Harvey on a decade at Glencairn
Willie Harvey says he’s proud to be leading Rutherglen Glencairn into the top flight of the West of Scotland League set-up, as he celebrates 10 years at the helm.
Harvey started out in 2010 alongside coaches Joe Pryce, Alex McArthur and Andy McFadyen, and while the latter has just moved on to become Arthurlie boss, they share the same milestone.
And the Glens gaffer is proud of where they have taken the club.
“That’s 10 years I’ve been manager of the club; that doesn’t happen very often in the junior world,” he said.
“I’m quite pleased with that. Joe Pryce, Alex McArthur and Andy McFadyen were all there at the beginning, so they’ve been here 10 years as well.
“That will be few and far between. You tend to find that managers go between three and four years at a club, and then either move on or into something else.”
Harvey has enjoyed his time at the club, and feels they’ve almost come full circle since he took over – and thanks the committee for their initial patience.
“It has been a rollercoaster,” he said. “Highlights have to be winning the league and getting promoted.
“When we took over, the club had just been promoted to the Premier League but we had no team, all the players had left to go with [previous managers] Scott Smith and Willie Paterson, so we had only one player!
“The other teams took a wee bit of advantage of that, and when we tried to buy players it was costing us a bit more than it would normally, so it was hard to settle on a whole team.
“We didn’t manage to stay in the division, but after that we stuck at it. We consolidated ourselves in the league and I felt every year we got stronger, until we had the team that won it last year, which was great, because it was paying back the belief that the committee had shown in us.
“There was a time in the earlier part of my tenure when they could have looked at the situation and decided to try something fresh, because we were tiptoeing around the relegation zone.
“Before we left for the West of Scotland League we had got back into the league where we had started when we took over.
“We’re quite proud of what we’ve done and we’re in a good place moving up into this new league.
“It’s nice to be a manager moving up into the new senior set-up, and that’s something I can hold my head up about.
“It will be difficult, but we’re quite confident. We’ve tried to set a plan in motion for the next couple of years, so we’ll see where we want to be.”