{"id":503409,"date":"2025-10-16T05:59:21","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T05:59:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/503409\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T05:59:21","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T05:59:21","slug":"derek-mcinnes-names-what-he-is-guilty-of-after-hearts-move-amid-rangers-next-boss-noise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/503409\/","title":{"rendered":"Derek McInnes names what he is ‘guilty’ of after Hearts move amid Rangers next boss noise"},"content":{"rendered":"

The boss reckons that Kilmarnock have one gripe they can level at himDarren Johnstone<\/strong> and Mark Pirie<\/strong><\/a> Assistant Live Sports Editor<\/p>\n

04:00, 16 Oct 2025<\/p>\n

\"HeartHeart of Midlothian Head Coach Derek McInnes (Image: SNS Group)<\/p>\n

Derek McInnes insists the only thing he was guilty of at Kilmarnock <\/a>is wanting to speak to Hearts.<\/p>\n

And the Jambos gaffer feels he can walk back into Rugby Park on Saturday with his head held high after guiding Killie to the Championship title and then into Europe.<\/a><\/p>\n

Some Kilmarnock fans might think differently as McInnes prepares to return to Ayrshire for the first time since leaving for Hearts<\/a> during the summer.<\/p>\n

But the 54-year-old, who said earlier this week he was committed to league leaders Hearts after being linked with the vacancy Rangers, is proud of his achievements at his old club.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cThe only thing I was guilty of was wanting to speak to Hearts.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t make any apologies for that. I know supporters don\u2019t like to hear that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always felt this was a club that felt a good fit. \u201cWhen it was indicated to me Hearts were keen to speak, I said to my agent, I said to the club, I said to (Kille owner) Billy Bowie, I\u2019m going to make sure Kilmarnock are safe first before I even have any conversations with Hearts. That\u2019s how it was.<\/p>\n

\u201cI genuinely was trying to do the right thing but I feel good about that. I did the right thing by the club.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe managed to make sure we stayed up with a couple of games to go then I had the opportunity to speak to Hearts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Killie were trailing Arbroath in a second tier title fight when McInnes succeeded Tommy Wright in January 2022 – ten months after leaving Aberdeen.<\/p>\n

And after taking the club back to the top-flight, he then secured Europa League football with a fourth place finish in 2024.<\/p>\n

McInnes<\/a> is adamant he can look back on his time there with pride.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cThere was work to be done at Kilmarnock. It was a club sitting fourth in the table, the home record was poor.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were a lot of concerns about whether we had the squad to meet the demand. The demand was for the club to go straight back up.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe managed to find a good rhythm at home, a good form at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fans started to believe and it all played out in the second to last game against Arbroath with an unbelievable ending.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat first season in the Premier League was a challenge but we managed to maintain our Premier League status, which I thought was always going to be a tough ask.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe next season we cleared the decks a wee bit. I felt as if it was my squad and my team put together.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd what we did do was something special. It was a brilliant campaign – it\u2019s not easy for a club like Kilmarnock to finish fourth and in the European spots.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got the benefit of that with the European trip. \u201cThere are ups and downs with every job, but for me there was loads of enjoyment from the job. It\u2019s a brilliant club with brilliant support.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were some really brilliant people there. I\u2019m looking forward to catching up with some of my staff, who I still keep in touch with and a lot of the key people there who work in and around the club.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Image: SNS Group)<\/p>\n

That success paved the way for his eventual switch to Hearts and McInnes has the Jambos beating with a two point lead at the summit from seven games.<\/p>\n

But McInnes admits he was in no rush to return to the dugout at Killie following a lengthy stint at Aberdeen.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cI had eight years at Aberdeen and I enjoyed the break, the time off in between that from Aberdeen.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was enjoying doing what I was doing, getting to know my family again, getting to enjoy life and not be a football manager, and doing a bit of TV work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was only really the last month or two when I was doing TV work and things like that, I started to get a wee bit dugout envy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started to think more about the games, and started to get that itch again.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Tommy Wright lost his job, I remember it came up on the Sky Sports ticker at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt no point did I even consider applying or whatever. I didn\u2019t put two and two together then my agent said Kilmarnock had asked if I\u2019d be interested in a chat.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went down and I liked the people, I liked how I felt once I came out of the room, and I thought \u2018why not, let\u2019s take it on\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m so glad I did. I enjoyed my time there, there was a bit of risk with that but it was so rewarding.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery job\u2019s different. You normally get jobs because teams are struggling, or teams aren\u2019t meeting the demand.<\/p>\n

\u201cVery rarely do you get into a club because the club\u2019s doing well and flying.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s always issues but our job as managers is to go in and try and get the whole thing moving in the right direction, and I felt we did that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The boss reckons that Kilmarnock have one gripe they can level at himDarren Johnstone and Mark Pirie Assistant…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503410,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8816],"tags":[748,71562,1102,1811,4884,47959,71563,1946,712,164964,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-503409","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edinburgh","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-derek-mcinnes","10":"tag-edinburgh","11":"tag-europa-league","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-hearts-fc","14":"tag-kilmarnock-fc","15":"tag-rangers-fc","16":"tag-scotland","17":"tag-tommy-wright","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115382319029263991","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}