Falkirk: From ‘scary’ beginnings, John McGlynn’s club ‘miles ahead’

“We’re miles ahead,” McGlynn says. “The board believes that if we can reach the Premier League within five years, it will be an achievement.

“We were able to do it faster. A lot of hard work. Some good recruiting. Some good personalities in the locker room. Some teamwork. Punching above our weight most of the time.”

He was not an immediate success after he left League One rivals Raith Rovers to take charge of Burns.

“We’re getting close [to promotion] “The first year and then we got the Invincible record the second year,” McGlynn recalled. “Very quickly, one year into the Championship and here we are sitting sixth in the Premier League.

“It’s been a steady project all the way through. We’re thrilled to be where we are now. It’s been great.”

“We will never have the biggest budget. We are fan-owned. There is no big money being put forward.

“This is what’s coming. It takes the whole Football Association and the fans. So it was very much a collective thing, everyone together. Because if the fans didn’t get behind us and back us, the funding wouldn’t be there.”

“It was a rebuilding process. Make no mistake about it. That’s how the board told me it was.”

McGlynn, who previously coached Heart of Midlothian and Livingston, admits that when he arrived at Falkirk and looked at what was required, he found it very surprising.

“When we came in and saw what we already had in the preseason, it was really scary,” he recalls. “I think the players I brought in were more afraid than I was.”

McGlynn inherited a squad of 14 players, 13 of whom remained for the following season, so there was little room for maneuver in the transfer market.

“There were only one or two others to come out the door and allow us more money because we only had what was left in the budget to try to bring in players,” he adds.

“So you try to give the best you can for the money you have. Maybe you don’t have the numbers, but you’re going to focus on quality and quality might mean physicality because I felt they were a very young team. They needed to put physicality into the team.”

“They needed to be strong, a little more powerful. It was never going to happen like this because there are so many things.”

“The mentality was bad – that doesn’t come overnight. You have to win games. You gain confidence, you gain confidence.”