Managers Thoughts: Brian Dawson 06.12.2025

The club officially welcomed Brian Dawson to his new position as First Team Manager and Head Coach last week.

Brian will oversee all First Team activities and lead the men’s setup within the club.

Brian is still making a number of appointments, back room staff will be announced in due course.

We went into the game with real optimism after having our first training session with the boys on Wednesday. Unfortunately, the result didn’t reflect the overall performance, which was frustrating. That said, I was really pleased to see some of the things we’re trying to implement come to fruition, a positive moving forward.

We were missing several key players, which naturally didn’t help. It left us very young and lacking a bit of experience. At times, I felt we put ourselves under unnecessary pressure by overplaying, and we became too open by overcommitting. These are things we can learn from and address in training moving forward.

He brings with him a wealth of experience with his Non league playing career including Barrow, Kendal, Workington Reds and Holker Old Boys.

His coaching career spans Millom, Holker Old Boys, Cleator Moor Celtic and more recently assistant manager and latterly interim manager at Workington Reds.

Credit to Coppull, who handled everything we threw at them. They managed the game well and always carried a threat. We struggled to deal with their Number 9, who was excellent and probably the difference in the end.

We’ll regroup this week and look forward to the challenge of next week’s game against Astley & Buckshaw.

A huge thanks to caretaker managers Matthew Branthwaite, Callum Morgan, Scott Pears and David Hodgson supported by Steven Kitchen and Paul Smith for their support over the past few months.

Brians Assistant Manager will be appointed in the new year.