Kevin McHugh criticizes Finn Harps board over lack of support
Kevin McHugh has never been one to hide from a fight at Finn Park. For almost three decades, he has worn the badge, scored the goals, and carried the weight of a club that always seemed to be one bad week away from another crisis.
This time, he has decided he will not carry it quietly.
Days after Finn Harps announced his departure as first-team manager, McHugh has laid bare the reasons behind his exit, accusing senior figures at the club of crossing lines and failing him and his staff when they needed backing most.
“I am extremely disappointed in the chairman and a few of his close board members that are supposed to be directing this football club,” McHugh said in a statement to Donegal Daily, calling out what he describes as a lack of “honesty, decency and support” during a turbulent spell on and off the pitch.
A club servant pushed to the limit
McHugh’s bond with Finn Harps is not casual. It is carved into the club’s modern history.
He scored 186 goals in 439 games across two spells, made his senior debut back in August 1998 in a League Cup tie against Fanad United, and since 2017 has headed the Finn Harps Academy. In April 2025, after Darren Murphy’s departure, he stepped into the senior hot seat while still running the academy – two demanding jobs rolled into one, taken on in what he describes as a “tough period” for the club.
He knew the chaos. He accepted the strain. He just expected basic standards from those above him.
“Here, after nearly three decades, I am well hardened to the mayhem and nonsense that happens around this club in a normal season, and how you have to just roll sleeves up and get on with things,” he said. “I was more than prepared to take a hit in terms of my own reputation for the club with two hands tied behind my back whilst doubling up with first team and academy roles to help us in a tough period.”
Then came the turning point.
“Having pieced things together over the past few days, lines have been crossed way beyond what I am prepared to let slide.”
Budget cuts, key exits and a slide to the bottom
On the pitch, the picture has been bleak. Harps have slumped to the bottom of the First Division, their form eroded by a steady drip of departures and financial strain.
In the space of six weeks, McHugh watched Max Johnston, Idir Zerrouk, Perrault Tokam, Daniel De Lacerda and Temi Ajibola leave. His budget was slashed. The job, already heavy, became close to unworkable.
He insists he was willing to “ride the waves” with the team, believing there was a potentially brighter future under a prospective new owner. What he could not accept, he says, was how he and his staff were treated in the meantime.
“Their behaviour over the past few weeks in particular, because of the lack of honesty, decency and the lack of support shown towards myself and my staff during a period when we needed it most,” he said of the chairman and certain board members.
McHugh admits he did not want to go public, but feels he owed it to those who stood beside him in the dressing room and on the training ground.
He says he has been forced to speak out “to show support for my staff who have shown nothing but full on commitment, professionalism and dignity throughout all of this and deserved much better treatment from the people involved.”
He did not stop there.
“Lesser men would have walked months ago with the conditions we were left in to compete at this level,” he said. “We had too much time for the players and supporters who showed up to Finn Park and away grounds each week to walk out on them. People deserve better.”
A break with the board, but hope in a new era
For all the anger directed at the current hierarchy, McHugh’s words are not a rejection of Finn Harps as a club. Far from it. They are a defence of it – and of what he believes it can become under new ownership.
Since stepping down as first-team manager, he has held talks with prospective new owner Freddy Gonzalez, the Filipino entrepreneur whose takeover bid is expected to go before shareholders in the coming weeks.
McHugh says Gonzalez has outlined both short and long-term plans and that he is in no rush to commit to any future role, despite the club’s statement on Sunday night suggesting he would move into a new position “as part of the club's transition to a professional structure”.
The Killea native makes it clear: nothing is agreed.
“(Freddy) stepped me through his short and long-term plans and he also understands I need time to assess everything before discussing any potential roles he has planned for me,” McHugh said.
He does not hide his belief in the direction Gonzalez wants to take the club.
“Whether I decide to be part of this journey or not, there is certainly exciting times ahead for this brilliant football club when Freddie does come on-board. What I can also say, is the direction the club will go under him is hugely positive and what I like most, he has complete clarity in his plans.”
McHugh has even suggested there would be “complete change within the club” if Gonzalez’s buy-out is approved – a line that will resonate with supporters who have long felt Harps are stuck in survival mode.
From survival to development
Strip away the politics and the boardroom tension, and McHugh’s message lands in a familiar place: the fans, the volunteers, the people who have dragged Finn Harps through the lean years.
“I am delighted for each and every fan, current and past volunteer and staff members who have gone through the mill in some shape or form down through the years for this club, to eventually, in their lifetime be hopefully be able to watch Finn Harps FC come out of survival mode and into development mode,” he said.
That is the crux. A club legend has walked away from the dugout, not from the idea of Finn Harps. He has called out those he believes failed him, backed those who stood with him, and pinned his hopes on a future that looks very different to the present.
The next move belongs to the shareholders – and to a club that now has to decide whether it really wants to leave survival mode behind.
