JJ McKiernan looks set to leave Lincoln City this window, with Bromley identified as a possible destination.
Leaving Sincil Bank feels like the natural conclusion to a move that never really got going, which is a shame because I genuinely thought he would be a success when he arrived. He came to us on a four-year deal; he had shown plenty of promise at Morecambe and, on the face of it, looked exactly like the sort of player our recruitment model is supposed to identify. He was young, technically tidy and had enough EFL experience to suggest he could make the step up. The hope was presumably that he would develop with us, become an important League One player and perhaps one day leave for a healthy profit, but football does not always follow the plan laid out for it.
There were mitigating circumstances from the beginning. McKiernan was stepping into a side that had just produced that remarkable run at the end of the 2023/24 season, narrowly missing out on the play-offs after looking dead and buried a few months earlier. There was already decent competition in the areas he wanted to play, and he was trying to make the jump from League Two at the same time. That does not mean he was destined to fail, but it did mean he needed to be patient, take the opportunities that came his way and gradually establish himself. Instead, an injury interrupted his progress and, from the outside at least, it felt as though he became unsettled quite quickly.
There was a lot of noise around him at that time. There were unsubstantiated claims that Michael Skubala was not communicating with him, which I personally find difficult to believe; talk that he was fit when the club were saying otherwise and rumours that his representatives were already considering a move. It is impossible to know exactly what was happening behind the scenes, and I am not going to pretend I have every detail, but the overall impression was that McKiernan’s Lincoln career had started to drift before it had ever properly begun. That was particularly frustrating because I liked what I had seen of him. He looked composed on the ball; there was a bit of Peter Gaib about some of his play. He showed promise in the EFL Trophy, although we have seen enough players impress in that competition to know it is not always a reliable measure of whether somebody is ready for regular league football.
The loan move to Burton Albion should have been a chance to reset. He went there, played regularly and did reasonably well, but the following summer became the point at which his future with us appeared to become much clearer. The message seemed to be that he was expected to return and fight for his place, yet he went back to Burton instead. It was stated outright that the move was player-led, and clubs rarely speak in those terms, but that was certainly how it came across. When he then gave an interview around Christmas, making it fairly clear that he wanted to remain at Burton, it became difficult to see a route back for him at Lincoln.
That was probably the moment the relationship became impossible to repair. Supporters will usually forgive a player for struggling, getting injured or failing to find form, but openly appearing to prefer another club is different. Once that impression is created, the player has to work extremely hard to reverse it, and there was never really any indication that McKiernan wanted to do that. I do not think that makes him a bad person or a bad professional, and I have never spoken to him, so I would not make those sorts of claims. I do think he may look back and feel some of his decisions were misguided, because there was still plenty of time left on his contract and a chance to return, apply himself and force his way into the manager’s plans.
The obvious comparison is Rob Street. Both players arrived in the same summer, both endured difficult starts, and both went out on loan, but Street appears to have used his spell away as motivation. He returned determined to put himself back into contention and showed the sort of application required to revive a Lincoln career that looked in danger of not getting started. McKiernan went in the opposite direction. That does not tell us everything about either player, because every situation is different, but it does demonstrate how much attitude and application matter when things do not immediately go to plan.
I also think City have handled his return in the right way. He was not publicly frozen out; he was involved in pre-season, and he was given the opportunity to show potential suitors that there wasn’t anything ‘wrong’ with him. There was no need for the club to make a spectacle of the situation, and it appears they have simply accepted that the best outcome for everybody is a permanent move. Bromley should offer him regular football at a club that has progressed sensibly, retained Andy Woodman and continued building rather than panicking after promotion. It looks like a decent move for him, and I genuinely hope he makes the most of it.
There is still a talented player there and I hope we have included a sell-on clause, because it would not surprise me if McKiernan eventually found the right environment, performed consistently and earned another move. Should he end up being sold for a significant fee in a few years, we could at least take some satisfaction from having identified his potential in the first place and played a part in his development, even if his actual spell with us never became what either side hoped it would be.
More broadly, his potential departure is a useful reminder that not every transfer works. Recruitment is not an exact science, and even good recruitment teams will make signings that fail for reasons they could not entirely predict. Players get injured, struggle to settle, find themselves behind established teammates or simply decide that a club is not right for them. Had we finished seventh, eighth or ninth last season, McKiernan’s exit might now be used as another stick with which to beat Jez George and the recruitment team, but promotion should remind us that individual failures have to be judged within the wider picture.
Lincoln have recruited well enough over recent years to earn some understanding when one deal goes wrong. McKiernan looked a sensible signing at the time and, had circumstances developed differently, he might still have become a success. They did not, and there is no point trying to rewrite the move as something it was not. It was a transfer that failed to deliver, partly because of injuries, partly because of competition and, I suspect, partly because the player never fully committed himself to making it work here.
That is disappointing, but it is not a disaster. We move on, McKiernan moves on, and both sides get the chance to start again.
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