Dave Bassett is a highly experienced and successful manager who boasts seven promotions in his eight-club career.

A member of management's prestigious 1,000 game club, Bassett sprang to prominence as the boss who lifted Wimbledon from basement to big time, an achievement that bordered on the miraculous.

He went on to further promotions with Sheffield United and Nottingham Forest, also reaching play-off finals at Crystal Palace and Barnsley.

The scale of the likeable Londoner's success at Wimbledon - who had been a League club for only four years when he took charge in 1981 - is almost incomprehensible. The Dons were in the top flight five years later after promotions in '83 - as champions of the old Fourth Division - '84 and '86.

It was still largely Dave's rags-to-riches side - featuring the famous "Crazy Gang" - who won the FA Cup in 1988, the year after he left Plough Lane, beating Liverpool at Wembley.

After a brief interlude with Watford, the irrepressible character known to his friends as "Harry", resumed his winning ways at Sheffield United in 1988. He could not prevent a struggling team being relegated to the third tier, but restored the Blades to the top flight in two consecutive leaps.

Surpassing even those promotions of '89 and '90 was the fact that Bassett's low budget team remained in the Premiership until 1994 when they were relegated in a dramatic last-day twist. The promotions in 89 and 90 make Bassett the last manager to achieve back to back promotions to the top league.

After leaving Bramall Lane the following year, Bassett made an instant impact at Crystal Palace with a run to the play-off final and went on to win a first-season promotion as manager of Nottingham Forest who returned to the Premier League as champions in 1998.

Another play-off final appearance followed at Barnsley in 2000. Bassett has since had two spells in charge of Leicester and been assistant manager of Southampton and Leeds United.

He is consistently in demand as a television pundit and a speaker on motivational techniques, besides being a long-serving member of the LMA's management committee.

In the history of Association Football, only four managers have guided the same club from the lowest division, to the highest rung of the game; Dave Bowen with Northampton Town, Graham Taylor with Watford, John Toshack with Swansea and  Bassett with Wimbledon.