Nairn County caretaker boss not looking any further ahead than Saturday
BRIAN Macleod says he is currently only interested in getting Nairn County through Saturday’s clash at Formartine United before considering who will become the next manager of the club.
Macleod, who was assistant manager under Ross Tokely, who stood down as boss earlier this week after nine months in charge, has taken over as caretaker boss along with coaches Alan Geegan and Wayne Mackintosh.
Tokely left the club officially on Monday, two days after their 5-1 defeat to Forres Mechanics at Station Park as they find themselves in 12th place in the table.
Now Nairn County are expected to have started the process of finding Tokely’s replacement to become manager. Chairman Mark Kelman has said the club will take their time to ensure they bring in the right person.
He was promoted to assistant manager at Nairn County in April when Tokely was appointed as manager.
Macleod said Tokely leaving his position came as a shock to everyone at the club. But the squad are looking to put the disappointment behind them and attempt to turn their disappointing season around.
He said: “We were all shocked with the news on Monday, it is never nice when someone loses their job.
“Everyone feels a bit of guilty of how that happened as the season has not been good enough. There is uncertainty among the players but I had a good chat with them on Tuesday night. And bring a bit of focus to the group, it is just a case of preparing the best that we can.
“We are looking for a positive reaction from them from last Saturday.”
Despite Macleod’s Highland League managerial experience, Macleod is playing down speculation that he could be interested in taking the job on a permanent basis. He just wants to focus on their clash against Formartine in Pitmedden on Saturday and take things from there.
“It is completely different to taking full responsibility compared to being an assistant. We are employed by the club to support them in any way. Myself, Alan and Wayne and director of football have been working with Graeme Macleod who has been doing hard work behind the scenes and he has taken a lot off of me this week.
“It has been a collective effort from everyone and we look to get a positive result on Saturday.
“I am literally just focussing on this week. I think that is important as the season we have had has been up and down. Saturday was such a sore one for the club, when you get beat 5-1 by your rivals, it was important this week that we focus on trying to move things forward.“
“Everyone wants clarity on the situation, but this week it is important to only focus on training and the game on Saturday. Then we can have a conversation to see what route they want to go down. I am not sure if I would be interested in the job at this moment in time. But I am focussing on giving the players support.”
Fraser Dingwall and Matthew Wright look set to miss this weekend due to illness but everyone should be available for the clash at Formartine.
Macleod says his squad are capable of a positive result to end a disappointing week.
“Formartine are a tough team but we have players who can cause them problems. Equally we have let ourselves down in terms of work rate, so it is important we get that right. I have said to the players as much as we want result, we need to focus on our work rate, performance and application. If we can do that and get a positive result and focus on what we control, we will see what can we control.”
