City job still up for grabs, says Lennox

**patsh** · 19/02/2003, 9:17 AM

19/02/03 By Bill George

(This comes form the examiner so........)

CORK CITY Chairman, Brian Lennox, last night stated he had not appointed a new manager despite rumours that Pat Dolan of St Patrick�s Athletic was to take over from the former manager, Liam Murphy.

Dolan, who was manager and chief executive of St Pats for the past 14 years, was last night said to be meeting the board of the club to inform him of his future plans.

He was not available yesterday when Richmond Park was contacted for clarification of the issue.

Meanwhile, Mr Lennox claimed not to have made up his mind who would be appointed to fill the vacancy caused by the decision

of Liam Murphy to step down.

He travelled to England two weeks ago to interview two applicants for the position and spoke to nine Irish based applicants in the past week. He declined to identify any of those interviewed.

�I have read where Pat Dolan is supposed to have been appointed but that news did not come through me. The fact is I have not yet made up my mind so that report is not true.� he said.

Yet the Cork City chairman has arranged a press conference for Friday at 12 noon at the offices of Guinness House, who are Cork City's main sponsors.

�I am sending out the invitations now. I set Friday�s deadline for myself when I embarked upon the process of finding a replacement for Liam Murphy and I am going to stick with it.

�Arranging the conference for Friday means I have to make a decision over the next 24 hours. But I will not reveal the identity of the man selected before Friday.2

Everything seems to suggest that Pat Dolan is the man who will be appointed on Friday. He, like most other managers in the National League, is envious of the potential for growth that exists in the club.

Dolan was an Irish U21 together with his twin brother Eamon when they played in London with West Ham and Fulham respectively.

He joined Galway when he first came to Ireland and from there moved to Richmond Park where he transformed a club that was historically overshadowed by Shamrock Rovers, Shelbourne and Bohemians.Their stadium at Richmond Park was up-graded over the years and the fan base grew to the point where St. Pats are not the best supported club in Dublin.

They won the League Championship under Dolan three years out of four in 1996, 1998 and 1999.

Meantime Damien Richardson last night denied that he was about to step into the manager�s position at St Patrick's Athletic. Richardson has not been involved in the National League since he parted company with Shamrock Rovers before the start of last season.

He was one of those popularly believed to be on Cork City�s shopping list but he was not one of the nine people interviewed by the chairman.

He has been working with TV3 this season as a football analyst and before he went into studio last night to comment on the Champions� League matches he said he had not been approached by St Pats