TONY Parkes is back in football after accepting an invitation to help out Blackpool caretaker boss Simon Grayson.

The Blackburn Rovers legend, who has been out of full time employment since he was controversially sacked by Mark Hughes 12 months ago, was due to start work as Grayson's assisant today with the plan being to help him secure the job on a permanent basis.

Parkes said: "I am looking forward to it and I am hungry to get back in now.

"Simon phoned me a couple of weeks ago and at that time I thought it wasn't a good idea to go there because there was so much instability.

"I had another couple of things going on but I didn't really want to go there two or three games then have nothing to go back to.

"But Simon kept pursuing me and I eventually agreed to meet him, we had a

chat about a few things and the situation was a lot more positive than I initially thought.

"I then met the chairman last weekend, we spoke for an hour, and this has all come from there."

At the moment, Grayson has still not been given the job on a permanent basis but if results were to improve over the next few weeks then the former Blackburn defender stands an excellent chance of succeeding Colin Hendry at Bloomfield Road.

"It could be a month, it could be six weeks, it all depends on how results go when you are a caretaker," said Parkes.

"But I am hopeful we can get the job on a permanent basis."