COVID STOPPED ME QUITTING EK
Winter reveals pandemic forced a rethink
Sean Winter has revealed Covid-19 stopped him quitting East Kilbride.
The Kilby winger has spent the last five seasons trying to get his hometown team into the SPFL, but their promotion bids have so far come up short.
But none of the previous seasons were as bad as the last – with Kilby turning in their worst-ever results under Stuart Malcolm and plummeting down the Lowland League as defending champions.
The club went through two caretaker managers as Jim Paterson took on the role and then resigned, leaving David Proctor in charge.
With Kilby at an all-time low, Winter thought about giving up on the promotion dream.
However, he says the Covid-19 shutdown has allowed him to take stock and give it another go.
Winter, who believes he was struck down by Covid-19 after he fell ill in March, said: “I’ve said before, every year we don’t get promoted it scunners me that wee bit more.
“I’m absolutely desperate to do it and, if it wasn’t for Covid, the way things were going for me and the club, I don’t know if I would have wanted to give this another go at EK. But the fact all of this has happened, where there’s been no football, no sport, it’s totally given me my appetite back to do this again.”
Now there is light at the end of the tunnel for Winter after the appointment of highly-rated former Dumbarton and Stranraer boss Stevie Aitken.
The pair enjoyed a relatively successful spell at Stranraer when they reached the Championship play-off final in 2015. And Winter believes Aitken will be able to take the fight to defending champions Kelty Hearts when the Lowland League returns.
“With Stevie coming in and the ambition he has, the backing he’s going to get, I can really see us going for it,” the 32-year-old said.
“The guys behind the scenes will accept the league is getting harder and over the next couple of years the little window that’s been there for EK is getting smaller.
“I think they understand there’s another couple of years to give this a right good go and, you never know, they might just not want to try as much after that.
“But bringing in someone of Stevie’s experience, the club are really serious. They see the ambition Kelty have and they won’t let up. The last five years have given us enough to know what it takes to get there.
“We’ve got everything in place – we just need to do it.”