“There was a commotion. The Galatasaray fans were fuming, of course. I did not really understand. I was not sure if there was something going on in the stadium. The atmosphere was like nothing I had ever known before,” Dean Holden tells Sky Sports.
He is describing the scene in Istanbul in February as Adana Demirspor players left the pitch during the first half against Galatasaray in protest at a penalty awarded against them. Holden had been the assistant manager in Adana for less than a week.
"It was tense. I had managed to get tickets for my family about two hours before the game. And then this happened. There are the police with these big shields. Scary is too strong a word but it was hard to make sense of it all in my own head. I was a little panicky.
"We got the players into the dressing room very quickly. The president had just had enough. It had happened too many times, apparently. But the aftermath was difficult. You are managing the emotions of it with a very young team. You are trying to lift them."
It was not what he expected but in an odd sort of way, it proved to Holden exactly why he had decided to take a job with the bottom club in Turkey. "I just felt that I could probably accelerate my learning far quicker coming here than going back to England," he says.
"A lot of people were saying, are you sure you want to go there? They look at the table and see a club on minus points with big problems. I understand it. My next potential club could look at the win rate and just see a negative. I saw the other side of it.
"I wanted to put myself in the most challenging environment I could. Can it work in another language? Can I have an impact? You are working through a translator so you have to be really concise and clear. It is all about finding a connection with a player."
While daunting on the pitch - "trying to prepare a plan for a front three of Alvaro Morata, Victor Osimhen and Dries Mertens" - it was even trickier off it. But Holden sees it as valuable experience. "I learned more than I would have in two or three years in England."
This Turkey adventure comes after spending the previous year as assistant manager to Steven Gerrard at Al Ettifaq in Saudi Arabia. He has certainly thrown himself into his career. In Adana, he lived at the training ground. "I was there 24 hours a day," he says.
"When I walked around I would be thinking, who can I inspire, who can I help be the best they can be? I spent hours on Wyscout. I did not see it as work. When I am out of a job, I do it anyway. On a day off, I would fly to Istanbul or over to Izmir, watch a game or two."
Where does that come from? "My parents," he replies. "My mum was a childminder, my dad was working three or four jobs. He was even a steward at Old Trafford. They just grafted and grafted. My dad never took a day off in his life. I never forgot that."
The loss of daughter Cici to meningitis in 2012 has also had a profound impact. "Danielle and I losing our daughter was never going to be our story. The stats say 88 per cent divorce within two years. We are in the 12 per cent. I just never try to waste a day."
He confesses to struggling with tardiness. "If a meeting is at 4pm, you should be there at ten to." And finding a kindred spirit in Gerrard. "I have never seen that drive before anywhere. It surprised me. His standards are the big thing that rubbed off on me."
Gerrard, who would go on to captain Liverpool and England, had been an international team-mate at age-group level. "Steven's career went one way and mine, unfortunately, went the other." But maybe that sense of unfulfilled ambition has also pushed him on.
"I had a career in front of me with Jay-Jay Okocha, Bruno N'Gotty, Fernando Hierro, Ivan Campo. Then I broke my leg the week before the FA Cup semi-final at Wembley against Aston Villa in 2000. I then had to have it rebroke because it did not mend properly."
He still enjoyed a long career in the lower leagues, overcoming adversity. Everything since has been a bid to stay in the game. Holden is even a qualified referee. "Just about seeing the game from all sides, ticking every box." At 35, he became Oldham manager.
In his next managerial job with Bristol City, he had the Robins one point off top spot in the Championship in December of 2020. But he was sacked by mid-February. "It shows how ruthless it can be." And after a stint at Charlton, he wants his next job to be right.
"There was an ownership wrangle, a lot of issues behind the scenes. So I am being really cautious about the next job as a manager." He has taken risks with his coaching appointments but wants the top job to be different. I want it as stable as possible."
How does he sum up his ideas about the game? "I have a dossier," he says. "I really like watching Andoni Iraola's Bournemouth. The way they play fascinates me. The Premier League is all about possession but that is not the football I grew up watching and loving.
"I will never forget playing with John Sheridan and whenever he passed it, he would say, 'Can you score?' I used to wonder what he was on about. But now I get so frustrated when you see a midfielder who can put someone in on goal but chooses to go sideways.
"A lot of modern football is like that. I know Russell Martin really well and he has been very generous with me and when you see Vincent Kompany go from Burnley to Bayern Munich, you can see why coaches do it. But I always come back to, 'Can you score?'
"Players like simple messages. I want runners in behind to open up space for the No.10. When we lose the ball, let's go press, suffocate them. Nearly every single drill is about that two-second reaction. I want to see a team that really goes after the opposition."
Holden hopes to have that opportunity soon. His next club will be getting a better manager than before. Driven but empathetic. "I suppose I am a bit different. I do not mind saying how much I put into the emotional, psychological side of management."
He is proud to have introduced individual development plans at Adana Demirspor and talks of the big improvements in their young players. "It has proved to me how important it is." Now, Holden just wants the chance to show what he has learned on his travels.
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