After Taylor became England manager in 1990, Ward remained at Villa for a further year and a half under Jozef Venglos and then Ron Atkinson.

In late 1991, Ward heard that York City, then a struggling fourth division club, had just sacked their manager.

[2] Ward guided the club to a play-off position in his first season in charge, despite this however, a poor start to the 2008–09 campaign saw him under heavy pressure to resign.

[5] Ward applied for the vacant Swindon Town managerial role in November after Maurice Malpas left the club by mutual consent.

[6] He held preliminary talks with Port Vale over their managerial vacancy in May 2009,[7] and was the favourite for the job,[8] however lost out to Micky Adams.

He was sacked in September 2012 after the club began the new season without a win in nine league and cup games, leaving them near the bottom of the table.

[11] Having signed a contract until the end of the 2012–13 season, he succeeded Mark McGhee to become the club's fourth manager in two years.

Having taken over with Rovers second from bottom and in the relegation places from the Football League, he achieved a 50% win ratio, with 42 points from 23 games, to guide them to a comfortable mid-table finish for the 2012–13 season.