Kirkintilloch Rob Roy boss Stewart Maxwell admits he couldn’t jump ship to Kilbirnie

Maxwell was approached by the Ayrshire club over their managerial vacancy. But despite Rabs’ precarious position at the foot of the Premiership, he is staying with the club.

Despite frustrating delays over the planned move to a new stadium, Maxwell has been a major driving force behind encouraging the community to rally round the beleaguered club.

He says that loyalty to the club he has played for, managed and supported meant he couldn’t simply walk away.

He told the Herald: “With the park and everything that’s going on with me being a big driver behind the scenes I didn’t think it would be right for me to leave the project and decided to stay on.

“I think a lot of people thought I was going to leave but I decided to stay and battle it out. Hopefully you get a wee bit of respect for that because with where we’re sitting in the league it would have been easy to jump ship to a team that’s not going to get relegated.

“I’ve got managerial aspirations and have done reasonably well in my time at Rob Roy on a limited budget and resources.

“Obviously results haven’t bene great this year and it’s hard; you’ve got to motivate yourself every week and motivate the players.

“It’s not easy but I think if anyobody had any doubt what Rob Roy means to me, me staying should answer that.

“With Davie Smith passing away after 50 years at the club, I was very close to Davie and feel I have to stay to drive things for people like him. It’s never about me and I couldn’t jump ship. I couldn’t do it to the players either, I felt I had to stay and fight it out.”