KEY POINTS:
There were five minutes in 1964 and another 10 in 1973 when Allan Jones considered walking away from the game.
It's not stretching it to say he comes from the Bill Shankly school of football (the great Liverpool manager said, "some people believe football is a matter of
life and death, I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that").
There are pictures of Jones with Eusebio, Just Fontaine and Terry Venables on the walls of Jones' study. Playing formations lie in a heap on the floor, trophies line his shelves and biographies of Bobby Robson and Alex Ferguson stand in his bookshelf.
"My wife thinks that when they actually nail the coffin down, they'll hear a banging and me yelling, 'get the bloody back four up tighter'," Jones says with a grin as he takes a sip of tea from his England football mug.
Football is Jones' passion. Some might call it an unhealthy obsession, but few coaches are more suited to take the reins of Auckland City as they take on Egypt's Al Ahly at the World Club Championships in Japan tonight.
The 67-year-old Geordie was the logical replacement after the club cut ties with coach Roger Wilkinson. Jones guided them to Japan in the first place, gaining victory at both the NZFC and Oceania Club Champs.
His recruitment was not without its drama. And there were moments when Jones thought he wouldn't board the plane on Wednesday morning because of a badly sprained ankle and then a foot infection that had him on an IV drip for five days.
But he made that flight and his presence has given the bunch of amateurs about to play in the biggest tournament of their careers the boost they need.
While most pundits think Auckland City are on a hiding to nothing against Al Ahly, and Oceania and New Zealand Soccer just hope they perform credibly, confidence pulses through Jones.
"We're planning on winning," he says earnestly. "I'm constantly listening to people say that we're on the stairway to heaven, and all this nonsense. No, we play football and I'm approaching it like any other football match. You go there to win.
"I have a phrase I use constantly, 'I'm not afraid of their coach and there's no reason on earth why you should be afraid of their players'. I have no fears. I know exactly how it will work."
What makes Jones so confident is his record internationally. In 130 international games, from youth to senior level, he's managed results in 100 (68 wins and 32 draws).
He's also coached a side to victory over Al Ahly. It might have been in 1996 when he was with Qatar club side Al Shamal and have absolutely no bearing on what happens tonight, but it's information like this that Jones filters down to his players to show them he is in control.
They will need all the help they can get. Some might be overawed by the fact they could play in front of 45,000 fans at Toyota Stadium (they normally get 1000 at Kiwitea St) and travel with a police escort but they are likely to feed off Jones and his bravado.
It's fair to say their mentor has been there and done that. A centre-back of moderate ability who was recruited by the great Wolves side of the mid-1950s and then finished his career at Second Division Bristol City, Jones soon went into coaching and was even touted by some in the early 1970s as the next Brian Clough.
While working for the FA in 1979, he got wind of a job going with the New Zealand Football Association, as they were known then, as their director of coaching. "That sounded like fun," Jones says. "It was only supposed to be for three years."
Those three years turned into six and then another six as All Whites coach in the early 1990s, interspersed with stints in Kuwait, Qatar, Dubai and Oman. "It's a bit like a movie," he jokes when rattling off his coaching CV.
When he returned to New Zealand in 2003, as Central United and then Auckland City coach, it was supposed to be a precursor to retirement. There were eyebrows raised when he walked away from Auckland City after three years, especially with the World Club Championships six months away.
"I felt it, and I still believe it, that it was right for me to leave Auckland City," he says. "If we were in England I would have sold about 50 per cent of the players but because we're not a professional club I couldn't do that. They needed a fresh face."
It's this ability to recognise when his time is up, that characterises his longevity. In 38 years as a professional coach, he has been sacked only twice - and one of those was in 1973.
Japan is more than just an agreeable interlude but, as the national women's coach, his eyes are still on the 2007 women's World Cup and the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
"I think I can [retire] but my wife doesn't think so," Jones says.
Retirement is not in his immediate sights. But a certain team from Cairo is.
