Lee McCulloch interview in The Herald with Spiers

[ian1964 10,416]

ON Lee McCulloch’s desk inside Rugby Park lies a book, The Secret by Rhonda Byrne. When it came out in 2006 it was acclaimed around the world as a literary key which could unlock a person’s inner potential, leading to greater happiness and fulfilment.

 

“It is one of the greatest books ever,” McCulloch tells me when we sit down to chat. “I’ve read it over and over and it has really helped my thinking. I believe in bettering myself, in learning and improving. I’m not just a big thug, you know.”

 

McCulloch goes on to tell me about his “affirmations” which he thinks about and enunciates most days. At 37 this former Rangers captain, and now assistant manager at Kilmarnock, is on a road to self-improvement.

 

“I get up most days at quarter to six. When I drive in my car I listen to spoken books – like The Secret and others – because I find them inspiring. They help me go beyond my comfort zone, they help me to feel no fear where I might feel fear. There are certain affirmations I have and say, about what I want to do, where I want to go next in life.

 

“I’ve been like this for a few years now, but recently it has become very important to me. I find it helps me. I’m into all of this, being positive, trying to think things through like this.”

 

For years McCulloch has known he wanted to be a football coach, but it was a question of where and when. Then, around Christmas time last year, while he was still a Rangers player, he took a call from Gary Locke.

 

“In all of my years of playing I was always passionate about learning. I was hard-working and pretty driven. I know I am going to get better at this job. Through hard work and listening to people, and finding out as much as I can, I know I can improve.

 

“Just after Christmas last year, Gary called me and said, ‘I want you to come and be my Kilmarnock assistant next season…would you be interested?’ I said to him, ‘of course I am, what an opportunity.’ But I asked him to just let me concentrate on my final season at Rangers – and things were pretty tough. Then Gary and I met at the end of last season and sorted everything.

 

“This is a brilliant experience for me. I have made mistakes at Kilmarnock, and I’ll make more of them. But I’ll get better, I know I will. I will improve myself in this job and then see where it takes me.”

 

In the context of “pretty rough”, nothing could compare with the afternoon of April 25 this year for McCulloch. For years he had been a Rangers stalwart, a hero, but the sands of time were running out for him, and he was barracked that afternoon at Ibrox for a shaky display in defence against Falkirk. Indeed, he was dropped after that game.

 

“At the time, it was hard. There were maybe 40,000 Rangers fans inside the stadium and I got booed by 5,000 of them. But in the grand scheme of things, my time at Rangers over eight years – winning five league titles, six cups, playing in the Champions League and a UEFA Cup final – was a tremendous experience.

 

“I had to handle it that day. I’ve no problems with it. I still went and took the ball. That afternoon at Ibrox was a small negative for me, but I have too many positive memories. The Rangers fans were fantastic to me for eight years.”

 

It was obvious that McCulloch was going to run out of time at Rangers. When the club faced liquidation and starting again at the bottom in 2012, McCulloch was already 34 years old. Even if the steady climb through the divisions had occurred – which it didn’t – he was always going to be ready for retirement by the time Rangers celebrated top-flight status.

 

I asked McCulloch how he had found “the journey” with Rangers over these recent seasons.

 

“It was brilliant,” he replied. “After the initial bad spell of administration, and all the terrible things that happened, just getting to play again, and thinking that everything was going to be all right, gave us all a goal to aim for. We knew what we had to do.

 

“All of a sudden, you had a group of young kids playing for Rangers. I mean, you’d have to go back decades to find when that had last happened. It was a fantastic thing for me. We just had to be professional about it. A guy like Lee Wallace was suddenly a very experienced Rangers player at 24 or 25.

 

“I had to help the manager look after a bunch of 17 and 18-year-olds – the Fraser Airds, the Lewis Macleods. The demands of playing for Rangers or Celtic are like no other clubs. It was brilliant for me, and for Lee Wallace. He will be a better Rangers captain now for having gone through all that. We spoke every day – me and Lee – about what we had to do for Rangers. It gave you a tremendous responsibility.”

 

By June of this year, now 37 and with Kilmarnock beckoning him, McCulloch says he had never had any illusion about leading Rangers, even if they had got promoted, through a triumphal season back at the top.

 

“I was very aware of that. People do play to the age of 37, 38 or 39 but very rarely does it happen at Rangers or Celtic. Davie Weir, at 40 or 41, was the blatant exception. It just doesn’t happen. So as we came through the divisions with Rangers I knew that I would have to quit, even if we had got promotion last season.

 

“I thought, if the club go back to where it should be, I would just bow out. I’d never have been playing week in, week out anyway. If I’d stayed, and just hung around Ibrox, what would I have achieved?

 

“Coaching – and maybe management – is something I wanted to do. If I had stayed on at Ibrox I’d have missed a year of coaching, being in the position I am in now, which is what I wanted my next step in life to be. I didn’t want to miss out on this opportunity with Kilmarnock.”

 

The challenge he and Gary Locke now face together is onerous. There were less than 3000 fans at Rugby Park for the visit of Dundee United on Saturday, and around 400 of those had travelled down from Tayside. Kilmarnock FC has been afflicted in recent years by a town and surrounding area consumed by economic hardship.

 

“It is tough. Kilmarnock is a big club with a big catchment area. We should be able to attract the best kids to the club.

 

“But we’ve got an 18,000-seater stadium and we are averaging around 3000. It just shows you how much things have gone down the way here. But the club, I believe, is now debt-free. Billy Bowie has been bank-rolling the club for a year or more. He has been putting his own money in. So something has got to start coming together.

 

 

“I’m relishing this challenge. I work well with Gary. I take the training and I have a voice in the dugout. It is a totally different side to football that I am discovering. That is the biggest thing for me – the talking, the thinking, the hours you put in. It is unreal.

 

“Like I said, I’ve made mistakes, and I’ll make some more. But I’ll learn, and I’ll get better. I’ll make sure that happens. I watch, and ask, and listen, and learn. That’s what it is all about for me now.”

 

http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/14129917.The_Graham_Spiers_interview__How_Lee_McCulloch_knew_the_Jig_was_up_at_Rangers______/

Edited December 8, 2015 by ian1964

[ian1964 10,416]

''When the club faced liquidation and starting again at the bottom in 2012, McCulloch was already 34 years old.''

 

Graham Spiers just can't help himself!

Edited December 8, 2015 by ian1964

[Bluedell 5,329]

“Like I said, I’ve made mistakes, and I’ll make some more.

 

Yeah, speaking to Spiers is one of them.

[boabie 230]

Played 17. 17 points. There's a lot of learning still to be done Lee.

[pete 2,499]

I wish big Lee all the best. He may not have been the best player in the world but you always got 100% effort.

I hope he does well. Killie were also the only club not to vote us out of the SPL even though they only sat on the fence and never voted for us.

[JTP 0]

"The Secret by Rhonda Byrne" .........

 

Just a pity Rhonda didn't come and say Lee was a hindrance on the side 3 years ago eh. He might have listened to her.

[MacK1950 2,231]

Good luck Lee you deserve it wish we had a defensive organiser just now would not have lost a couple of goals from set moves at corners.

[Tannochsidebear 2,315]

Sums up Jig for me, giving an interview to that scumbag. The worst technically performing captain our club has ever had. Only wish he took Miller with him to Killie.

[Davie P 4]

I am fairly sure that Lee gave an interview during the course of last season (May have been around the time of the short reign of KMc) and stated that he intended to play on next season. When did he have the epiphany that he was finished as a player, or was it just easy money playing for Rangers?

[boabie 230]

Good luck Lee you deserve it wish we had a defensive organiser just now would not have lost a couple of goals from set moves at corners.

 

The other side of the coin is though mac, we would probably have lost more goals because of a painfully slow defender falling on his erchie or playing forwards onside through his own inactivity. Towards the end McCulloch became the same as Miller is just now, great at waving his arms around "organising" others but incapable of delivering what the club pay him to do. Sorry mate.