However, despite a loan spell at Lincoln City, Cork failed to break into the Derby first team and subsequently joined Wimbledon, who had been recently elected to the Football League and were playing in Division Four at the time, on a free transfer in 1978.
Initially, the club's first choice starting striker, Cork also played sixty minutes of Wimbledon's famous FA Cup triumph over Liverpool on 14 May 1988.
Four days later, his testimonial match was held at Plough Lane against an All Stars XI from various club sides, to mark 10 years of Cork's service to Wimbledon.
However a number of key players brought to the club by Cork during that period[5] would form the spine of the Swansea side that won the Division Three title under John Hollins in 2000.
Cork was appointed player-manager of non-league Chesham United in 1998 where he remained for nearly two years before accepting the role of assistant manager at Cardiff City in the summer of 2000.
Despite this, Cork was never very popular with the supporters, and he was fired the following season in February 2002,[6] after a run of results that left Cardiff somewhat adrift of the Division Two automatic promotion places.
This was despite him leading Cardiff to a famous FA Cup third round win over then Premiership leaders Leeds United some six weeks earlier.
In October 2007 he was appointed to the Bolton backroom team full-time when taking up the role of Assistant Head Coach but left in January 2010 when manager Gary Megson was replaced by Owen Coyle.