I've proved my worth after hard work, says Queen of the South assistant boss Kenny Brannigan

Aug 31 2008 By Gordon Waddell

KENNY BRANNIGAN knows people look at his CV through the cracks in their fingers.

He knows mud sticks. He's had enough of it tossed at him through the years.

But after six months at the elite edge of a game he's given 27 years to, the Queen of the South No.2 feels vindicated.

Because in those six months, when he has filled the Hampden dugout in a Cup semi and final, helped fly the flag in Europe and been backed to the hilt by other managers, he's rediscovered this - football NEEDS guys like him.

The 43-year-old is straight from the old school - a cast-iron defender with one commandment: Thou shalt not lose.

Who's not scared to tell stoppers Row Z is their friend.

And despite being tagged as trouble for a spate of black marks on his career record, Brannigan has enough faith in himself to know he has something to offer in a game that has lost its growl.

This is the first time he's spoken to the media in four years, a vow of silence taken following the stitch-up that saw him sacked as Queen's Park boss after being attacked by a fan in the dugout at Elgin.

Throw in his part in the infamous "Saltcoats Seven" nightclub fracas that cost him his job as a player at Falkirk, plus a first-minute headbutt that got him axed from Kilmarnock, and he knows why people rush to judgment.

But in a week when Gordon Chisholm's side did Scottish football proud with a gutsy UEFA Cup show in Denmark, Brannigan reckons his presence there proves a point.

"I've been branded," he shrugged, "and we all know mud sticks.

"They say 'He's a crackpot'. Fine, I might have played like a crackpot at times, that was my game, but many a manager has told me recently, 'We're looking for a guy just like you'.

"Because they know that when I played, I organised. I didn't need people on the side having to shout on all the time to get it sorted, which is what we have to do now.

"And I coach the game the way I played it. I know what I can contribute.

"It's a balance. Chis is a thinker, a great man manager. My contribution is simpler but runs deep. Thou shalt not get beaten.

"I like dominance in defence. Guys now can maybe play but they can't dominate a centre forward.

"Ideally you want both. We've looked around for more than a season and it's impossible - I genuinely think it's a problem Scotland has."

Few sweat more for the cause than Chisholm and Brannigan to make the impossible possible though.

Sixteen-hour days are more the rule than exception for a guy who got used to grafting in a near 23-year playing career that took in Queen's Park, Sheffield Wednesday, St Mirren, Kilmarnock, Falkirk, Clydebank, Partick Thistle, Stenhousemuir, Stranraer and Berwick. Brannigan said: "We finish training, go to a reserve game in the afternoon then take in a match at night.

"We may be do that three or four shifts a week, cover seven games on top of our own training sessions.

"I'm not sure directors appreciate the work that goes in.

"I'm a single man, I own a pub called The Bowlers at Glasgow Green near where we train so most days I'm working from nine until one the next morning.

"I got into the pub game when I was 30 because a lot of people were looking at me and saying 'He's not the kind of guy we want as a coach or manager'.

"Football doesn't pay enough to sustain my commitments and the pub doesn't give me the enjoyment football does.

"But I'll never complain about going to a game of football. It's a joy, a release."

What happened in 2004 would have been enough to sour that love affair for lesser characters. But Kenny's presence proves he's the bigger man for it.

He said: "I got stitched up big time at Queen's Park. I haven't done an interview in the four years since, even right through the Scottish Cup semis and final last season.

"It was a disgrace. I'd taken a boy off, he kicked a water bottle and hit the coach, so I went in the dugout and dealt with it.

"This guy Willie Canning, who was the dad of one of our young lads and at the other end of the ground, ran all the way round. He was at the side of the dugout shouting at the doc and the physio.

"I asked him what the problem was, he said 'C'mere' and cracked me on the jaw.

"As he did it he jumped back.

"I told security to get rid of him but he went straight over to a couple of directors he'd helped vote on to the board.

"No-one said anything to me until the Thursday despite them speaking to him about five times. The next day the story came out that I'd hit the guy.

"As I say, mud sticks. People make judgments. The Saltcoats thing was an example of that when I was at Falkirk.

"A group of us had been on a night out and some local guys caused trouble for us but Peter Hetherston and myself ended up getting charged.

"We were cleared but the guy who kicked it all off had about four warrants out on him. We both still lost our jobs.

"And even the thing at Kilmarnock has held me back for different reasons."

That incident came in Jim Fleeting's fledgling spell as a boss when Brannigan nutted Stranraer's Derek Cook in what he accepts was a moment of madness.

But with Fleeting in charge of the SFA's technical development, Brannigan has hesitated for years to finish the badges he started more than a decade ago - until now.

He said: "I'm going back this summer to finish my A licence hopefully. I get on fine with Jim now. We all make mistakes."

Brannigan admits he took one thing away from his spell at the Spiders though - their motto.

And after serving them as a player and gaffer he reckons it means as much to him now as the first day he wore it on his chest as a teenager.

"Ludere causa ludendi," he says. "It means 'The game for the game's sake'. Not for the money or anything else, just because you love it.

"If I wasn't making a living in football I'd still be doing it for nothing. The motto sums up my outlook on a game I love."

  

MEANWHILE Brannigan insists Queen of the South would never have had their dream trip into Europe this week without Gordon Chisholm at the helm.

And he would rather walk away from the game than fill his mate's boots if Chis ever quit Palmerston.

Brannigan said: "The management game is not for me.

"If Chis left this job to go elsewhere and decided to take someone else, I'd walk. I wouldn't become a manager again, no chance.

"You have to deal with people whose views you don't particularly enjoy. Stevie Frail is a pal of mine and what he went through at Hearts was beyond belief.

"What I have now, working with Chis, is brilliant. The club are lucky to have such a gem. He has a great rapport with the players, press, other gaffers and is exceptional at his job."

Queens are also benefitting from Chisholm's decision to bring Billy Dodds in as striker coach.

Kenny said: "Billy wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Chis and if our players can't improve by working with the wee man there's something seriously wrong with them."