“I’m loving it.”
Kevin Nolan is back as a No 1 at Northampton Town, and he is relishing it.
It is his third managerial role, but it came six years after his second – having spent much of the time in between working as part of David Moyes’ coaching staff at West Ham United.
He is still only 42, but feels his stint at the London Stadium teed him up perfectly with a new perspective and a wealth of knowledge.
Nolan says working under Moyes taught him how as a manager ‘you can never stand still’
“When you go in as a young manager – like I did at Leyton Orient and Notts County – you feel like you’ve got experience because you’ve got experience as a player,” he tells Sky Sports.
“But now when I look back after four and a half years under David [Moyes] at West Ham, I feel like I’ve come into this one fully prepared for everything.
“Obviously, I had that emotional attachment to West Ham, and everything we achieved there was magnificent.
“So when that ended it felt a bit like: ‘where do you go from here?’ But when this job came up and you start doing your checks, make sure the owners and everything are a good fit – I was delighted to get in.
“And so far, thankfully, I’d say it’s gone well. But there is still a lot of work to do.”
League One table
Nolan admits he did not expect to spend so long away from being a manager when he left Notts County unexpectedly in 2018. But circumstance and opportunity took him on the path to east London.
Looking back, his time with Moyes was the best thing that could have happened to him.
‘I’ll never forgive the chairman’
“I was offered a job quite soon after Notts County, but it just felt too soon to go and jump right back into it,” Nolan admits.
“I’d lived away from my wife for a while at that point, and she’d just moved to Nottingham the week I got sacked.
“I’ll never forgive the chairman for that, because he promised that I’d be there for years and years.
“Then I was out for a while, and the opportunity at West Ham arose. I got in touch with David because I knew he was looking for staff, and it all worked out great.
“I learned so much under him, and I thank him so much for taking me on and trusting in me as one of his coaches, because I was an unknown to him really.”
Highlights of the Sky Bet League One match between Northampton and Birmingham
Throughout that time the desire for Nolan to be a manager again one day never left him.
“There was no question about that,” he says. “It was just about when I dipped back into it.
“But I didn’t realise how much I’d learned at West Ham until I did come back into it.
“You see some of the things David did, and you’d be questioning and thinking if it was right. Then you would see it come to fruition.
“It was just how relentless he was in trying to make things better. How involved he was in all departments to get improvements every day.
“You can never stand still, and that’s the biggest thing I took from him. As a No 1, you’ve got to make sure you’re always on the ball and you’re on top of everyone at the club, but that you’re also there to support and help, and be a friend when someone’s in need.
“I’ve taken so much of that into this job.”
Nolan was manager at Notts County from 2017 to 2018
The task at Northampton Town is, admittedly, a very different one to what Nolan had at West Ham.
From fighting to finish in the European places, to trying to keep a club afloat in League One.
He has made a good fist of it so far. When he arrived just before Christmas the Cobblers were just two points above the drop – while all the sides below them had games in hand. Now that gap has increased to six.
Nolan knows the short-term goals of survival have to be attained, before any long-term targets can be achieved.
“The board never put me under any pressure to say that, but that’s the pressure I put on myself and what I want to do,” he says.
“For me, it was about coming in and trying to change the culture. That’s something they were excited about, and it’s something I was excited about in taking this opportunity.
“I wouldn’t have taken the job if I didn’t think I could keep them in the league. I believe I can, and that we’re on our way to doing that.
“What we’re going to do is keep showing up and keep performing like we have in recent weeks, and keep getting positive results.”
