Former Millwall defender Danny Senda – now Charlton U21 head coach – on struggles accepting career was over and his big ambitions to reach top

Danny Senda is targeting reaching the very top as a football coach and he certainly has plenty of life experiences to impart to the young players he works with along the way.

Charlton Athletic’s U21 head coach was forced to retire a couple of months shy of his 32nd birthday. The final straw was when he suffered a second rupture of his patella tendon, in his left knee, while on Barnet’s books.

It was the latest in a succession of major injury setbacks for Senda, now 41, who did the same injury in his other knee at Millwall in the final game of the 2007-08 season against Swindon Town at the County Ground.

There was a two-year contract extension on the table the following summer from the Lions if the right-back could prove his fitness in pre-season. Senda ruptured his Achilles.

“I was probably at the peak of my career playing for Millwall and heading in the right direction,” Senda told the South London Press. “I was under contract and in a really, really good place.

“That first injury knocked me back, in me no longer believing I was invincible. When you go through the sort of injury I had, it has more of a psychological impact. The physical part is you go and have the surgery and you’re fixed.

“Coming back is not that easy – being alone, not knowing if you can come back the same as you were and not knowing if you are going to get your contract renewed. There is lots and lots going on there that is hard to deal with.

“To then get another injury straight off the back of it sends you back to square one again. It takes you to quite a bad place. By my third injury I’m thinking that I’ve got to go 14 months of this – 14 months of not being under contract.

“At Millwall I also had eight months, after I did my ankle, when I was out of contract. They had put a two-year deal on the table but then took it away. I was essentially rehabbing with no money coming in. You have got your savings, bits and pieces, but they disappear very quickly. Your family are the ones who have to pick up the pieces around you.

“Because my injuries were so lengthy I was out of contract again after my third one. It shows how lovely the Barnet chairman was that I got paid up by them the day after I got injured. That put me out of contract again for 14 months.

“I knew my career was done at 30, 31 and it was time to start looking in a new direction. I got advice to stop.

“I became a personal trainer but I struggled to deal with the aftermath – that I went from flying at Millwall, fighting for my career and then it is gone, through no fault of my own.

“My wife, family and friends had to take on the burden of putting me back together. The ending was difficult but it has shaped me to where I am now, 10 years on from that transition.

“I’ve taken so many lessons from it. The person I am today is strong, happy and content.”

Senda played 439 matches, 315 of those for Wycombe Wanderers, Charlton’s opponents tomorrow.

“Back then it was three on the bench and one of those was a goalkeeper,” he said. “I made my debut when I was 17 and by 19 I was a regular. There wasn’t anything about what you hear now, in terms of managing a player’s minutes or loads. Aaron Henry, for example, played 60 minutes for our U21s and we’re making sure we are managing him, as best as we can.

“That wasn’t the case back then. I played a lot of games early on which could potentially have contributed to my injuries, but in part it was probably genetic.”
He played under two Wycombe bosses that were top players – Lawrie Sanchez and Tony Adams.

“Lawrie was what you expected as a member of the Crazy Gang (at Wimbledon),” said Senda. “He was a fierce and uncompromising manager who demanded a lot. He really pushed me.

“He gave me my debut and he was also the last manager I played for at Barnet. The Lawrie Sanchez I knew at 17 was incredibly intimidating, at times, was very different to the Lawrie at Barnet – very empathetic. We ended up having a really good relationship. He was very, very good with my last injury.

“John Gorman was very caring and I probably played my best football under him.

“Tony had played at the highest level for the whole of his career. He only knew what the elite end of the game looked like. Coming down to League One football, I think he found it difficult to understand why we weren’t necessarily doing the things he wanted us to do straight away. His one-on-one defensive coaching was unbelievable. He was a lovely man. He made me captain of Wycombe and gave me a two-year contract.”

Senda made the PFA League Two Team of the Year in the 2005-06 season – and had been the subject of bids from Hibernian, Luton and Preston in the January window.

He rejected contract offers from the Chairboys to become a free agent.

Senda had a three-year deal on the table from Luton and met with then boss Mike Newell.

“I was due to go in the following morning and sign but I got a call from my agent at 11 o’clock at night saying Leeds United had come in,” said Senda. “They had just been relegated out of the Premier League.

“I phoned my dad to ask him what I should do, he said: ‘It’s Leeds United – you need to get yourself up there’. I went up there in the belief that Kevin Blackwell just wanted to get a closer look at me and that a deal was there.

“It didn’t transpire that way. There were other agreements in place and arrangements for players at other clubs that I was unaware of. I was essentially a pawn in a game to try and get another player.

“I only found that out after two or three weeks of being at Leeds and going on tour with them.

“Luton were aware now I was at Leeds. Mike Newell had publicly stated his dislike for agents and what they were doing to the game.

“My agent kept reassuring me that Leeds had put something on the table and it would be fine. It transpired they didn’t and by then Luton had pulled out of the deal. I asked my agent where all the other offers were but at that stage they had all gone and got their other targets. Millwall got in contact, I trained for a couple of days under Nigel Spackman and they made me an offer pretty much straight away.

“I liked what I’d seen at Millwall. They’d only just come down from the Championship. They had brought a lot of young players in.  I thought it was the right move for me. I sacked my agent and signed for them.”

Senda started coaching in Brentford’s academy before joining Barnet at the start of 2018. He was appointed assistant head coach at Leyton Orient but left in June 2021, shortly after boss Ross Embleton was sacked.

Senda initially came to Charlton as assistant professional phase coach before heading up the U18 team from September 2022.

Hamza Serrar’s departure saw him promoted to U21 level at the start of this year.

“Charlton is a big football club that, at this moment, is suffering – I don’t think you can shy away from that,” said Senda. “We want to be somewhere different but one area where there has been constant success has been the academy – forever producing players.

“Maybe when people are in place they don’t get the plaudits they deserve. I know that it isn’t in Steve Avory’s personality to want it, but we need to recognise what an incredible job he has done (as academy director).

“He’s had an impact on hundreds of players’ careers – not just the ones still at Charlton.

“To come in and work and learn from someone like Steve and other staff here was a massive influence.

“I’ve been a head coach at various different teams and what I’m doing now is leading a group of staff and setting a culture, inside a culture, for U17s to U21s – to give them the tools you require to get yourself a senior career. That’s also putting a demand on the staff.

“My playing career was unplanned. I didn’t plan to go up to Leeds at the 11th hour, or get injured and then bounce around the country to get back on my feet and play again.

“What I’ve done with my coaching career is ensure there is some structure and balance to where I want to be long term.

“I had a 10-year plan in place that has now become a 20-year plan. The start  was to get educated, learn my craft and know how to become a good coach. I’ve coached from under-five to first-team level.

“I’m on my UEFA Pro License. The next part of the plan is to shape myself as a leader, to get more awareness about whether I can lead. That may very well take me back into senior football. I enjoyed it, I won’t hide away from that.

“I want to become one of the best coaches in the country, I won’t hide away from that either. Some people might say that’s arrogance but I’m not shy in saying I believe I’ve got the ability to do that. Whether that pushes me to senior football, we’ll have to see. I certainly have huge ambition.”

If he could give only one piece of advice to a young player, what would it be?

“It’s your own career – take control of it,” said Senda. “It’s very difficult now for the modern player, they have so many voices around them and external opinions, with social media. There is so much money around young players now.

“Ultimately they are in control of their destiny and they have to be big enough to do it.

“There are lots of bits I’ve touched on in my back story. Should I have gone to Leeds? Should I have taken what was actually in front of me? Should I have listened to what I wanted to do?

“I tell players that any decision they make, it should be for yourself. Take advice – listen – but make sure that you are the final decision-maker.”