'I've had to learn calmness' – Ian Murray on mellowing as a manager and the example set at Hibs

Ian Murray admits he’s mellowed considerably in his working environment over the years, with his typical relaxed dugout persona nowadays in sharp contrast to what he could be like as a rookie boss at Dumbarton a decade ago.
Former Hibs captain Ian Murray became Raith Rovers manager in the summer. Picture: Mark Scates / SNSFormer Hibs captain Ian Murray became Raith Rovers manager in the summer. Picture: Mark Scates / SNS
Former Hibs captain Ian Murray became Raith Rovers manager in the summer. Picture: Mark Scates / SNS

The former Hibs captain, 41, took over as Raith Rovers manager on a two-year contract in the summer. He previously served as Dumbarton boss between 2012 and 2015, before a brief stint at St Mirren and four years in charge at Airdrieonians, whom he left before taking charge of Championship club in Fife. He also worked in Norway as assistant manager of Asker between 2017 and 2018.

“I would say I was pretty fiery in my early days as a manager,” Murray recalls. “Because you are fresh into the changing room, you are in a new job, you’re desperate to do well, you’re dealing with different situations that you’ve never dealt with befoe. You don’t know how you’re going to react. For me it’s been a huge learning curve and maybe being assistant manager in Norway helped that, having to do a different role as well.

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“When I look round all the leagues now, the older guys have got lines where things are drawn and it’s very unusual to see these managers lose the rag. But the younger guys do because they’re impulsive. I can understand it, but I think the players now respond to calmness rather than kneejerk reactions.

“I think as you get older like everyone else, with more experience you learn to deal with situations in a different way. I think I’ve had to learn calmness. I’ve certainly calmed down a lot from 10 years ago, that’s for certain. Don’t get me wrong, you still get frustrated and annoyed at times like everyone but you learn to deal with it in a better way. So I think I’m fairly calm now. I don’t get involved with referees and stuff, which I used to do, and I don’t take things too personally either with players. It’s a different approach I guess.”

When asked if he had a favourite manager during his playing days, Murray – who served Hibs, Rangers and Norwich City among others – remains open minded. “I was quite fortunate that I had a lot of good managers,” he said. “I try to take bits from all of them and I can’t think of any who weren’t quite understanding about what it felt like to be on the pitch and make mistakes or do well.

"But I think the first really calm manager I had was probably Tony Mowbray.” He was Murray’s manager at Hibs in the 2004-2005 season. "He came from a different background down south and didn’t really know much about us as young players, but he taught us really well. I don’t remember him flying off the handle too much and obviously he went on to good things.”

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One manager Murray served under twice was Alex McLeish, at both Hibs and Rangers. “I really enjoyed working with Alex,” Murray recalled. “He was really good to me, I tried to give him that back. I did see a difference in Alex from when he was at Hibs to when he was at Rangers because he was dealing with different players and different characters.

"Hibs was one of Alex’s first jobs and he had to make that transition over to Rangers quickly. It doesn’t happen very often that the Hibs manager becomes the Rangers manager as they tend to look further afield now. It was a huge change for him and he had to change because – no disrespect to Hibs – he was dealing with better players. He had to maybe tone down a little bit and listen to the players a little bit more, but he still maintained that steeliness where he had a line that you don’t cross or he would let you know about it.”

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