Blackpool on the up

Blackpool's players celebrate their LDV Vans Trophy triumph

By BBC Sport Online's Paul Fletcher in Cardiff

As Sunday's 4-1 LDV Vans Trophy final win over Cambridge illustrates, Blackpool are a club moving in the right direction.

And manager Steve McMahon is the man plotting their course.

At one point last season the once-proud Lancashire club were 23rd in the Third Division and a 7-1 thrashing at Barnet reduced McMahon to tears.

The club's ground, Bloomfield Road, was an embarrassment, a dilapidated shambles hardly fit for Sunday morning football.

While the outlook for Pool's supporters became ever more overcast, local rivals Preston continued their assured climb up the league, putting in sharp perspective the Seasiders' decline.

McMahon: The man behind Blackpool's revival

But McMahon, who took over as Blackpool boss in January 2000, did not panic and continued rebuilding and reshaping his squad.

Blackpool sneaked into last season's Division Three play-offs and went on to defeat Leyton Orient in a thrilling final to win promotion.

McMahon's team have now followed last May's triumph with another success at the Millennium Stadium.

"If you go to any club and see improvement then that is good," McMahon said.

"It does not have to drastic, but if you see improvement you know you are moving in the right direction."

John Hills, on the scoresheet against Cambridge and the game's man of the match, is in no doubt that McMahon is the key figure in Blackpool's revival.

"Since he took over as manager he has changed a lot of the players," said Hills.

The ground is taking shape and we now have a trophy cabinet to put in the new stadium

Steve McMahon
Blackpool manager

"There are just two or three players left from when he took but he has brought quality into the side. I have been here from the start and we are now much stronger."

Improvements on the field are going hand-in-hand with developments to Blackpool's much-maligned ground, which has been given a dramatic facelift and will eventually become an 18,000 all-seater stadium.

"The ground is taking shape after the play-off win last year and we now have a trophy cabinet to put in the new stadium," said McMahon.

But the boss is not content to rest on his laurels and is already planning how a mediocre return to Division Two - his team are currently 15th in the table - can be improved upon next season.

"Things are looking up but we need to get players in," he said.

"A number of players contracts are up at the end of the season and they will be surplus to requirements.

"It is up to me to get four or five players in who will strengthen the squad.

"I said this season was a period of consolidation, a chance for the players to find their feet .

Hills (left) wants to restore parity with Preston

"If we can get some new players in we'll see how we do. But I'm not going to make any stupid predictions."

Hills hopes that the LDV Vans Trophy success is another step on the road to establishing parity with Preston.

"I have always said that I think Preston are a couple of years in front of us," he said.

"I hope that we can now do what they have and perhaps we will be playing them in a derby match once again."