The Long Road

This month sees Keith Long’s second anniversary as Waterford FC manager and the club has come a long way in those two years. When he was appointed on the 29th of March 2023, the Blues were fourth in the First Division – behind Cobh Ramblers and Bray Wanderers, and already seven points adrift of Galway United after just five games.

Two years on, Long’s team lie second in the Premier Division with a much stronger club overall. So, who is ‘the Gaffer’ and what shaped him? Everyone knows about his time at Bohemians, but there’s a lot more to the man who learned from some of the greats and made the best of his opportunities to build a career in football as one of the most respected managers in the country.

Keith joined Stoke City as a 16-year-old at a time when they were a Third Division club managed by Alan Ball, first, and then Lou Macari. He played in the youth team without ever breaking into the first team set-up and it was a challenging time for the young Dubliner. Speaking to SportsJoe.ie about the fantastic system Stoke have now compared to then, Keith said, “It was different when we were there in the early ‘90s, at the end of The Troubles. We weren’t really looked upon necessarily with a great fondness or affection. You know ‘these Irish boys are coming into our club to take away our jobs’ and that type of stuff. It was sink or swim. It made you grow up very quickly. I think my Mam would have said that to my sisters – that he went away a boy and came back a man.”

 

(Photo - DundalkFCWhosWho.com)

He returned to Ireland in 1993 and spent three seasons at Dundalk under Dermot Keely before Brian Kerr signed him for a St Patrick’s Athletic team that had just won the league. Known as a utility man, Keith played a mixture of right back, centre back and midfield over the course of his career while always maintaining a day job, initially as a Telemarketing Manager. 

Long went on to be part of the Pat’s squad that won the league again on the final dramatic day of the season in Kilkenny in 1998. Long was on the bench, but unused, at Parkhead when St Pat’s drew 0-0 against the Celtic of Larsson and Lambert in that summer’s Champions League qualifier. He had experienced European football previously with Dundalk when playing 45 minutes as a substitute away to Malmo in the UEFA Cup.

He didn’t get much game time under new Pat’s manager Liam Buckley and made the decision to take time out and travel. Then-27, Keith went from South Africa to Australia where he played for Manly Warringah Dolphins from Sydney in the New South Wales Super League. He spent time in New Zealand and the United States too before coming back to Ireland.

 

(Photo - INPHO)

 

Long joined Bray Wanderers in July 2000 where he spent six seasons playing under the management of Pat Devlin, who is now his father-in-law. Keith played his most sustained run of football at the Carlisle Grounds at a relatively late stage in his career. He made 131 league and cup appearances for the Seagulls before retiring in 2005.

The next phase of his career began as a voluntary coach with his old schoolboy club St Joseph’s from Sallynoggin. Maybe he was destined for management having not only learned from Keely, Kerr, Dolan, Buckley and Devlin, but also played alongside future managers Eddie Gormley, Martin Russell, Paul Osam and Johnny McDonnell at Pat’s. 

Keith’s first foray into management came in 2012 when he kept Bray in the Premier Division against the odds, having moved from Devlin’s assistant to the top job. Their tenth-placed finish consigned Dundalk to the relegation playoff where they would beat Waterford, but Long had stepped aside from the Bray managerial role by September of that year.

 

(Photo - Noel Browne)

Next up, it was Athlone Town in 2014. Roddy Collins had led the Midlanders to promotion, but immediately jumped ship to take over Derry City. Mick Cooke was named as his successor, but was gone by April having lost the first ten league games. Long was his replacement, but Athlone were already doomed to relegation. However, Keith had shown enough promise with just nine more defeats in the remaining twenty-three matches to persuade Bohemians to offer him the chance to manage one of the top clubs. 

At Dalymount, Long took over a crisis club and turned them into contenders. They were still a part-time team and Keith continued to work a forty-hour week as a Business Development Manager for DBC Group office supplies until 2019. The peak for Bohs was finishing second in the shortened 2020 season to the far-better-resourced Shamrock Rovers who went unbeaten that year. They qualified for Europe for the first time in eight years, beating Stjarnan and Dudelange and had a famous win against PAOK of Greece at a packed Aviva Stadium. 

Bohs reached their first cup final in thirteen years in 2021 and were selling out their home fixtures on a regular basis. All this while bringing through and selling a long list of stars like Evan Ferguson, Danny Mandroiu, Andy Lyons and Promise Omochere. Eventually, the loss of talent caught up with Bohs and disappointing results in 2022 saw Long sacked that August when many felt he had earned some patience. Certainly, their standing hasn’t improved in subsequent years under Declan Devine or Alan Reynolds.

 

(Photo - Ken Sutton)

The Bohs board gave him the most favourable P45 you’ll ever read, part of which stated, “When Keith joined Bohemians in October 2014, he joined a club that had a multi-million euro debt and its future existence very much under threat. Thanks in no small part to his dedication, Bohemian FC is a very different place to the club he joined nearly eight years ago.”

 

By then, Long was a UEFA Pro Licence holder who had also qualified in Sports and Performance Psychology from Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology. After a short break, he was back in management – this time with Waterford. The Blues’ poor start to the season saw Danny Searle sacked and Long was appointed on the 29th of March 2023 having been approached by Director of Football Jonathan Walters. Within two days, he had overseen a 7-1 win against Finn Harps and by the end of the year, the club was back in the Premier Division.

 

Last season started exceptionally well, but tailed off. Still, a seventh-place finish was very much mission accomplished. This year’s first month has been very good too and when challenges arise, we can be sure that Long will keep his ‘sink or swim’ attitude and figure it out. It’s what he’s always done.