Dunfermline Tennis Club: Mike Russell appointed new head coach

Mike Russell, 32, officially began his new role in January, having returned to the Bothwell Street club last year as assistant head coach and junior programme lead.

A player with Dunfermline's men's first team for more than a decade, Mike can also call on fatherly advice in relation to his new position, having taken over from his dad, Alan.

Alan, who also coaches with Brucehaven Tennis Club in Limekilns, is a two-time Tennis Scotland Coach of the Year, and has been nominated for Official of the Year in the governing body's annual awards for 2024.

Having previously held the head coach role, Alan took up the job once more last year, and he will continue to coach at the club, as well as at Brucehaven.

He has, however, passed the head coach reins to Mike, a lifelong Dunfermline member, who has built up experience working abroad with Mark Warner and Neilson Active Holidays as a tennis coach, as well as with David Lloyd Health Club in Dundee, where he worked as their racquets manager.

Mike Russell said that the role was a dream come true. (Image: David Wardle.)

"I wasn't really sure what to expect when I came in because I'd been, essentially, three years away from the club, just from doing coaching in Greece, and then coaching at David Lloyd in Dundee for 18 months," Mike explained to Press Sport.

"I came in and I felt like it was quite a smooth transition. I've dreamt of having that job. That was my dream job when I was younger, to eventually be head coach at Dunfermline.

"I didn't think it would happen this quickly, but I'm delighted.

"I just think everything's come at the right time. Like I said, it's a dream come true, but, at the same time, I think I'm glad that I had this year as almost like a transition year for me to take charge of the junior programme, and then to go, right, ok, I've had that nine or 10 months of stability here, I can then progress to head coach.

"It's going to be a lot of work but I'm really looking forward to the challenge. I just want to continue from what we built last year. I think we put in a huge amount of work."

Alan commented: "This was a planned transition. We've planned this since last year, so it's just a natural progression.

"My plan was to go back to Dunfermline as head coach for a year and then step back a bit and take it easier. We'll see if that's going to happen, but that's the plan certainly!

"I'll be involved at both clubs. I'm not stepping away from Dunfermline - I wouldn't do that to Mike or the club. I'll still be there as a coach.

"I'm going to be competitions head, or competitions manager, so I'll be running all the LTA competitions, like the Dunfermline Junior Open. Our Grade Five competitions, I'll be running those, and that links in quite closely with coaching because we want kids to play tennis.

Alan Russell will still continue to coach with the club. (Image: David Wardle.)

"We don't want kids to come to coaching. We want them to, as soon as possible, start playing the sport."

Mike continued: "We're trying not to make it a performance-only tennis club, which I think a lot of clubs are run like.

"For example, we brought in pickleball last year as an option. It tends to be older people that play that sport, but also you've got things like cardio tennis, we've cluster squads and performance squads, but we've also got a really wide range of junior squads.

"Not everybody's going to be playing at Wimbledon. We want them to be coming down and just enjoying tennis. It's meant to be a sport for a lifetime, so we've got to cover all those different and aspects."

At the weekend, the club held its first Saturday coaching event of the year, which saw 83 youngsters attend, and a new coach - Kieran Rickard - join their team.

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