Aston Villa have suspended coach Kevin MacDonald following claims of bullying made by former Irish international Gareth Farrelly.
Speaking to David Conn of the Guardian, Farrelly made a series of startling revelations of how MacDonald treated young players at Villa, saying that his experience drove him to suicidal thoughts.
Farrelly joined Villa as a seventeen-year-old in 1992, and broke into the first team three years later. He joined Everton the following year, and later played for Bolton while winning six senior Irish caps along the way.
MacDonald was reserve team manager for Villa when Farrelly joined, and has recently been working as the club's under-23s coach. Following Farrelly's revelations, the club have suspended him from that role pending an investigation.
Farrelly, now working as a solicitor, said that he believed McDonald "destroyed far more kids than he ever developed".
He called MacDonald's approach "relentlessly negative".
He would say: ‘You think you’re a fucking player? You’re not a fucking player. You’ve got fucking no chance.’ He would be calling players ‘cunts’ all the time; crazy stuff when you think about the role of responsibility he operated in.
In training it wasn’t unusual for people to end up squaring up to him, games would have to be stopped. It became normal. People were lucky not to have their legs broken. Every day you’d go into work, put your boots on, and think: ‘Here it comes again’. It took a huge toll.
Farrelly believes that MacDonald's approach stunted his development.
MacDonald also scoffed at Farrelly's achievements - when he returned from representing Ireland at the US Cup, Farrelly recalls MacDonald saying "I hope you don’t think you’re a player now; those fucking Mickey Mouse caps you’ve got".
These "fucking Mickey Mouse caps" didn't prevent MacDonald from taking a later role as Steve Staunton's assistant with the Republic of Ireland.
The full piece is on The Guardian's website.
