I’m leaving Killie with head held high and the club back on a high
Fowler feels guilt-free after quick promotion
He had never been relegated as a player after 460 games for Kilmarnock.
So the guilt would have been too much for James Fowler to take if he’d left the club he loves outside Scotland’s top flight.
Instead, the Rugby Park legend will hold his head up high as he looks for his next job.
And he’s humble enough to accept that it might NOT be in football.
Fowler was a cup-winning captain at Ki l l ie before returning to Ayrshire in 2019 as their head of football operations.
It was a change in direction for him af ter working as Jack Ross’ assistant coach at St Mirren and Sunderland.
Talk about being thrown in at the deep end.
A global pandemic, relegation, four dif ferent managers, a squad rebuild and promotion back to the Premiership.
In his first gig of that type, Fowler experienced just about everything.
And he hopes that will stand him in good stead when it comes to future employment.
When he left his job as Queen of the South gaffer in 2016 he ended up labouring on a building site.
He hopes he won’t have to do that again. But in the precarious world of football, he’ll never take anything for granted.
He’s just glad that, after voluntari ly leaving Ki l lie following a club restructure, they’re on the up again with Derek McInnes at the helm.
Fowler said: “It’s just pleasing to leave Kilmarnock in the Premiership. We’ve now got a top manager in Derek who’s working hard to bring success back to the club.
“So the club are probably in a good place right now.
“I ’ d have felt responsible if, after being relegated , they’d stayed in the Championship.
“We put a squad together that managed to get back up at the f irst time of asking, which isn’t easy.
“It’s tough to get back up. Of course I’ ll look back and think, ‘Should I have done some things differently?’
“But to get promoted straight away is a credit to the players and staff.
“Being a Kilmarnock player for so long and never getting relegated, going down was hard to take.
“I saw the impact it had across people within the club.
“They lost their jobs because the club were making changes and cutting budgets.
“But they’ve rebuilt and are moving forward with Derek which is great to see.”
Fowler was doing everything
Going down was hard to take .. I saw people lose their jobs .. but Killie are in good place now
at K i l l i e , f rom overseeing their new women’s team and being a loans manager for young players, to scouting and recruiting for the top-team boss.
It has been a steep learning curve for the club stalwart who has learned from the likes of McInnes, Tommy Wright, Alex Dyer and Angelo Alessio.
He said: “It was certainly an experience, through Covid, relegation and then promotion. “We’ve also had a squad rebuild over a period of time, with a high number of players coming and going. “But that’s been part of my development in that role. I’m doing a Level Four FA course on talent ID and recruitment and it’s most l y Eng l ishbased guys on it.
“Their roles can be a loans manager, a head or recruitment or whatever.
“But they’re doing one role. So I have a laugh with them because I was doing a lot of those at the same time at Killie. “Where they work in England, the clubs would have someone in a full-time post doing each of them.
“So it was a challenge. But it also brought me knowledge and experience, I was learning all the time.
“We’ve had four managers in my time at Killie, starting with Angelo then Alex, Tommy and now Derek.
“I’ve learned bits and pieces from each of them, how they deal with certain situations.”
The situation he’s dealing with now is unemployment.
And with a wife and kids to support, Fowler is keen to get back to work as soon as possible, whether it be as a coach, in a club’s academy or in a similar role to the one he has just left at Rugby Park.
But he’s realistic enough to know that he might need to look OUTSIDE the game.
Fowler said: “It would be hard not to be involved in the game because football’s been my life.
“But it can be unpredictable and that uncertainty can affect your family too. You never know how long something will last and that impacts on them.
“This summer we haven’t been on holiday just because of the uncertainty over my job.
“So they’ve missed out because of me.
“Now that I’m out of work, I don’t want to go away in case something comes up.
“So it’s a challenge. But it will be a fresh start for me.
“Of course, you worry about how you’re going to get back in and what it might look like.
“I’ ll consider everything. When I left Queen of the South, it was five months before I got another job in football.
“I was labouring for a while. A Killie fan who was on my testimonial committee gave me a job in Renfrew.
“You can never be too proud to do something else.
“Ideally, I don’t want to be in that position again but I’ve got bills to pay.”