ABERDEEN boss Mark McGhee last night explained to the fans his reason for sacking fellow club legend Jim Leighton — the 'keeper could not coach outfield players.
Leighton parted company with the club at the weekend after nine years in the job, and initially no reason was given for his departure.
But in line with the club's recent openness with the supporters, and McGhee's candid style, yesterday the gaffer explained that he has to get best value from his backroom staff — and that means multi-tasking coaches.
He said: "Jim is a long-time friend and a former colleague and I could never stress enough how difficult a decision it was from a personal point of view.
"But, from a professional point of view, I'm looking at maximising any resources I have at my disposal and what I need from those resources is flexibility.
"Jim is a specialist goalkeeping coach and, at this moment in time, I can't afford that.
"If I'm going to bring someone else in, it will have to be someone who can do more than just coach the goalkeepers on the training ground.
"I've got to try to maximise those resources in order to get all the bits of my team together that I need."
McGhee now wants to bolster his backroom staff with a coach who can offer more to the team as a whole — and he has indicated an interest in Motherwell coach Colin Meldrum.
McGhee said: "If I draw up a list of people who I would like to have here, who can do these things that I'm talking about, Colin Meldrum would be on that list.
"But there is nothing in it so far as I have made no approach to Colin Meldrum and I’ve made no approach to Motherwell.
"I felt it was only fair to deal with Jim first and now I'll pick that up. Of course he would be a candidate but it’s by no means certain that Colin Meldrum is the guy who would be coming here."
