KINNEAR’S GOT BOSS’ BUG BACK
FORMER Dover Athletic and Margate boss Chris Kinnear says he is ready for a return to football after almost two years on the sidelines.
Kinnear, 66, has won six promotions – including three to NonLeague’s top-flight – in a managerial career spanning 35 years and over 1,000 games.
In 2015-16, he led Dover to fifth in the National Premier, the highest finish in the club’s history, but left in October 2018 after a run of poor results.
“The last six months at Dover were tough,” Kinnear told The NLP. “My dad died. I was still working full-time as a PE teacher, and everyone knows how tough that can be. On top of that, the club was trying to go full time. It was too much.
“I’d done 30-odd years, countless games. I needed to have a little break, a refresh and that’s what I’ve done. Now is the time to come back – if I get an opportunity, of course.”
Kinnear initially managed Dover from 1985 to 1995 and spent a year out of the game before spending a hugely successful decade at Margate.
“I had that break for personal reasons – a divorce and looking after my two kids,” he explains. “But from a football perspective, it was very beneficial.
“When you’re a manager, you watch the game differently. You’re so involved that it’s hard to learn anything, or analyse what you’re doing.
“I went away, learned a lot, then I came back and took Margate into the Conference. It did me good then and I think it’s done me good now.
“I’ve already had a couple of offers that I was interested in but the place wasn’t quite right. It doesn’t have to be a big club, Just somewhere with ambition, like Dover and Margate, that I can see going forward. I like building clubs up, and seeing the potential to go somewhere.”