Graham hopes there will be no soap operas during his time at The Steelmen
Graham Alexander will step into the limelight once more when Motherwell host Premiership leaders Rangers this afternoon.
The match will be screened live on satellite television, and the presence of the former Salford City manager in the opposition dugout to Steven Gerrard will add extra interest for the wider audience.
Alexander might have been a reluctant cast member in The Class Of ’92 – the fly-on-the-wall documentary about the shared project of Gary Neville, his brother Phil, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, David Beckham and Nicky Butt to “do a Gretna”with their local club – but he made an impression nevertheless.
Taciturn, even slightly morose, when trying to tackle the problems of having nowhere to train, the 49-year-old Scot can also be seen doing a fair impersonation of Sir Alex Ferguson after his team tanked against an unfancied opponent.
Ask him whether we can expect to see a Netflix show about Motherwell FC any time soon, however, and his response is an emphatic: “See you later!
“I never wanted to be part of a soap or a documentary. I don’t want to be a TV star or anything like that,” insisted Alexander.
“I knew it was part of the deal at Salford, but I steered clear and I didn’t really want to be a part of that side of it anyway.
“Actually, I got on really well with the guy doing the filming because I knew he had a job to do.
“I think if they are handled in the right way, I think they can be balanced.
“I watched the Hearts one on BBC and, considering they were getting relegated, I thought it was quite balanced and a good insight. So some of them can be quite informative for people who don’t actually see the inner workings of a football club.
“Some can go very dramatic, and some can be more like a documentary. It’s not for me to say which is better.
“But, for me, I wanted to be a football manager winning games of football, and that was it.
“When I was playing, I didn’t want the attention, and I am the same now I am a coach.”
Anyone who has watched Gary Neville and Co’s attempts to win promotion every season will know that is not an attitude shared by Salford’s high-profile owners.
Everything is done at breakneck speed, with the former Manchester United stars seen in what appears to be a near-endless succession of tense crisis meetings.
“For a lot of that stuff, and a lot of the talk that was going on, I wasn’t in the room,” said Alexander, who could not have been called the elephant in said room as his name got plenty of airtime in his absence.
“And, listen, I was well aware of what the expectation was when I went there because of their track record over the previous years. It was to win.
“I wouldn’t have gone there if it wasn’t like that. I dropped a couple of levels to take it because I believed in the longterm project of where they wanted to go.
“It didn’t quite work out that way, obviously. But we did have success there. We got promotion, we got to a cup final, and we were unbeaten last year.
“I don’t want to look back at it with regret because I had great times, and worked with some brilliant people and brilliant players.
“For one reason or another, it ended. That’s it, that’s life.”
For all that today’s match sees him pitting his wits against one of football’s most-iconic figures in the shape of Gerrard, Alexander is relishing the prospect of a less-showbizzy existence.
“I do think that it is a different environment up here on Scotland, and certainly at Motherwell,” he said.
“I think things are more stripped back to basics, if you like.
“My job is about managing players, talking to media and winning games of football.
“It is normal, if that’s the word. “However, as I say, I would not speak negatively about my time at Salford because I had some great times there as well.
“As a manager, you know you are not going to be at a club forever. But when you leave, you want fans when they hear your name to say: ‘He was a good guy who helped us get better’.
“That is what I have done in my previous three jobs – Salford, Fleetwood and Scunthorpe. And that is certainly my aim with Motherwell.”