A summer of hope, a toxic end and what went on in between ... Steve Evans' year in charge at Rotherham United

It came on a wet midweek night in early October at Cambridge United when Rotherham United won away for the first time in 23 months.

The boss who had brought that long, draining run to an end thanked his family and shed fake tears in a monologue more akin to an Oscars acceptance speech than an after-match press conference conducted in the pitchside rain at the Abbey Stadium.

Steve Evans decided he was too big a man to comment on the management teams during that near-two-year barren spell, yet just seconds later it spat from his mouth …

“Shambolic.”

He criticised the past too much after being brought back in April by Tony Stewart, the chairman pinning everything on the rekindling of their partnership similarly rekindling the promotion spirit of their time together a decade ago.

The irony is, while the manager was incessantly trashing previous Millers regimes, his own was crumbling away.

The job of reviving the club was bigger, much bigger, than he'd initially thought. And that job is his no more.

The parting of the ways comes after arguably AESSEAL New York Stadium's worst-ever day: a shameful 4-0 loss at the hands of drop-zone Crawley Town played out against a chilling, toxic backdrop of empty seats and fans' chants of ‘We want Evans out’.

The last 12 matches had produced just two wins.

It's a far cry to the summer of hope, marquee signings, 14 arrivals and declarations of love for the club when the Scot talked a better game than his new side would ever go on to deliver and promised a push for an instant return to the Championship.

The split would have happened sooner had it been anyone else in the hot-seat. Stewart, against the advice of others, renewed acquaintances and gave his friend, his appointment, as much time as he could.

Others might have been sacked after an insipid October defeat at Leyton Orient, they would definitely have gone after a November loss lacking derby drive and direction at Barnsley, they would never have made it to – never mind survived – the rotten, shapeless loss at Crawley later in the same month.

January brought brief hope of a revival, February and March saw that optimism snuffed out.

“Our season has been ‘ish’,” became one of the boss's regular sayings. As in okay-ish. It wasn't in his nature to admit to bad or terrible. With respect, you could put ‘rubb’ in front of that three-letter adjective to describe some of the Millers displays.

The beginning of the end had come at Oakwell in a South Yorkshire showdown, just as it had for a previous Rotherham manager nine years ago.

Like Alan Stubbs in 2016, Evans was forced to run the gauntlet of raging fans as he made his way at the final whistle to a tunnel fatefully situated directly next to the away end. He even used the same language. “My shoulders are broad enough,” he said.

That was the night when supporters gave up on him. Their anger continued to foam and fester and, with performances deteriorating even further, the end had become a matter of when, not if.

A master self-publicist, he twisted everything until he reached the narrative he wanted. Victories were to his credit, defeats the fault of others. His relationship with the truth was about as close as the one he has with referees.

Amid much entertaining rhetoric, there were little discrepancies, fibs, big discrepancies and downright lies while his after-match views on games often bore no resemblance to what had actually taken place.

I say ‘rhetoric’. Many posters on social media seemed to prefer ‘bullshit’.

The Millers had enjoyed ‘total domination’ in encounters they had deservedly lost, players who had done well had been ‘brilliant’, when one or two were very good they were ‘simply stunning’.

On the other side of an approach that was almost bipolar in its extremes was Cameron Humphreys twice being mercilessly called out in public and Cameron Dawson being informed via the media that one of the saves of the season could have been made by Donald Duck.

Evans' economy with facts stretched to injuries. Sean Raggett, for example, was ‘days’ away from a return for weeks on end. One fully-fit player was more surprised than anyone to read in the press that he was unavailable for selection.

The manager was right on one thing, mind: injuries did hit his chances of success very hard.

On the basis of take as you find, I like Big Steve. He's good company, an utterly persuasive talker, a chaotic mix of strengths and weaknesses, kindness and harshness. Maybe it's the flaws rather than the qualities that make him such a beguiling character.

His humour saves him. He can tell a joke against himself and, when in relaxed mode, has the ability to step away from his madness and poke fun at the caricature he can't help becoming.

Radio Sheffield's Rob Staton and I would join him for press-conference duties late in the week. We were a regular three, cloistered in a small room at Roundwood, sipping coffee and swapping views. We laughed a lot.

The off-the-record chat would last longer than the on-the-record interview and an hour would fly by. Pre-match-presser Steve is a gentler, warmer soul than post-match-presser Steve.

He treated me well. But I heard stories.

Behind the scenes, there was tension, discontent, dissent. The boss didn't want most of the players he inherited and quickly alienated some of those he'd brought in with the help of the club's biggest-ever budget in League One.

Called-out Cam won't be the only person smiling at the training ground next week.

Another irony of Evans' reign is that he probably built a squad capable of challenging for the play-offs, only not with him as its leader.

Word emerged from Roundwood of short training sessions, not enough work on shape, little attention to set-pieces, a lack of modern tactical thinking, unedifying treatment of young players.

It will be interesting to see what a new manager can wring out of the same group.

A sharp, clever operator, he knew how to try to buy himself time. Judge me after 14 games, he asked, then at Christmas. Later, Sir Alex had once told him that March/April were the real months of reckoning. Finally, he was describing next season as the proper time for a verdict to be cast in stone.

He claims to have to have mellowed over the last decade, a combination of edging towards pensionable age, becoming a grandad four times over and trying to stay the right side of more vigilant HR departments.

But it's all a matter of degrees. A calmer Steve Evans is still a volatile anyone else.

He was committed to the club and to the town. The family home is in a picture-postcard village not far from Peterborough but he rented a property in Wickersley for the duration of his stay in South Yorkshire and divided his time between the two.

He desperately wanted it to work, most of us wanted it to work. But it hasn't. The club has gone so far backwards since the days of Paul Warne when it had structure, a process, an identity, its own proud DNA.

Now. What DNA? Does Not Apply. The club, in a footballing sense, knows what it wants to be but is far, far from being it.

“I didn’t come here for mid-table mediocrity,” Evans said. In that sense, he succeeded. Because he never got that far. He leaves New York with the Millers in 16th spot and going the wrong way in the table.

Yet another irony – that word again; a lot of ironies piled up in his reign – is that his successor, if he feels so inclined, will be entitled to cast aspersions about him in much the same manner as the Scot did about Matt Taylor and Leam Richardson.

That first crazy, coruscating spell of two successive promotions and Championship survival will always be in the record books. Sadly for Evans, so, too, will be the one when he lost his way, lost the dressing room and lost the fans.

It was a break-up that had to happen, a break-up supporters, results, reality demanded.

After one man's fake tears at Cambridge, few real ones will now be shed in Millers quarters.