Chairman George Manson has thanked Kris Hunter for his contribution to Turriff United after the club and manager parted company.
Hunter, who first managed the Haughs outfit between 2009 and 2011, returned for a second spell as boss in February 2018, but his time in charge has now come to an end.
Although nothing has been announced, it is believed assistant manager Graeme Mathieson and first-team coach Roy McBain are also set to depart.
When Hunter returned to Turriff the club’s finances were strained and they were having to cut costs.
The former Formartine United and Fraserburgh manager was charged with blooding young players and building for the future.
In his first full season back at the helm (2018-19) United finished 15th, before ending the Covid-19 shortened 2019-20 campaign in 14th position.
Turriff United part ways with managerhttps://t.co/5a8vPOO8pT pic.twitter.com/bddpObjWoE
— Turriff United Football Club (@TurriffUnitedFC) January 12, 2021
Turriff’s four games so far this term had all yielded defeats, losing 2-1 to Inverurie Locos in the Aberdeenshire Cup and by the same scoreline to Formartine in the Scottish Cup.
In the Highland League they were defeated 5-1 by Formartine and 13-1 by Fraserburgh.
Chairman Manson said: “Over his two spells Kris has made a great contribution to the club.
“He was our first manager in the Highland League, it was new to us and new to him, but we had a good two-year spell.
“When he came back to Turriff we had been on an up, but the up was straining us financially, there’s no doubt about that.
“Kris took on board what we were going to do and the road we were going down with cutting the costs and we sorted things out.
“Our finances are now healthy, unfortunately our team is not performing as well as we’d like them to which is why it became time for a reshuffle.
“I’m sad that this has happened, but football is like that and things happen.”
Hunter’s last game in charge was last Saturday week with Turriff thrashed 13-1 by Fraserburgh at Bellslea.
Manson added: “I suppose it was a tipping point. Fraserburgh are a very good side, but we should have competed better.
“We had some injury and unavailability problems that day which didn’t help.
“We had nine young lads and two experienced players and Fraserburgh had 10 experienced players and one young lad and experience told on the day.”
With all Scottish football below the Championship suspended until the end of this month at the earliest Turriff have time to conduct their search for a new manager.
They have set a deadline for applications of January 20, with interested parties asked to apply to turriffunitedfc@highlandleague.com
Manson said: “We have a bit of time now, we’ve put a date on applications and will try to adhere to it.
“Although we have a bit of time when we’re able to start again we want to be ready to start with somebody new in place.
“We’ll wait and see what comes in the applications, but some Highland League experience would be helpful, but we’ll wait and see.”
