McGinley has old score to settle with Edouard
Motherwell new boy excited to go up against Frenchman again
NATHAN McGINLEY can boast that he once kept Odsonne Edouard quiet on a big European night for his club. The challenge of trying to do it again four-and-a-half years later in the Scottish top flight was one of the premier attractions in signing for Motherwell.
Centre-half McGinley joins Stephen Robinson’s side on a two-year deal from Forest Green Rovers in English League Two.
Thanks to his new club finishing an excellent third in the truncated Premiership of last season, the 23-year-old has Europa League qualifying-round football to look forward to.
And he brings European club competition pedigree with him to Lanarkshire after helping Middlesbrough on a memorable run to the last 16 of the UEFA Youth League.
A Boro squad that featured Rangers captain James Tavernier’s brother Marcus blazed a trail past Torino, Dynamo Kiev and Stade de Reims to book a one-off away tie against Paris Saint-Germain in February 2016.
Eighteen months before he joined Celtic, initially on loan for a season under Brendan Rodgers, Edouard led the line for the French starlets.
On more than one occasion, however, he was frustrated by the tackling and defensive work of McGinley. Jean-Kevin Augustin scored the game’s only goal to eliminate Dave Parnaby’s unlucky group.
‘We should have won but missed a few chances,’ recalled McGinley. ‘That was a great experience.
‘The PSG game was at their training ground because the PSG game was on the same night. In England, we were playing at The Riverside.
‘Usually, we were playing in the big stadiums and in Italy the fans were mad, crazy, which as a young lad is a great experience because you learn a lot.
‘There was a few thousand at the home legs but in Italy and France there was quite a few more, maybe 10,000. The lads were buzzing about that and it’s given me a taste for European football.
‘It’s going to be a 90-minute tie with Motherwell in the Europa League qualifiers now, similar to that PSG game. You play in a totally different way, treating it just like a final.
‘(Christopher) Nkunku, who was at PSG and is now at Leipzig, and (Jean-Kevin) Augustin (on loan at Leeds from Leipzig) were really good that evening. Those two stood out the most as really special.
‘You want to play against the best players and the chance to come up now against the likes of Odsonne
Edouard was one of the reasons I wanted to come to Motherwell.
‘That is how you get better and learn and it will be massive to play against clubs like Celtic and Rangers.’
Boro fanatic McGinley’s career with his hometown club came to an end after only one first-team appearance.
Following six months on loan at Wycombe, he debuted for Tony Pulis in a League Cup penalty shoot-out win over Notts County.
‘I’d been a fan since I was a young kid, so it was a massive occasion with my family and friends all in the stands,’ he explained. ‘I remember my mate saying the day before the game: “Bloody hell, you’ve waited all your life for this”. And he was right. Because to walk out in the team at The Riverside was a dream come true.
‘It was really hard to leave Middlesbrough because I’d been there since I was nine. But it felt like the right thing to do and I wanted to get out and play first-team football week in, week out.
‘You’ve got to think about your career. So while it was frustrating it was ultimately the correct decision — and it’s paid off now with this move.’ Marvin Johnson, a team-mate of McGinley’s in that Notts County tie, is just one example of a Motherwell signing from the lower echelons of the English game to use Fir Park as a springboard to a bigger stage. Johnson moved to Oxford after Motherwell and then on to Boro in a £2.5million deal. He spent 2018/19 on loan at Sheffield United, helping the Blades to promotion into the English top flight. McGinley was aware of that history but also checked in with former Forest Green team-mate Christian Doidge to receive a glowing report on the Scottish game. Doidge endured a nightmare start to life at Hibernian last season, failing to score a league goal until the second weekend in November. However, his hattrick against St Johnstone that afternoon counted for three of an 18-goal haul in 38 appearances in all competitions.
McGinley said: ‘I spoke to Christian for advice over the summer and he didn’t have a bad word to say about playing in Scotland. He’s done well and hopefully he gets the call-up for Wales that he deserves. ‘Coming up here is taking a jump out of your comfort zone. He said straight away that the exposure is far greater north of the border and I realised after speaking to him that it was for me. I obviously played against him in training quite a bit and it will be a good battle to look forward to when I come up against him next season.
‘Motherwell have earned a reputation as a great club to come and develop. You can see that with the amount of lads who have moved on to get really good moves.
‘It shows the good work everyone is doing at the club. I watched a few games from last season to take a look at the style of football. I’m the type who wants to get on the ball and play out, so it will suit me.’