Mark Briggs: connected to success
In-depth profile on Birmingham Legion's new head coach, with insights from those who have known him at various stages of his career.
When you talk to those who’ve known Mark Briggs over the course of his career, they all say the same thing.
Before bringing up his achievements or coaching ability, they tell you about Mark Briggs the person. They say he is a really good, genuine man. One who truly cares about people, his players and the institutions he represents. One who will forge lasting and meaningful connections with all of them.
The success is just a by-product.
“He's the type of guy who can get players to run through a wall for him, because he builds relationships,”Matt Glaeser said.
Now the head coach for Forward Madison FC in USL League One, Glaeser first met Briggs as a player at Wilmington Hammerheads when Briggs was the assistant coach. The two quickly formed a strong bond, leading Glaeser to follow Briggs as an assistant coach through the next steps of his coaching career.
“It’s more than just show up to training, coach footy, and then I'll go home for the day,” Glaeser said. “He's a person who takes a lot of time to build relationships and have conversations. Even the hard ones. Even the hard conversation, he's good.”
[Disclaimer: This article was originally written for and published on Birmingham Sports Media, but I put too much time and effort into it to not publish it here too. However, I recommend reading the original article to get the full experience with the interactive visualizations.]
The early years
Mark Briggs was born in Wolverhampton, England, on 16 February, 1982. But though the city have a professional soccer team of their own, it was a different West Midlands club that gave him his shot at professional soccer.
Briggs joined the academy of West Bromwich Albion, barely five miles outside the English city of Birmingham, in 1998. Though he never broke into the club’s first team, which played in the second division of the English pyramid at the time, his stint in the Albion academy set him up for the rest of his career.
“He was one of those players that had a real interest in the game, wanting to know why and where and whatever,” Richard O’Kelly, a former coach in the WBA academy, said. “Mark was always very intelligent. He asked questions and could work things out for himself. So he had the makings of a coach back then at 16-17 years of age.”
O’Kelly explained that him and the other coach at the time, John Trewick, encouraged the players to be involved in their own development. They never wanted to simply tell them what to do.
As a result, they stimulated Briggs’ curiosity and questions.
Briggs wasn’t the only future coach there, either. Enzo Maresca, now head coach for Chelsea FC in the English Premier League, joined the academy around the same time as Briggs.
Even though they were rivals in a sense — both vying for a spot in central midfield — the Italian’s arrival showed the personable nature that became Briggs’ calling card.
“[Maresca] couldn’t really speak English, but he made himself understood,” O’Kelly recalled. “That’s where Mark Briggs comes into his own as well, because Mark Briggs is one of the players that welcomed him to the club.”
“That’s another thing about Briggs,” O’Kelly added. “He made people feel at home. It didn’t matter who he was, whether he was a rival position, he would make them feel at home.”
Briggs said in an interview with GiveMeSport that Maresca’s arrival effectively ended his own WBA career. The Italian was a step above his teammates, displaying the gap they needed to bridge to make it at a club of such stature.
But Briggs was determined to succeed.
What he lacked in athleticism, O’Kelly said he made up with his knowledge of the game. His positional play and understanding of where to be on the pitch was his standout attribute according to his former coach.
So when his chances at a career in his home nation faded away, Briggs found a new path.
“He was the sort of person that didn't stand around waiting for somebody else to do something,” O’Kelly said. “He basically took control of the situation himself. It's almost like if you're drowning and you go, ‘Oh, I'll wait for something to save me,’ But he was proactive in his own recovery.”
A journeyman career
Mark Briggs departed West Bromwich Albion and his native England in 2003. And so began a playing career spanning over a decade, 19 clubs and four different countries.
Briggs joined Herfølge Boldklub, in Denmark. He spent two years with the Scandinavian club before returning to England in 2004 with Notts County. The next four years saw him bounce across multiple lower division clubs in both England and Wales before making his first move to the United States near the end of the decade.
O’Kelly said he was not surprised to see his former player make a way for himself despite the constant change.
“He’s got good standards, which is very important,” O’Kelly said. “If he got good standards and got good morals, good guidelines with the family and that, he was okay. He was set up, put it this way. I think whatever he did, he would be okay it.”
The Englishman joined Kalamazoo Outrage, in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in 2008. The team played in the USL Premier Development League — today’s USL League Two — and Briggs stayed just one season before returning to England once again.
He returned stateside a year later for his first stint with the Wilmington Hammerheads. The North Carolina team won the now-defunct USL Second Division regular season, and Briggs earned the club’s Player of the Year title.
Very few of his stops led to much recognition or silverware, but they were all key steps in shaping the man who would become the manager.
“You need the respect of the team based on your playing career,” Carson Porter said. Porter gave Briggs his first shot as a professional coach in 2015, hiring him as his assistant at Wilmington Hammerheads. “I'm not saying you have to be this most amazing player, but I do think that when you walk into that locker room and you can look those players in the eye and say 'I've been in this particular space, which means I've been in the USL, I've been in the American professional pathway, but I've also been in other locker rooms in other challenging situations,’ he brings that experience with him.
“He's got a confidence, and I think that gives you confidence,” Ported added. “He's got a confidence about speaking to professional players that I don't have, in terms of just like he's been in those locker rooms. He’s had a very unique journey as a professional player, and he brings all those experiences when he talks to people every day.”
His playing success with the Hammerheads led to a transfer back to Europe, this time in Malta. He joined Mosta Football Club, in the Maltese First Division, in 2009 for a two-year stint. He did however return stateside through a brief loan spell with the Charleston Battery in 2010.
Two more English clubs followed before his eventual return to Wilmington in 2012.
There, he ended his playing career and started his coaching success.
First steps
Mark Briggs played two more seasons for the Wilmington Hammerheads before hanging up his boots. Before he ever did, his coaching career had already begun.
Wilmington’s head coach at the time, David Irving, invited Briggs to take charge of a session while he was still a player. The arrangement became a regular occurrence, and Briggs found his calling.
Once he retired in 2014, Briggs got involved in youth coaching in the area. A year later, he was back at Wilmington as Porter’s assistant.
Porter had joined the Hammerheads after Briggs’ retirement, but that did not prevent the two from making an instant connection once the latter came on as his assistant.
“He starts with just being a good, a genuine guy,” Porter said. “He's got a smile on his face and knows that people are human beings first, that soccer players are human beings first. So he's a good person to just have conversations with.
“I think when he was younger, when we were working together, it was great to have him talk to the players and be that go between that an assistant coach sort of needs to be,” Porter added.
Porter said he very quickly saw in Briggs the potential to be a great head coach. One of the reasons for it was the Englishman’s leadership skills, as well as his ability to have tough conversations.
Through his own career, Briggs had learned the importance of being direct with players. Because he had been in their shoes, enjoying successful stints as well as disappointing rejections, Porter said that journey allowed him to speak with his players in a direct manner.
He told it to them how it was, because that’s what he knew he had wanted for himself.
“There's always a conversation about what level you need to be at as a player to be a good coach,” Porter said. “Not always the best players translate to good coaches. I think that his professional pathway was where he saw the ups and downs of being a professional player, and in the hardest way. He got released from teams, he also had success with teams and everything in between.
“I think those types of experiences are really valuable if you go into [coaching],” Porter added. “If you're one of these big name players that's won everything but hasn't had a lot of struggle, then it's very hard to connect with those players that are going through it day in and day out. I saw him have empathy towards players, understand what they were going through.”
Taking charge
Having established strong connections with his players as the team’s assistant, Mark Briggs was well-set to take over as head coach. When Porter stepped aside midway through the 2015 season, he did just that.
Matt Glaeser, who had served as a goalkeeper coach while also playing for the team, was elevated to his assistant. From the off, he saw the social skills that became synonymous with Briggs’ career.
“It’s a rare thing to have this, I would call it social competency,” Glaeser said. “The communication skills that he has, just the way he's able to to make you feel important no matter who you are. Whether you're someone working in the cafeteria or a grounds crew member or a player or whoever it might be, I think he has a unique ability to make people feel important, to listen, to hear people out.
“He's an incredibly good listener and communicator from that perspective,” Glaeser added. “I think those leadership qualities are hard to learn. I think some of that is just a gift. You can learn some of that, but I think he has a gift for it.”
Like Porter, Glaeser said that Briggs’ career path gave him a unique perspective. It gave him a lot of interesting experiences and valuable insights to convey to both players and staff.
Wilmington was in a tough spot at the time. Only a few years prior, in 2010, the team had undergone a year-long hiatus due to financial difficulties. Halfway through the 2016 season, reports emerged they might do so again in 2017.
Despite it all, Briggs’ connection with his players kept everyone going.
“It started being apparent that maybe the Hammerheads wouldn't survive,” Porter said. “And so it makes what he did in Wilmington even more impressive. It's hard when people start to understand like, ‘oh, I'm not sure if we're going to have a team next year,’ but you keep them going and you keep them on the same page.
“There was a lot of things that didn't set you up for success, and he still fought against that,” Porter added. “So it's a credit to him and also an indicator of, man, this guy's got a lot of ability to lead a group of men.”
Despite finishing just one spot off the playoffs, Wilmington’s fate was sealed by the end of the season. The club self-relegated from the USL to the Premier Development League, and, a year later, the PDL disbanded. The club subsequently dropped its professional team to become a youth soccer academy.
But for Briggs, it was just the beginning.
“You could start seeing that his brain was sort of wired to set a team up, and he was thinking about things in the right way and doing things in the right way,” Porter said. “So that [2016 season] was a good moment, for sure. A hard moment, difficult, but a good moment.”
A taste of the big time
Mark Briggs had faced Real Salt Lake in the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup in his final year in North Carolina. His Wilmington team had taken the MLS side all the way to penalties before losing. As his Wilmington career came to an end, Briggs parlayed his success and that game into an assistant coach’s job with Real Monarchs, Real Salt Lake’s lower-league affiliate.
For a coach with just two years of professional experience, it was a big step.
“When we got to Salt Lake, that was an incredible time for both of us,” Glaeser, who followed Briggs to Utah, said. “Now we're going into an MLS environment. You’re surrounded by people who have done it, people who are experienced, people who have had some success at the highest level in the country.
“I think that was another good opportunity, another good pathway for him and myself, really both of us, to learn and continue to hone our skills,” Glaeser added. “He's a guy who always wants to keep developing as a coach and continue to push the envelope.”
Real Monarchs originally hired Briggs to work under Mike Petke. But like in Wilmington, he did not remain an assistant long. Real Salt Lake tabbed Petke to take over the MLS side before the season even began, giving Briggs control of the at-the-time USL affiliate.
Like in North Carolina, his ability to create connection during his tenure as an assistant made for a effortless transition.
“In that assistant coach role, a lot of times you can have a closer relationship with the players as you're not the main one calling the shots,” Chandler Hoffman, a Real Monarchs player at the time, said. “I think he did a good job in preseason of establishing some relationships with some key players within the team.
“So when he got promoted to the head coach when Petke took the RSL job, there was a lot of respect from the group and belief in that we were going to have a great season,” Hoffman continued. “That kind of carried over and kick started his coaching career.”
Another player at the time, Max Lachowecki, admitted the players were not particularly familiar with Briggs prior to his arrival. However, once he was there, he very quickly gained their respect.
“When he showed up, the intensity increased right away,” Lachowecki said. “We had a vision and a goal from the jump, which was super important for a team that hadn't had a ton of success in the previous year.
“Ultimately, one of the building blocks for being a good coach and a good manager is that you have to respect the person from the jump," Lachowekci added. "And we did that. The way he conducted himself on the field, in training, in the locker room and elsewhere really set the tone and the tempo for how our team was gonna conduct itself, which is great.”
Briggs’ approach worked. In his first season as the Monarchs’ head coach, the team won the USL Championship regular season for the first time in its history.
A winning formula
Mark Briggs’ inaugural season success was even more remarkable when considering the team’s history. It was not just the club’s first title, it was the first time they had so much as made the playoffs.
It was no surprise he earned the league’s USL Coach of the Year as a result.
For both Hoffman and Lachowecki, one of the key ingredients to his success was Briggs’ ability to assess his team.
“He's pretty adept at evaluating what strengths and weaknesses the team has and then building a game plan around that,” Lachowecki said. “He’s pretty good at being able to recognize what makes the most sense for a team to have success on the field, which ultimately I think is the most important thing.”
Hoffman went even further. He said that Briggs didn’t just understand what worked for a team, he knew how to bring the best out of everyone. As a result, the forward enjoyed the best scoring season of his career, leading the team with 17 goals.
“I think understanding the players that you have and then building the system around what you have rather than trying to force your players into a certain style or a set way that you wanna play, I think was the biggest thing,” Hoffman said. “He just did a great job of seeing ‘okay, what's the skill set of of my team and how can I maximize the players that I have?’”
The two players also said their coach did a great job setting clear expectations. He came in with a plan, and every player on that 2017 roster knew exactly what he expected of them.
And the expectation was unwavering: to win.
“There was definitely that culture mentality that, when you stepped across the lines, you were going to figure out a way to compete and figure out a way to win,” Hoffman said.
Getting to that mentality came down to Briggs’ communication skills.
Lachowecki described Briggs as a “player’s coach.” He said he would demand hard work in training and games, but he was also someone players could go to with any concern or question. He challenged them to grow but did so with the right mixture of hard-lining and compassion.
He also did a good job of blending in the team’s youth and veterans, a key component for an MLS’ affiliate team. Lachowecki said he struck the right balance of letting the team’s leaders lead while still retaining control of the group.
It all resulted in a truly unified mentality, where the entire team felt like they were fighting together against everyone else.
“You definitely have to have everybody buy in,” Lachowecki said. “I think a great way to do that is definitely with one of those us-versus-them mentalities. It definitely proved fruitful for us in his first year with the Monarchs. We really had that mentality, which was great.”
Challenging years
Mark Briggs’ second year in Utah was less successful, and when off-field matters took centre stage, the Englishman resigned midway through the 2018 season.
The setback did not keep him out of a job for long, as both his reputation and his former players ensured he quickly found a new home in California.
“I thought he did a great job of just organizing the team and understanding how to compete and create that culture of being successful,” Hoffman said. “So I kind of vouched for him when he got the job in Sacramento. Todd Dunivant was there and he had reached out to me. I told Todd that he would do a great job in Sacramento.”
Briggs moved to Sacramento Republic in 2019, first as the club’s academy director and U19 coach. He took over as head coach ahead of the 2020 season. But after leading them out for their first competitive game of his reign March 7, 2020, the next one had to wait until July.
Like it did everything else, the COVID-19 pandemic suspended the 2020 USL Championship season.
When play resumed, it was behind closed doors and with limited scope. Teams formed groups of four, playing the same matchups again and again.
It was a challenge, but one Briggs accepted head on.
“He likes to do things the right way,” O’Kelly said. “He's got a real drive. He wants to be successful. He's always looking to educate himself and never accepting what he's got, wanting to know better, curious about things, why we do things. All those aspects come into the frame.”
The following season, 2021, saw some return to normalcy but still plenty of of COVID-enforced rules. As teams competed in limited subdivisions within each conference, Sacramento struggled. For the first time in their history, the California club missed out on the postseason.
Despite that disappointment, the club announced in December that Briggs had signed a new contract to return in 2022. It quickly proved to be the right decision.
“He was able to take the team that suffered through that during Covid and build them back up and have the spirit come back,” Sharon Anderson, co-host of the State of the Republic podcast, said.
The 2022 Open Cup
With his second chance, Briggs achieved the feat he is perhaps best known for.
In 2022, Mark Briggs led the Sacramento Republic to the final of the US Open Cup. The California team became the first USL Championship side to reach the competition’s final in over 15 years, defeating three MLS teams on the way there.
And so the Briggs name became known nationwide.
“All coaches will tell you that their journey and their path to get to where they are, you need a couple of breaks,” Porter said. “You need a couple of things to happen. Sacramento has been kind of at the top of USL in terms of visibility and certainly sort of spectators and support from the community. So that's a really big job, and he made the most of that opportunity.
“That U.S. Open Cup run was just fun,” Porter continued. “It was fun for the entire country. So then you start showing kind of what you can do against MLS teams. Not only does your confidence grow as a coach, but also the amount of eyes [on you]. You start building a resume and you start putting your name on things.
“So I think it's opportunity, but also he was prepared for that opportunity and he made the most of it. So surprised [at his success]? No. But some breaks that he got? Yes. But also just a great preparation and a lot of hard work to make sure that he took advantage of those.”
Three years on, Sacramento Republic fans all attribute that historical run to the same thing.
They say Briggs created a real belief amongst the club that they could beat any team they faced.
“I think that comes from Briggs’ mentality,” Ryan Hodek, writer for Quail City Soccer, said. “He was able to get the best out of every single player that was on the pitch, whether we were the underdogs or the overdogs. He made sure that we were gonna get the results in that cup. I think it's a direct reflection of his mentality and his passion for the sport and for the team. I don't think we would've made it through without it.”
“What he does so well over most coaches is he instills the belief that they can do anything,” Anderson added. “When he has control of the locker room and that spirit, our guys run through brick walls for Briggs. Just because he instills the belief in them.”
Riyan Lacara, co-host of the State of the Republic podcast and writer for All is Quail, added that the team had no fear. While they respected the MLS teams they went up against, they were never scared of them.
Tiago Suárez, a current Birmingham Legion player, got his start as a 16-year-old in that Sacramento team. He remembers it well.
“It was probably the most special months of my life in my career so far,” Suárez said. “A lot of USL teams don't get to go on a run like that. But the experience of playing three MLS teams in a row and showing that the USL can compete and beat those teams? Those were top MLS teams. And we showed that we were a good team.”
Sacramento entered the competition in the second round, claiming a 6-0 victory over Portland Timbers’ U23 side. Two more lower league wins followed before finally facing their first MLS foe in the Round of 16.
On May 25, 2022, Sacramento defeated San Jose Earthquakes in front of over 10,000 home supporters. Just under a month later, they traveled to LA Galaxy, one of the most successful franchises in MLS history. Now in front of a hostile away crowd, the USL Championship team came away with a shock 2-1 victory.
Through those results, the self-belief became so strongly instilled in the players that it soon spread beyond the confines of the locker room. By the time Sacramento hosted Sporting Kansas City in the cup’s semifinal, even the fans believed their team would see it through.
“The players felt like they were gonna come away with that win and they were gonna give everything they got to get something," Hodek said. "And the fans felt the same way during that cup run. I remember the semifinal, sitting in the stands, watching this game. It goes into extra time, and we're all a little nervous at this point. But at the end of the day, everybody in the stand felt like we were gonna come away with that win.
“I think that's a direct result of what Briggs put out,” Hodek added. “He made everybody believe that whatever we went out there for, it was possible. It doesn't matter what team we were playing, we could come away with that one for sure.”
Connecting with the community
With the cup run in his back pocket, Mark Briggs was indisputably a cult hero with the Republic faithful. But it wasn’t just the on-field success that endeared him to the Sacramento community.
“When Mark Briggs came along, he was just like this breath of fresh air,” Anderson said. “So accessible to talk to for the fans. He just enjoyed being in the moment and with people. You could tell he appreciated his family and the family that he built with the Republic and with the fan base.”
Republic fans all speak of a coach who truly cared about the fans and creating a meaningful connection with them. During games, several of them recall how Briggs would turn to the stands and ask for their help in return.
It was all about creating a two-way street, where both sides felt truly connected.
As at Real Monarchs, it ultimately led to an incredibly powerful us-versus-them mentality that carried the team forward.
“Whatever position he was in, he was fine to play that villain character,” Hodek said. “And more power to him for that. Because I think that mentality is where he was able to get the best out of players. No matter who came into town to play against us, no matter who's home we went to to play against, he made sure that the players knew, and he brought the mentality, that it's us versus everybody else.
“We're gonna get out there,” Hodek continued. “We're gonna find those points. We're gonna find those wins and we're gonna do everything we can to make sure that we are successful. I think that's a mentality that will take any team a very long way. If they're not shaken or concerned by who they're playing against, because they know it's us versus them. I think you'll get the best out of any player doing that.”
That strength of mentality carried the team not only through its 2022 cup run, but through impressive league displays as well. Sacramento Republic finished top of the Eastern Conference in 2023.
However, like with the Open Cup, Briggs failed to get the team over that final hurdle. Though regular season conference champions, the team missed out on the Players’ Shield by three points. Their subsequent postseason run ended in the conference championship game against the year’s eventual league winners, Phoenix Rising.
So when an injury-disrupted 2024 ended in disappointment, the writing was on the wall.
“When Las Vegas ended [a first-round playoff loss on penalties], I could tell that there was something deeper going on,” Anderson said. “I have a funny feeling Mark knew himself. He hadn't brought silverware back to the Republic. He got close, runner-up, cup, all of these deep runs in the cup, all of these deep runs in the playoffs. But I think he knew that he had to go.”
Anderson said a lot of fans had wished to see him given another year, with the hope that the return of injured players would lead to more success. But on November 4, 2024, three days after the Las Vegas game, Sacramento Republic confirmed that they had parted ways with Mark Briggs.
“I think we all had a little bit of relief,” Hodek said. “It was definitely time for him to move on. It was kind of this bittersweet moment where I think he had taken us about as far as we thought he could. But he was very much loved in Sacramento.”
A new challenge in Birmingham
That was that for Mark Briggs at Sacramento, and many thought the Englishman would be headed home to try his hand at the English leagues. He admitted himself that the idea appealed to him.
But when Birmingham came calling, they convinced Briggs to take on a new USL Championship challenge.
For Sacramento fans, it was a happy day. Though they had understood, even supported for some, the decision to let him go, many still feel a strong attachment to their former head coach. Seeing him get another job in the United States was therefore welcome news.
“A lot of us were concerned that he would go elsewhere, that he wouldn't necessarily find a home,” Hodek said. “So I'm happy to know that he’s still coaching in the league. I think the Championship is better with him.”
“I was super shocked that Sacramento let Mark Briggs go at the end of last season,” Lacara added. “I have nothing bad to say about a wonderful manager. [Birmingham Legion] picked up a great coach.”
Birmingham Legion officially announced Mark Briggs as their new head coach April 30, 2025. An introductory press conference took place the following day.
For Hoffman, a Birmingham native and former Legion player, the appointment is a perfect match. After observing the growth in popularity of the beautiful game in his home state over the last few years, Hoffman believes Briggs is arriving at just the right time to elevate the team to a new level.
“There's just a desire for success and to see the team do well, " Hoffman said. "I think more than anything, people will get behind the culture that gets created there. Hopefully better results start coming in, and I think it'll be just a fine fit.
“The ownership group is bought in, so I think the resources and everything will be available,” he added. “And I think the fans will appreciate the kind of culture and desire that he will instil in the group. It'll be a team that competes and looks to not just settle for making the playoffs, but look to win things and push the club into new heights.”
Briggs led the Three Sparks for the first time just a couple of days after his arrival, drawing 2-2 with the Tampa Bay Rowdies down in Florida. Though it was not the result anyone wanted — especially considering Tampa got the draw with a last-minute equalizer — there were already plenty of positives to be found.
For Glaeser, who for the first time will not be by Briggs’ side as he takes on this new challenge, results should follow soon. Like the Real Monarchs players said of the Englishman’s time in Utah, Glaeser believes Briggs’ ability to assess a team’s skills and maximize their potential will serve him well.
Anderson agreed, citing Brigg’s “very high soccer IQ.” She said he sees things nobody else does.
It’s the first time Briggs has joined a team mid-season. As a result, he will have to manage with what he has, for the most part. Those analytical skills could thus prove invaluable.
Adapting on the fly
Mark Briggs has now been in Birmingham for just over a month. Results have yet to turn around — his record stands at 2-2-2 — but there are signs here and there of the change underway.
“Expect his first time with Birmingham, unless it's magical, this first half season or 3/4 of a season to be building,” Anderson said. “And then next season, expect him to have more ‘his guys’ working for him and playing for him. That's what Mark brings.”
Briggs has already started to bring in a few of his own players, with three transfers confirmed since his arrival. One of them, Erik Centeno, already played under Briggs back in Sacramento.
“I’ve worked with Coach Mark for quite a time before I got here,” Centeno said. “So I know him, he knows me, and I’m really excited and looking forward to the season.”
The other newcomers are Kameron Lacey, who was on trial with the team before Briggs ever entered the picture, and Edwin Laszo. Briggs said he signed Laszo due to the Colombian’s performances against his Sacramento team last season, where he dominated the game on both occasions.
Anderson had called the move, without naming a specific player, weeks before it happened. She identified that defensive midfield slot as the key player in Briggs’ system, someone he would have to bring in if he didn’t have a suitable option in the Legion ranks.
“He counts on the midfield,” Anderson said. “He’ll always count on a defensive midfielder, one or two of them, to shift positions and to be in the core of the group.”
Hodek echoed Anderson’s opinion, stating Briggs “lives and dies by the midfield.” Sacramento played a three-man backline for most of the Englishman’s tenure, but both Anderson and Hodek believe he is flexible enough to play any formation as long as he has that key midfielder in place.
Glaeser confirmed this, stating Briggs is more focused on philosophy than formation. Several people added that he also likes to have adaptable players, ones that can play in multiple positions, to give him added flexibility when setting up his team.
The next step is getting a full buy-in from everyone at the club. Only then can they truly play the Mark Briggs way.
“They have to trust the system,” Anderson said. “If they have one doubt, it's not gonna work. They have to literally believe and trust the system, and he knows exactly how to get that from the guys. And the guys usually are very willing participants.
“As long as they believe they can do it, they will,” she added.
Looking forward
Hodek, Anderson and Lacara all agreed the shift to a Mark Briggs team will start with defense.
Sacramento were one of the most defensively-sound teams in the league under his tenure, conceding barely over one goal per game. Real Monarchs were the same. In comparison, Legion have conceded an average of 1.41 goals in their seven years of existence.
“His defense will be impenetrable,” Anderson said. “If you know Sacramento stats, our defense always held up like nobody’s business.”
Briggs explained how he achieves this in his introductory press conference. He told told the assembled media that while he wants his players to be good people, when they’re on the field he wants his team to be “horrible” and “nasty to play against.”
Lacara expanded on what that looked like at his previous stop.
“He said he wanted Sacramento to be the villain of the league,” Lacara said. “He wants to be super dominant. He wants to strangle the life out of a match, basically. He wants to not see any opportunities for the opposition. Whether it be through his wingbacks or through the center of the park is up to him, but what he wants is a super physical, super dominant game from his team.”
“He turns players into warriors, but only as a group,” Anderson added. “Their whole group moves together.”
It might not be a “Mark Briggs side” from the off, but Hodek said it will come with time. Once given the chance to bring in a few more of his own players, he will have the whole team playing the way he wants.
But that does not mean there won’t be plenty of progress before then.
“You're gonna see it immediately because he's gonna go in that locker room and make an immediate impact on the players,” Hodek said. “The passion that he's got and the ability that he has just to earn the buy-in from the players, you're gonna see a shift in your mentality pretty early on I feel.”
What that means for Legion fans, according to someone intimately familiar with the team, is a significant shift.
Hoffman made 19 appearances for Birmingham in their inaugural season. Though he left the following year, he still holds an affinity for his hometown team and keeps up with them when possible.
Based on that knowledge and his experience playing under Briggs, he predicted what the team will become with the Englishman at the helm.
“There will be a little bit more in the possession side of things," Hoffman said. Looking to kind of create more opportunities as opposed to maybe some of the direct play that we saw over the course of a couple years. And I think just stylistically there will be a change.
"Just the whole DNA of how they create goals will change," he continued. "I think with Briggs coming in, there’ll be a different style of the way that they see the team attack and then the way that they see the team defend.”
Keeping connections first
No matter what the product ends up looking like on the field, one thing is for certain. The Mark Briggs ethos remains the same off of it.
Tiago Suárez has fond memories of the man who gave him his professional start as a teenager nearly half-a-decade ago. And when the pair joined forces once again in Birmingham, nothing had changed.
“It’s the same Mark Briggs,” Suárez said. “I love the way we run our sessions and how his tactical mind is. He helps the team and needs to transform the team into this style he wants to play.
“He allows you to speak to him, he’s a very personable person,” Suárez added. “There’s a lot of coaches that think they’re above the players, but he makes sure that he’s in the rondos with us, talking with us. That’s why he’s been so successful.”
Several sources added that he’s open to suggestions from all, including the younger players on the roster. All of it comes from a constant desire to improve.
That drive has also seen him surround himself with assistants capable of challenging him and helping him grow. It’s no surprise several of them have become head coaches in their own right.
Despite all his success and accolades, Briggs told USL All Access that was what he took most pride in.
“The biggest thing for me, the most prideful thing for me when I look and hear those things, it’s something that hasn’t been mentioned,” Briggs said. “The most prideful thing for me is the assistant coaches that have worked with me that have gone on to be head coaches.
“That’s probably something that I take most pride in,” he continued. “That shows the body of work more than results.”
Danny Dichio met Briggs as a player back at West Bromwich Albion. He reunited with Briggs for two seasons in Sacramento and is now head coach for Detroit City FC.
Danny Cruz played for Briggs at Real Monarchs. Following his retirement after Briggs’ first season, he immediately became one of his assistants at the Utah club. He’s now leading Louisville City FC.
Matt Glaeser played for Briggs in Wilmington before becoming his assistant in North Carolina, Utah and California. He has since become technical director and head coach for Forward Madison FC.
For Glaeser, the success of Briggs’ former assistants is no surprise. He said the Englishman not only has a real eye for talent, but knows how to help coaches grow.
“He's not the type of coach, in my experience, who is gonna micromanage every moment,” Glaeser said. “You've got to earn his trust, then you've got it. You've got to show that you're a worker, show that you're gonna get his back and you can put the time in and do the things that he's asking of you.
“Once you've built that connection, my experience with him has been he lets you work,” Glaeser added. “He gives you opportunities to try things and gives you autonomy to do things within the team environment. I think that's highly beneficial for any young coach. That's probably why you're seeing that tree that he has of some of us who have gone on to be head coaches. I think it's a credit to him.”
With Eric Avila having taken successful interim charge of the team prior to Briggs’s arrival, there could well be another future coach in the Legion ranks.
Briggs will face the unique challenge of going up against all three of his former assistants this season. Two of them compete in the USL Championship’s Eastern Conference, same as Birmingham, while Forward Madison are part of the same USL Jägermeister Cup group as the Three Sparks.
Glaeser said that pitting two coaches so familiar with each other’s soccer brains against each other should make for intriguing encounters.
Like many who have known him, Glaeser still keeps in regular touch with Briggs. The two speak about soccer on a weekly basis, and their families are very close. It’s another pattern that has emerged throughout the Englishman’s career, dating all the way back to his start in his native West Midlands.
“He's one of those players throughout my career, he's drifted in and out,” O’Kelly said of the player he coached over two decades ago. “We got back in touch a couple of years ago when he did come back to England. We met up. He's one of those people that you would gladly meet up with because he's a nice person.”
Even when there’s no personal advantage to be gained, Briggs has maintained those connections. Because at the end of the day, it comes from a genuine desire to connect with those around him.
“I'm very much out of the professional game,” Carson Porter said, 10 years after Briggs and he went their separate ways. “There's not a whole lot I can do to help him, and he still picks up the phone and calls me once a month at least just to see how I'm doing, just to check in and talk about the game and talk about our families and talk about soccer.
“That's pretty rare in a person,” he added. “I think he remembers how we helped each other during a time and he doesn't forget it. So there's a lot of loyalty there and I'm glad to call him a friend, for sure.”
If Briggs can continue to forge connections in this way, his stop in Birmingham is sure to be another successful one.
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Incredibly well-written and well-researched piece, really impressive stuff! Definitely has me excited for the future of a Mark Briggs Legion team.