Ex-Deal Town manager Tommy Sampson, who took the club to FA Vase victory at Wembley in 2000, has told of euphoric highs and suicidal lows in his book about his life-changing stroke in 2007.

Named Sudden Exit, the 225-page memoir tells how the once overtly confident manager dealt with the instant change to his life after he “spiritually died” on December 5, 2007.

From being a gregarious, larger-than-life character, Tommy retreated into a shell of depression.

He was desperately sad at not being able to mentally or physically achieve the things he used to and be the person he was.

“When I walked about at Wembley that day I was idolised by thousands, then suddenly I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t even make a cup of tea" - Tommy Sampson

“It was devastating,” said Tommy, who lives in Maidstone.

“When I walked about at Wembley that day I was idolised by thousands, then suddenly I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t even make a cup of tea. Basically I was a dead man.”

He started working on the book in 2008 and finished it while on a trip to Chicago in August 2013 for a friend’s wedding.

He said: “Writing it was the best therapy I could have had because I was really struggling.

“I was being treated for severe depression. After I came home I couldn’t move and was left on my own with nothing to do.

“My GP said I’ve got to have a project, so I just started writing about my stroke.”

The story includes extracts from his partner Sandie Wilson’s diary, as well as his first-person account of the debilitating effects of the stroke on his body and mind.

Sudden Exit by Tommy Sampson is published by Authorhouse and can be purchased for £12.95 (paperback) or £23.99 (hardback) from www.authorhouse.co.uk

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