When it is put to David Dunn, approaching 20 years since his debut, that he has devoted much of his life to Blackburn Rovers, he quickly points out it has been a two-way street.

“It’s been a massive part, it has been my life I suppose,” he told the Lancashire Telegraph.

“But as much as you say I’ve devoted my life to Blackburn, they have been really good with me.

“It goes both ways and it’s been great.”

His association with the club he served as a player and coach at both first-team and Academy level, is now reserved to a watching brief from the stands at Ewood Park.

Dunn stepped down this summer from his role as assistant to Damien Johnson after helping to guide Rovers Under-23s to the top flight as Premier League 2 Division Two champions.

It is a decision in which he mulled over for several months, and discussed with Tony Mowbray.

Later this month marks 20 years since Dunn made his debut for the club as an 18-year-old in 0-0 draw at Everton.

A red card for Martin Dahlin meant his debut lasted just 11 minutes, cut short as Roy Hodgson adjusted his system as Rovers held on for a point at Goodison Park.

Dunn first left Rovers for Birmingham City in 2003, returning four years later, and departed again for Oldham in 2015 where he would have his first taste of management.

In February 2016 he returned to take up a position as Johnson’s assistant which he held for almost two-and-a-half years, minus a three month spell assisting Mowbray with the first-team after his appointment in February 2017.

“It might have been a shock to some people when I left but that’s the way it is,” Dunn said of his departure.

“I go to all the home games. I go down with my grandad and kids.

“I still have a really good relationship with the club, the manager, Mark Venus, and I will always have a lot of time for the people there because I enjoyed it.

“But I have got other things at my life that perhaps I couldn’t do when I was working there.

“It is such a time consuming job in football and my kids are at an age where, as hard as it is and it was a really tough decision that took me a good long time to make it, I don’t want them to get to 16 and saying ‘you were never there’.

“I really don’t want that. I want to go and watch my boys play football on Saturdays and Sundays, I want to be able to take them to school, pick them up. That’s where I’m at.”

Dunn may have moved on from Rovers, but his achievements in his 378 appearances won’t be overlooked.  It ranks him in the top 20 appearance makers for the club, achieving a boyhood dream to pull on the blue and white halves.

This week also marked another anniversary, as on September 6, 2000 he became the first Rovers player to score a hat-trick of penalties in a Worthington Cup win over Rochdale.

Dunn, who won one England cap, made his Rovers bow on September 26 1998 under Roy Hodgson in a season which would they would eventually be relegated.

“Growing up, being a Blackburn supporter and coming through the age groups, I perhaps had opportunities to go to bigger clubs when I was younger but I always felt I wanted to stay at Blackburn,” he explained.

“I was always really confident in my ability and I was eager to play.

“I definitely felt ready and like most young players do, they all feel they’re ready and all they are wanting is to be given a chance.”

Rovers had won just one, and lost four, of their opening six matches of the 1998/99 season under Hodgson before Dunn was handed his debut off the bench.

He finished the season, in which Rovers would finish second bottom with just seven wins, with 10 Premier League appearances.

But the position of the team didn’t weigh heavy on Dunn, who said: “You are fearless. You get on with it.”

“As a young player you don’t really think about that.

“If you get relegated, of course it hurts, but at the start of your career, you’re selfish in a way, and you don’t think about the bigger picture and what it means for a lot of other people.

“Let’s be fair, you’re carving a career out for yourself.”

Rovers had the unwanted title of becoming the first Premier League winner to be relegated as they dropped in to the Division One. 

They were back within two years, and enjoyed 11 consecutive seasons in the top flight.

On whether relegation was a benefit, he said: “I always feel it’s a strange thing to say.”

“Let’s be fair, getting relegated is never good because you’d rather rebuild in a higher league.

“Promotions are really hard to come by.

“People say ‘it would be good for the club to get relegated and then we can rebuild’ but why not re-start in the same league? It’s still the same preparations and probably a better budget.

“What it probably did was give a couple of us an opportunity that might not have happened, or an opportunity to play more, that’s probably the best way to say it.

“We perhaps got more games than if we were in a better league.”