Chelsea away, Arsenal, Aston Villa and four consecutive seasons of upward mobility.

By the time, he hot-footed it across the Pennines to Bolton, Parkinson had clocked up an impressive 1,757 days at the helm.

McCall’s first spell in management is a distant second on the list, finishing just a week shy of reaching four figures.

His time learning on the job saw a nearly season in the second year when increased investment in the squad pushed the Bantams within touching distance of a promotion challenge - only for the wheels to fall off spectacularly in the final two months.

Talked into staying on for a third campaign when he wanted to walk away, McCall would never get that close again - not until his second crack at the job post-Parkinson.

Not far behind him, on 969 days, came Colin Todd who stepped up from his role as Bryan Robson’s number two following City’s second administration in three years.

Patching a team together in the aftermath of near financial oblivion, Todd made a decent fist of his first year and flirted with the top six in League One before falling away.

Again, that was as good as it got for him and City eventually pulled the trigger after 32 months in an unsuccessful attempt to stave off the drop to the fourth tier.

Nicky Law, fourth on City’s list of managers to go some sort of distance, had to deal with the horrors of administration the first time around.

Geoffrey Richmond tried to sack the entire squad after Law had been in charge for barely four months as the club descended down a black hole.

Law stuck it out and begged and borrowed to build a competitive side that defied the critics who predicted a long season of struggle to follow.

But he would be shown the door two months shy of his second anniversary after a miserable start to the following one dumped the Bantams in a relegation scrap they would never win.

So that leaves McCall again at number five - taking the club within a whisker of returning to the Championship after a 13-year absence.

Having equalled the fifth-place finish from Parkinson’s swansong 12 months earlier, McCall would fall to the Lions just like his predecessor as Millwall edged that heart-breaking play-off final at Wembley.

His broken relationship with Rahic would lead to an inevitable parting of the waves when McCall hit his first rocky patch and he was gone the following February - City’s favoured sacking month.

It hardly reads like a roll of honour for the current man steering the City wheel, someone used to the majestic tenure of Sir Alex Ferguson.

But Hughes will soon have his name on the board and hopefully remain on course to keep rising.

It's been far too long since we've had the novelty of a Bantams boss making it into his second season.