Gor Mahia’s title-winning coach Johnathan McKinstry opines that it was the perfect time for him and K’Ogalo to come together when they did.In July last year, the Irish man joined K’Ogalo on a two-year deal, coming in to replace German tactician Andreas Spier who left the record Kenyan champions upon the expiry of his contract at the end of June 2022.At that time, Gor Mahia were serving a transfer ban and had to bring in young players from the youth team as they prepared for the 2022/23 season to kick off, a plan that McKinstry feels was perhaps aligning with whom he is.In his first interview, and despite the tough task that lay ahead of him, McKinstry revealed that he had one mission – to return Gor Mahia to the top.Johnathan McKinstry: The gutsy Northern Irishman daring to return Gor Mahia to its glory daysLess than a year later, he has done just that, guiding his team to a record 20th title with a team that no one would fancy getting to those heights at the start of the season.Speaking after the triumphant outing at Kasarani on Sunday, the Irishman said that Gor Mahia’s unfortunate moment that saw them turn to the youth team presented the perfect time for him as a coach at the club.”I have been in this game for a long time from the academy moving to the professional level and I have always been a person who has always wanted to incorporate young players into the senior team. If you look at my record at the national team level, I gave debuts to players aged even 16 years. I think it was the perfect time for a club like K’Ogalo and a coach like me to come together where we did it and also managed the senior players,” McKinstry said.##NAJAVA_MECA_7340259##Further, McKinstry revealed that they only started talking about the title just over a month ago.K’Ogalo had last laid their hands on the league title in 2020 when they were awarded the title during the aborted season after covid-19 hit hard.”It was about it being a step-by-step process and was not about putting this big ambition of winning the league. We only started talking about winning the league in the last four, five weeks,” he added.
