Micky Mellon
Manager Profile

Biography

Micky began his playing career with Bristol City in 1989, spending four years at Ashton Gate, including a loan spell with Irish club Cork City. He moved to West Bromwich Albion in 1993, and Blackpool a year later, where he established himself as a regular in the first team under Sam Allardyce. In 1997 he moved on to Tranmere Rovers, spending two years at Prenton Park before moving on to Burnley. He returned to Tranmere in 2001, before turning out for Kidderminster Harriers, Witton Albion and Lancaster City where he went into coaching.

After a spell as a youth team coach with Burnley, he became manager of Fleetwood Town in September 2008, guiding them to two promotions up to the English Football League. He moved on to Barnsley as assistant manager before returning to management with League Two Shrewsbury Town in May 2014. There he secured automatic promotion to League One in 2015 before becoming Tranmere Rovers boss in October 2016.

He enjoyed success at Wembley in May 2018, taking Rovers back to the EFL after a 2-1 win over Boreham Wood in the National League play-off final, and another promotion followed for Micky as he guided Tranmere to back-to-back promotions after defeating Newport County at Wembley in the League Two play-off final in 2019. By March 2020, Rovers were within the relegation zone of League One, and after the cancellation of fixtures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the club were relegated to League Two.

After a well publicised search for a new manager following the departure of Robbie Neilson, United announced Micky as the clubs first team manager in July 2020.

As manager of the team during the Covid-19 pandemic, Micky's entire tenure as manager was played behind closed doors. United began brightly under his stewardship, taking 7 points from their first 4 games before defeat to Celtic unraveled his good start. As the season progressed, a feature of Mellon's tactics was the determination to doggedly defend in games, resulting in a five clean sheets in the space of six games during October and November, and the "no score draw" becoming a familiar result.

With the club in a bottom six battle for Premiership survival, Mellon guided the club through a series of good results towards the end of the campaign, before securing safety with a 1-0 win over Hamilton on April 10th. United rounded off their season with a good run in the Scottish Cup, reaching the semi-final stage before bowing out against Hibs at Hampden.

On 25 May 2021, United confirmed that Micky Mellon had left the club by mutual agreement.