Kenny Lowe is of course the current Barrow manager. Many of you however will recall his playing days here with great pleasure. We wrote this appreciation of Ken Lowe after his transfer to Barnet in early 1991...
LOWE DOWN
Kenny Lowe is one of those rare players in non-League. There have been plenty of outrageously talented ball players in the Football League who only really try on the big occasions. The likes of Bowles, McKenzie, Hudson and, more recently, Gazza. But players like Lowe are rare in a Conference full of knackered ex-pros, players too lazy to have ambitions for League football and kids on their way up. The work ethic is king in the Conference. Kenny broke all the rules. Too many long balls. No running about like a chicken with no head. No crunching tackles a la Kevin Proctor. Loads of Gazza-style free kicks. And an almost total inability to venture too far from his beloved centre circle. Some people like to think we won't miss him. But he never was a Conference style player. He never intended to play like most of the other dinosaurs in the Conference, but that doesn't mean we won't miss his influence. Fans tend to have some strange ideas (see the recent suggestion that Cowps should take his place in midfield) but this notion that Kenny Lowe won't be sorely missed is one of the oddest for some time. We will miss Kenny Lowe because he was one of a rare band of players who could turn a game in one moment of sheer inspiration. The one incredible pass to Doherty. The outrageous dummy to free the midfield. The whole range of chips and flicks over the defence. The need for opponents to use two players to mark him out of the game. Or his greatest moment when his brilliant 40 yard goal finished off Colne in the Trophy semi-final. Who else in the Barrow team would have even thought of trying it? Could any fair thinking fan begrudge a 29-year old non-League footballer going to a club where he at least doubled his wage? Lowe played for us when times were hard and for much less than he was worth. It would take a hard person to say that when his skills began to decline he shouldn't have one last big pay day. It was also a very good piece of business. £40,000 for a 29-year old is a good price by anyone's standards. It seems the board are actually getting into the habit of thinking ahead. Credit where credit is due. That £40,000 should be the final lot of cash that puts us in the black. This fact and the new fundraising groups should mean the long overdue Popular Side roof finally being raised. It might be some time before Barrow get a player of Kenny Lowe's calibre again. I wish him luck and instead of looking at the negative side of his move, perhaps fans might do better to think back to that one moment in any one of a number of (big) games when a rare talent turned the game our way. Nice one Kenny! Paul Clarke Issue 006 - March 1991