Danny Murphy: ‘I’m not going to be Pep Guardiola or Jurgen Klopp. But I still want to be successful’

Murphy had decided towards the end of his final spell with Cork City that he wanted to go down the coaching route

Danny Murphy in action for Cork City winning a header against Derry City’s Marc Griffin during the Airtricity Premier League game at Turner’s Cross back in 2013. Murphy had three spells with the Leesiders. Murphy had decided towards the end of his final spell at Turner’s Cross that he wanted to go down the coaching route. Picture: Eddie O’Hare

Danny Murphy is in his van when he picks up the phone. It is matchday for Erith and Belvedere of England’s ninth tier and the former Cork City left back is dropping off kits, freshly washed by his mother, before going to coach one of the many teams affiliated to the women’s club he has turned from having 13 players to 14 teams in less than two years.

From there he will collect the physio and kitman, both in need of lifts, and drive an hour south to Crowborough Athletic.

Three goals in five second-half minutes will send them on the way to a comfortable 4-1 win, the only downside being a last-minute concession for a manager who has always treasured clean sheets as much as goals.

A day that started with him coaching a girls’ scholarship programme at 10am will end around midnight,12 hours before he is back out training another team.

These are the days and nights that the 38-year-old hopes will shape him into a coach capable of thriving at a higher level, perhaps with Erith and Belvedere, who are now owned by former Ireland U21 player Adrian Deane, or maybe even back at Turner’s Cross.

“I’m never going to be Pep Guardiola or Jurgen Klopp,” Murphy says, “But I want to be successful and to do well, and you need to be willing to make sacrifices if you want a career in the game. It’s part and parcel of it. In the next 10 years there’s a level I want to be coaching at.

“There are things I’d love to do. Would I want to come to Ireland to manage Cork City at some stage? Of course I would. What about rise the leagues in England? 100%. But I’ve got to prove I’m good enough to do that here first, show what my worth is.”

His work ethic is unquestionable. Murphy is on a pitch seven days a week and has lost count of the weddings of friends and family events that have been missed due to football. But sacrifices have been the backbone throughout a career that began in West Ham’s academy and brought three spells in Cork plus some time in Scotland.

The biggest sacrifice of all, however, was his decision in 2016 to take a job coaching girls aged 10 to 18 in America, moving several time zones away from his young son.

The offer of a role at the Carolina Elite Soccer Academy arrived following a chance meeting in a London airport. Murphy had decided towards the end of his final spell at Turner’s Cross that he wanted to go down the coaching route. He secured his badges, spent some time at Blarney United but knew that more experience was necessary to progress.

He had already investigated a move to the United States but the visa process seemed too much hassle until the arrival lounge acquaintance insisted that he could help him land a job.

Murphy was skeptical but passed on his phone number and by the time he made it to his parents’ house in south-east London he had a phone call with a firm offer.

There was little hesitation and once he landed zero respite. Business kept the homesickness at bay and the wonders of modern telecommunications helped further.

“You’re always going to have s***ty days when you start thinking about going home, doing what your friends are doing,” he says. “Going to the pub at the weekend, going on holidays. I’ve spent nearly my whole life missing out on that. But if I want to get to where I really want to get to, I have to do these things.

“There were days when I really missed my little boy but technology is amazing now. We could Facetime. It wasn’t like I didn’t see him. We spoke three or four times a day and he had opportunities to come to America. That’s something I couldn’t do as a kid because my family couldn’t afford to. So there were good things that came out of it.”

While the all-hands-on-deck approach surprised Murphy at first, it made him realise how far the infrastructure for the women’s game in England lagged behind their American counterparts.

On his return to London in December 2019, he joined up with Welling United. They may have been short on numbers initially but there is now a team for all ages and there are realistic hopes of the senior sides joining the professional ranks in the medium-term future.

“Everyone wants to go to America but a lot of people don’t understand the work ethic of American people,” he says. “They work so hard. Even from the top all the way down you’d be involved in everything. We had 18 floodlit pitches and 3,000 kids. Every week you were changing pitches, moving goals and doing lines.

“There was an active involvement in everything from day to day and that was before coaching. There was admin, dealing with parents and kids and then dealing with colleges. It was non-stop. People go out there and think they can coach for a bit and then spend the rest of their time sitting by the pool. You need to have a work ethic to go out there and do well. I’ve always had that and it opened my eyes.

“When I came back I realised that we were so far behind with women’s football in terms of the infrastructure. We’re still miles behind but I wanted to make a difference. We’re putting those infrastructures in place here and we now have 14 teams that are successfully competing with a women’s team that jumped two divisions last year because they won their league without losing a game.”

There are a lot of plates to keep spinning and other coaches need to step up on the days when Murphy is double-booked but he is determined to ensure that he is as committed to both roles.

This season’s ambition is for both senior teams to get promoted and the early form indicates it is more than a remote possibility with Welling taking nine points from the first available 12.

Erith sit six behind leaders Glebe with two games in hand before this afternoon’s game against Welling Town and Murphy has leaned on a wide network of contacts to bring in a few grizzled veterans of higher divisions, most recently the former Ghana international Chris Dickson.

The wage bill has risen from £700 a week to more than £1,300 and Murphy has found attracting sponsors a headache but it is just another part of the remit.

There are few pretences at this level, where the pitches are suboptimal but the defensive improvements are a source of pride even if he bristles at suggestions of them being a safety-first team.

“I’m not asking them to sit back and defend,” he adds. “In possession, express yourself. If we have the right structure in place without the ball we can get possession back quicker. For me, it’s very unrealistic to play out from the back because this isn’t Man City and I’m not Pep Guardiola. I can’t do that.”

Murphy believes takeover must happen for City to return to Premier Division

Danny Murphy believes a takeover is required for Cork City to emerge from their current malaise.

The former left-back, who won both Premier and First Division titles during three spells at Turner’s Cross, admires the job that has been done by FORAS, the supporters’ trust that has run the club since February 2010.

But with Colin Healy’s young side unable to immediately bounce back from last season’s relegation he believes more expertise is required off the pitch for them to regain their place among the country’s elite.

Trevor Hemmings, the owner of the Preston North End, turned down an option to buy the club at the end of last year following a vote by the trust.

“The takeover needs to happen and it needs to be done properly,” said Murphy, who remains in regular contact with a number of former team-mates. “Until then it’ll be difficult for them to keep progressing.

“It’s massively important for these things to come into play.

“I look at the team and I feel for them, but I also think a lot of that is about taking responsibilities.

“The club has put themselves in a situation which they didn’t really need to do.

“You need business people in place if it’s a fans club. It’s a great idea but you need business people.

“It’s hard. I’m paying wages and going through all that stuff here and I worry about where I can get money for it.

“You need other things to generate money, a bar or whatever, and putting them in place isn’t that easy.”