Port Vale's Rob Page to be announced new Cobblers manager

The former Wales international was heavily backed with bookmakers over the past few days to be the man to replace Chris Wilder, who quit Sixfields last week to take over at Sheffield United.

Page’s odds shortened throughout the day on Wednesday, so much so that he was 1/6 with some bookies, and by the evening media outlets in Stoke were reporting that the Port Vale man was Northampton bound.

There has been no confirmation from Northampton Town as yet, but it seems certain Page will be handed the task of leading the Cobblers into their Sky Bet League One campaign in August, and a press conference has been called for Sixfields for 2.30pm on Thursday afternoon.

Page, who is 41, has been in charge at Vale Park since the autumn of 2014.

He impressed last season as he took the club to a 12th-place finish in league one despite working with a low budget, and that was a six-place improvement on his first half-season in charge.

The former Watford, Chesterfield and Sheffield United defender has a year left on his contract with Vale, so if the deal does go through then the Cobblers will have to pay compensation, just as Sheffield United had to pay to release Wilder from his Sixfields deal.

Page has been at Vale Park for five years since ending his playing career, which spanned more than 500 senior matches, at Chesterfield.

Then boss Micky Adams took Page to Port Vale, offering him a job on the coaching staff in 2011,

Page then took charge of first team affairs on a caretaker basis when Adams resigned in September, 2014, and was given the job on a full-time basis a few weeks later.

Page, who also played for Coventry City, Cardiff City and Huddersfield, steered the club away from relegation in that first season, finishing 18th.

He then saw the club to a mid-table finish in 2015/16.

Page has also been linked with the jobs at Cardiff City and Sheffield United in recent weeks, but they went to former Cobblers midfielder Paul Trollope and Wilder respectively.

Town chairman Kelvin Thomas this week confirmed the club had received ‘a lot of applications’ for the Cobblers job, but it seems Page has impressed the most out of all those that tried to get the job.