William Ayre (7 May 1952 – 16 April 2002) was an English footballer who played for three clubs in a sixteen-year professional career, making over three hundred League appearances in the process. After retiring from the playing side of the game, he became a manager, and took the helm at five clubs between 1984 and 2000. He guided Blackpool to two successive play-off finals, in 1991 and 1992 (winning promotion in the second appearance), during his four years in charge of the club.
Billy Ayre was born in the Gateshead suburb of Crookhill. After trying his hand at refereeing in his teenage years, he played for several years in non-League football at two amateur clubs in County Durham: Crook Town and Bishop Auckland.
Ayre began his professional playing career at Scarborough in 1975 whilst balancing a teaching profession at St Leonard's Catholic School in Durham, where he taught art and physical education. He won the Scarborough Supporters' Player of the Year award in 1977. It was his uncompromising performances for Boro that earned him a move, also in 1977, to Hartlepool United.
Ayre played over one hundred league games for Hartlepool, scoring 27 goals. He made his debut for the club on 13 August 1977, in a 3–0 League Cup defeat at Grimsby Town. He made his league debut seven days later in a 2–1 home defeat to Torquay United. He was the club's top scorer in an ever-present season with the club, 1977–78, with thirteen goals, which assisted in his being named as the Supporters' Player of the Year. In 2008, Ayre was posthumously named United's "Player of the 1970s".
In Ayre's second season at Hartlepool, 1978–79, he made 42 league appearances and scored five goals. In 1979–80, he made 43 league appearances and score nine goals. In his final season at the club, 1980–81, he made ten league appearances and scored one goal before he was sold to Halifax Town. He played against Hartlepool in Halifax's visit to Victoria Park later in the season.
At Halifax, Ayre made 63 league appearances and scored five goals in his first spell at The Shay.
The summer of 1982 saw Ayre move again, this time to Mansfield Town, then managed by Stuart Boam. He spent two seasons with the Stags, making 67 league appearances and scoring seven goals. He scored a headed goal on his first-team debut in a Football League Trophy tie at Field Mill.
The following season, 1983–84, Ayre found himself acting as caretaker manager after the sacking of Boam. Ian Greaves was eventually appointed as the new manager, and Ayre was released on a free transfer.
Ayre re-joined Halifax for a second spell in 1984. In two years, he made 32 league appearances and scored two goals. He brought his playing career to a close with the club in 1986. On 5 August 1987, Halifax played a benefit match for Ayre against Halifax RLFC. At this point, he was the club's manager.
In October 1984, Ayre took over as caretaker manager of Halifax for less than a month. Mick Jones, who was godfather to Ayre's daughter, Rachel, was installed on 10 November.
In December 1986, Ayre became manager of Halifax again, this time on a full-time basis. (He was also managing director of the club.) Three years later, in April of the 1989–90 season, he resigned, having failed to get them out of the league's basement division.
A few days after departing Halifax, Ayre joined Blackpool as assistant to manager Jimmy Mullen. After Mullen's departure at the end of the month, Ayre worked alongside caretaker manager Tom White. Graham Carr was installed during the close season, and he kept Ayre on as assistant. When Carr himself was sacked in November 1990, Ayre was promoted in his place. His first game in charge was a draw at Hereford United on 1 December 1990. As Roy Calley wrote in his 1992 book, Blackpool: A Complete Record 1887–1992, Ayre, almost unknown outside the lower leagues, was "greeted reservedly by Blackpool supporters, yet in the space of two years [had] become the club's most popular – and certainly most successful – boss since Stan Mortensen". On matchdays, he wore the number 15 Blackpool shirt, in the days when only three substitutes (numbers 12 to 14) were permitted for league games.
When Carr left, Blackpool were lying in eighteenth position in the Division Four table; six months later, however, the team had qualified for the play-offs after losing only five of their remaining thirty games. Between 10 November 1990 and 19 November 1991 two new (and still existing) club records were set: fifteen consecutive home League wins in what turned out to be a twenty-four-game unbeaten run at Bloomfield Road. (The match that set the ball rolling, a 4–2 victory over Aldershot, was under the guidance of Carr.) Their good fortune came undone at the last hurdle, however, when they lost in a penalty shoot-out to Torquay United in the final at Wembley and remained in the Fourth Division for another season. (In an interview at the final whistle, Ayre said, "I've never had a worse moment in my life, never mind football.")
Ayre was able to keep largely the same team together and guided them back to Wembley the following 1991–92 season, in which they finally gained promotion after another, more successful penalties experience. Scunthorpe United were the unlucky team on this occasion. Blackpool had booked their place in the new Division Two. Ayre dedicated the victory to his parents, who died the previous year. Ayre's son, David, was Blackpool's mascot, and accompanied his father in the pre-match walk out to the centre circle.
The following season saw the Seasiders finish in a lowly eighteenth position after winning only twelve of their forty-six games.
On the final day of the 1993–94 season, Blackpool avoided relegation by a single point by virtue of beating Leyton Orient 4–1 at Bloomfield Road. Ayre was sacked in June by then-chairman Owen Oyston after the Seasiders failed to impress at their new level. He was succeeded by Sam Allardyce. Ayre's league record in his three and a half years at Bloomfield Road: 191 games, 77 wins, 70 draws, 44 losses. At the time of his departure, Ayre was the sixth-longest-serving Blackpool manager in terms of Football League games in charge.
Ayre achieved not only promotion but subsequently survival with very little financial backing from Oyston. After a defeat at his former club, Hartlepool United, on 2 October 1992, Ayre confronted the travelling support, who had been shouting to Ayre to spend some money. He explained how his access to finances were tied by his chairman. During this period, players such as Alan Wright, Paul Groves, and, most notably, Trevor Sinclair all left the club for bigger and better things. Despite this, Ayre's sides battled, grafted, and occasionally shocked sides with far greater resources at their disposal. As demonstrated in the retrospective DVD The Seasiders, a feature of the Geordie's time at Bloomfield Road was his "ticker-tape entrance" in games at Bloomfield Road – fans throwing paper aloft whilst Ayre made his way across to the dugout on the east side of the ground. He would acknowledge the fans, then clench his fists, urging the Seasiders' faithful to back his team.
Ayre's next stop was Scarborough, where he arrived in August 1994, some twenty years after playing for the Yorkshiremen. His reign at the McCain Stadium lasted four months, after he was sacked for failing to turn around the Division Three strugglers.