He coached Donegal to a famous All Ireland senior football final win back in 2012 and now the North West's GAA messiah has a new international soccer gig.
Jim McGuinness is bound for the US after being appointed manager of the Charlotte Independence in the United Soccer League.
McGuinness' move to the second tier of American soccer completes a remarkable cross-over from gaelic football.
After that 2012 success, he worked as a coach alongside Neil Lennon at Celtic before stepping down from Donegal in 2014 and moving to Glasgow on a permanent basis to manage the club's Under-20s.
McGuinness then joined Chinese Super League side Beijing Guoan before his move to the other side of the planet for the gig with Charlotte Independence, McGuinness' first foray into professional management.
You know that a club may not exactly be at the cutting edge or the top tier when you log onto their website and it's down!
However from Wikipedia we can determine that they are based in Charlotte, North Carolina. and play their home games at the Sportsplex at Matthews, North Carolina.
From their social feed we can see the standard of the sport the Donegal man is wading into.
It's highly likely that he will be a sensation.
The man credited (discredited?!) with introducing the blanket defence to Gaelic football would be doing his nut if one of his teams gave away some of these goals.
Don't forget to vote for the #USL Goal of the Week, presented by @select_america!
VOTE → https://t.co/e4DIlTFVWG pic.twitter.com/lehSTYtYG0
— USL Championship (@USLChampionship) October 16, 2018
What about at the other end of the field?
YANN EKRA IS THE BEST SOCCER PLAYER IN THE WORLD!!!!
Late heroics from @YannEkra give the Independence a 1-0 lead!! That's his 3rd goal in 4 games!! #WeAreCLT #OTTvCLT 0-1 pic.twitter.com/ZezPq9rn4p
— Charlotte Independence (@CLTIndependence) June 3, 2018
A team in any code would love to add artillery like Michael Murphy or Ryan McHugh in attack.
What are the odds on a high profile player joining him? Watch this space.
In any event best of luck with the new chapter Jim!
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