Glasgow Clan are a few signings and a few weeks away from the start of their Premier Sports Elite League season and seem to be in a good place.
The news of the players coming up that will make up the line-up continue to tantalise the Purple Army, but one thing above all could be the key to any success the club has…continuity. Malcolm Cameron arrived in Scotland last year as the Clan’s seventh head coach in just over 10 years, from when the club was formed in 2010. This season, barring any major changes in circumstance, he looks like being only the second man to stay at the organisation into a second campaign.
All too often, coaches have come and gone, usually with an enticing job offer from elsewhere as the cause of their departure and with that comes an overhaul of the team with it. Not this year as the prospect of Cameron, having already laid the foundations in a somewhat unconventional season, gets ready to continue the work he began. You only need to look around the other Elite League teams to see how having the same man in charge for more than one campaign is at the heart of their success.
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Current champions Belfast Giants have had Adam Keefe, their heroic former captain, in place since 2017 and has yielded two league titles and three Challenge Cups.
Cardiff Devils had Andrew Lord overseeing their most successful period in club history, where they won two league titles, two Challenge Cups and two play-off crowns.
In Glasgow, only Ryan Finnerty stayed on past a season, where a creditable fifth place and a play-off finals weekend spot in his first campaign in 2013-14 saw more relative success the following year.
‘Finner’, keeping the core of the team that served him well in that year, went on to finish second – Clan’s highest ever league placing – and a place in Europe in the Champions Hockey League.
A year later, it was a third place finish and while it was as good as it got under Finnerty during his four-year reign in charge between 2013 and 2017, having that continuity was certainly a massive key.
We’re not saying Cameron will gloriously lead the Clan to the title or any of the trophies, although it’s no secret having something shiny to show for their efforts is highly coveted.
But Malcolm Cameron is man of somewhat different stock compared to the likes of predecessors Zack Fitzgerald, Pete Russell, John Tripp, Finnerty, Drew Bannister and Bruce Richardson.
He’s a 30-year veteran behind the bench so knows the game and has the experience much more than the people he’s followed on from, which is in no way a slight on their input.
Cameron isn’t a man starting out on a coaching career likely to be enticed away for a job that could lead him on a dream path.
He’s a man who is comfortable in his own skin, happy to see the job as a challenge and test himself in different circumstances and can be argued knows the market perhaps better because of his experience elsewhere in the world.
He knows where he wanted to improve the team and has worked studiously since January to upgrade and better the areas that were lacking last season.
At the time of writing, six players from 2021-22 are returning and there could be more with a handful of signings expected to come to finish the team.
Mathieu Roy may have another stellar year in front of goal, while Mitch Jones can certainly bang them in from the opposition blue line.
But having those guys back and a coach now better familiar with life in the Elite League could be the cornerstone of any success in Glasgow this season.
‘Malkypuck’, to borrow a fan’s phrase, is officially underway and it could be a fascinating adventure this season.
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