Sharman named new Guernsey coach

STEVE SHARMAN has Muratti Vase history and an Island Games in his sights after being confirmed as the new Guernsey senior island representative coach for the next two seasons.

As expected, the highly-respected GFA technical director, who is involved with Guernsey FC and also helps a number of Priaulx League clubs, has been named as Kevin Graham's successor.

Having assisted Graham to the back-to-back triumphs over Jersey in 2012 and 2013, locally-born and based Sharman, 45, is confident of extending that winning run in the coming years.

'Murattis are one-off games as everybody knows and anything can happen on the day, but with the group of players we have right now and also the group behind them, we have every reason to be confident,' he said.

'The same goes for the 2015 Island Games, so I am obviously delighted to come into this role, especially at this time, because the quality of players is so high at the moment.

'From when I first got involved seven or eight years ago when I brought British Universities teams over to the island, the development of the senior side has been considerable.'

Sharman has confirmed that Colin Fallaize will be his assistant coach, while Chris Hamon will be the goalkeeping coach and a couple of other 'auxiliary' areas will be filled at a later date.