Goalie coach gets new post
Friday, 23rd Jan 2015Brian Potter has accepted the goalkeeping coach job at Hamilton Accies.
Talking exclusively to this website Brian who is the brother of manager John Potter described how big a wrench it was to leave the club he has supported all his life:-
"I had a chance to move full time but there was a lot to think about because I work full time juggling my job with Dunfermline and working with the Fife Academy as well. I have a lot to weigh up and have had opportunities before to go full time before.
"Everybody knows that Dunfermline is my club and I have been a fan for thirty years but I just felt that if I didn't do it now and give it a chance I might never get a chance to do it again. It doesn't mean that I will no longer be a Dunfermline supporter and it is doubly hard because my brother has just become the manager.
"The chance has come up and I had to consider the job that I have virtually been doing for the last sixteen years. For the last eight they have allowed me to juggle it, I had four years at Hamilton and four years at Dunfermline while still working between 40 and 45 hours per week. I am two or three days with Dunfermline - match days, under 20s, Academy and my work has been absolutely brilliant in allowing me to do it."
At Hamilton Brian will replace Craig Coyle who has left the club:-
"The chance to go full time doesn't happen very often. I love what I do here. I love the freedom of being allowed to coach and do things my own way. I have a great young group, even though Ryan Scully is on loan he has really progressed since he arrived at the start of last season.
"Ryan Goodfellow is a really good goalkeeper and the two young boys Cammy Gill and Jamie Wilson make up a very good group. I hope that they keep progressing."
Coaching goalkeepers is a specialised position, there are not that many opportunities in Scotland and this one sneaked up on Brian who never saw it coming.
"Even since I have been at Dunfermline I have had the opportunities to go full time for more money and I have turned them down. I am 38 next week and I thought that I would give it a shot and hopefully things will work out."
Brian knows the New Douglas Park environment well. (Even pictured above recently in the away dug out at an SPFL Development League game) He enjoyed his time there before but was drawn to Dunfermline in October 2011 because it was his club.
"You couldn't foresee what has happened in the four years that I have been here. Administration, relegations, players coming and going, everything has really happened. It sounds daft but I am glad that I was here at this time. Any part you can play to help, whatever it was, keeping spirits high or coaching - I am just glad that I could play a wee part in it."
Potter, who started his career with Raith Rovers, had previously coached with Accies after a stint in junior football with Oakley United, and even signed as a player in 2008 to act as cover for the club’s two main goalkeepers.
Potts made his mark at Raith Rovers in the 1994-95 Scottish League Cup Semi Final. When Scott Y Thomson was sent off the YTS player with only one previous first team appearance saw out the match and saved the final penalty of the shoot out to see the Rovers through to the final where they would defeat Celtic on penalties. As a consequence despite Scott Y's return for the final Brian has a Scottish League cup winners medal.
Everyone at Dunfermline Athletic would like to thank Brian Potter for his services to the club and extend their best wishes to him at his new club.
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