Trim man Clancy keeping busy with new business booming and media duties

Timmy Clancy says he’s “not hell bent” on returning to football management any time soon a year after he departed from Cork City to explore new frontiers. Not that he has ruled out a return to the dugout altogether.

It was in early May 2025 the Turner’s Cross club suddenly announced to a startled football community in Ireland that Clancy was departing as manager and since then he has kick-started a part-time career on Virgin Media as a football pundit for that station’s coverage of League of Ireland games.

In that role he has looked calm and composed under the glare of the TV lights and cameras, providing insights into how other clubs are faring out in the often rough-and-tumble, demanding world of professional football in Ireland.

The TV work, combined with the fact that Clancy has started up a Trim-based gym business with his wife Seaneen, has ensured he has plenty to keep him busy since leaving Turner’s Cross. “I’m not hell bent on diving back in and going at it again,” is how he puts it.

The Cork City job was the most recent stop-off point in a football career that has brought the Trim native far and wide. He experienced some smooth, fruitful spells in his career in football but some bumpy patches too. There were times in his career when he could have slipped back down the ranks and stayed there, submerged in obscurity. He didn’t. He repeatedly reinvented himself.

A Republic of Ireland u-19 international, Clancy was signed by Millwall before he had spells with non-league clubs Weymouth, AFC Hornchurch and Fisher Athletic. It was then he made a radical switch moving up to Scotland to turn out for Kilmarnock, Motherwell, Hibernian and St Johnstone before returning home to Ireland eventually finishing up his career with Bray Wanderers in 2017.

He turned to management and took over at Drogheda Utd when he was 33 and the club was languishing in the League of Ireland First Division with little or no money. He rebuilt the team on a meagre budget eventually guiding them into the Premier League in 2020. It was quite an achievement for Clancy.

He had good and bad times when he later took over as full-time manager of St Patrick’s Athletic. For some reason he didn’t appear to be accepted by a section of the St Pat’s supporters despite remarkable achievements such as the 1-0 triumph over CSKA Sofia away in the Europa Conference League before losing 2-0 in the second leg at Richmond Park, the Bulgarians scoring the winning goal from a late, controversial penalty.

He eventually left the Saints in 2023 before moving down to Cork City and guiding the club to the First Division title as runaway winners. Then, early in the 2025 season, with the club back in the Premier, it was suddenly announced that he had stepped away. Why?

“There were multiple things, I was doing a lot of travel up and down (from Trim where he lives) to Cork. It just got to the stage where it was affecting me and probably my home life as well,” he recalls.

“It was the right time (to leave Cork City) and for somebody else to step in and take it to the next stage. Unfortunately it didn’t happen for my replacement Ger Nash, they were relegated, it just didn’t work out and now it looks like they are flying again under Barry Robson.”

Despite the demands there were aspects of management Clancy greatly enjoyed. “The involvement on a day-to-day basis with a squad trying to help players improve, especially young players, can be very satisfying,” he adds.

“You might see they have a few rough edges and you’re just trying to give them the platform, the confidence to go onto a football pitch and play to the best of their ability.

“If you can help somebody in that regard and see them shine on a Friday night in front of a packed stadium it gives you a lot of joy. Then there’s working with the players in the lead up to games, the plans you’ve made during the week then match day arrives and you go on to get a result. All that can be very satisfying.”

He says these days a manager needs to be able, above all, to be a good man-manager. “When I started out in football years ago, managers would bollock you, scream at you, give you a hard time. You can’t do that anymore. You have to put a lot more emphasis on mental health, be aware of outside pressures. Successful managers these days I would say are those who are very good tactically but also have strong man-management qualities as well.”

He says it was “a massive step for him” to move away from Cork City and focus on building the gym business with Seaneen but now, he adds, he has that financial security he didn’t have before; a reality that may help him enjoy club management if and when he returns. Football management, he knows only too well, is a notoriously insecure business.

One thing he hasn’t lost is his passion for the game. “I was in for 250 games as a manager and I’d say I was just as passionate and vocal on the sideline for my 250th game as I was in my first, so I don’t think, if I go back, I will be much different. I think you have to be passionate, and supporters see and appreciate that.

“If I was a supporter I would want to see the manager of my team do more than just stand there with his hands in his pocket, invest more energy. I suppose that’s why Martin O’Neill has had such an amazing career. He’s animated on the sideline and that transfers to fans as well.”

Still only 41- he will be 42 next month - Clancy has a career in management behind him that might be expected to belong to another, much older man.

With time on his side, and so much experience in the bank, it’s inconceivable that Clancy won’t be back on the management beat – sooner rather than later.