Simon Bullock caught up with former Lions captain Danny Lowe on his time and the club, the promotion, final day survivals and his retirement from football after a great career in non league.
When you joined Guiseley, what were your aims for your time at the club?
I already knew Mark Bower because I’d kept in regular contact with him, and I knew that Guiseley had tried to get out of the league a few times from when I was playing with Halifax Town. My objective when I signed for the club was to try and help them get out of the Conference North and luckily, we managed to do that in my first season.
What was your proudest moment playing for Guiseley?
As I say, the main objective when I joined the club was to get up and out of the league, so that’s my proudest moment because we achieved the goal that we set out. There’s quite a few great memories, like staying up in the National League twice with the number of fans that were there and seeing the smiles on their faces, but the promotion is my favourite.
What are your memories of the play-off final win over Chorley?
Our preparations for that day went into turmoil when the M62 was closed which meant that we had to go the long way round and we were late for the game. I can’t remember when we arrived, but I do remember that it was the shortest warmup I’ve ever had, and Chorley wouldn’t move the kick-off time back which was a bit poor from them.
When the game started, we had a shocking start which probably wasn’t surprising given the preparation we’d had and then it just flipped. One goal went in, then a second, then Liam Dickinson came on and played his best/most important game in a Guiseley shirt and the feeling afterwards was great. We had good characters, a good group of lads and when the winning goal went in the players, the fans, the staff, everyone went crazy and the win was made better, given what we were up against before match began.
How did it feel to score that all important goal against Solihull Moors on the last day of the 2016/17 season?
Even though everyone says that you’ve just got to focus on your own result, with everyone keeping tabs on how York City were doing, we all knew on the pitch as well. I think I’d gone up for a corner or something, the ball had come back into the box, and I remember getting up in between the keeper and the defender.
I felt something on the back of my head and thought the keeper might have punched me, but it really didn’t matter. What did matter was that us lads had managed to pull off another last day of the season result that made sure we’d stayed up, so that was another good day.
After leaving Guiseley, you played for Bradford (Park Avenue), Scarborough Athletic and Emley before recently making the decision to retire, why is now the right time?
I’ve had a good career. Apart from the National League, I’ve won everything I can in non-league, played for and captained some good clubs and been a part of some great FA Cup runs.
I’ve been playing for Emley recently and it’s a decent standard with a good set of lads, but my daughter has got really into gymnastics and she’s quite talented at it. She’s training twice and week and is moving into competitions which will be on a weekend so as a father, I want her to have the same support that I had from my family.
I want her to see that I’m there for her at training and in the stands at competitions because there’s no better feeling than your family being there to watch you do something you love. I weighed up the pros and cons and my daughter is more important than me playing football so that’s the decision I’ve made, and I can give all my attention to her.
Thank you to Danny Lowe for taking the time out for this interview and everyone at Guiseley AFC wishes him the best in his retirement.
