WITH an artificial pitch at the Ryan McBride Brandywell, it might be a mistake to say the grass is always greener.
But with the entire League of Ireland programme brought forward 24 hours to not clash with the Euro 2024 opener featuring Scotland, it is understandable how Paul McMullan feels welcome here.
Tonight, Derry City take on Dundalk, although not surprisingly McMullan is sketchy about once coming up against the opponents’ new boss Jon Daly in the Scottish Championship in 2015.
He reckons he might have lost and that Daly scored but, in fact, it was a 1-1 draw between St Mirren — where McMullan was on loan from Celtic — and Raith Rovers, where Dubliner Daly spent the final season of his career.
McMullan said: “He was a really good striker. I would have known him from playing for Dundee United and then for Rangers as well.
“It’s his first proper game in charge so it’s hard to know what to expect. He’s been in the league with St Pat’s so you have a feel for the way he’d like to play.
“But he has a different group of players now so he may view things differently. All we can do really is concentrate on ourselves.”
The forward came up against Dundalk striker Jamie Gullan back in his native Scotland too but, prior to joining Derry City last summer, almost everything he knew about the League of Ireland came from Mark Connolly.
The pair had been at Dundee United together before the Clones native moved to Derry in the summer of 2022, following a loan spell with Dundalk.
Even though he liked what he heard, it was still a big decision to uproot given he and his partner Keavagh had welcomed baby Patrick into the world earlier in the year.
McMullan said: “He arrived four months before we got here and it was pretty hectic. But from the summer onwards we got ourselves settled.
“It was easy enough because people are great, they are more than willing to help, if we had any issues there was always somebody who knew somebody who could help and that made it a lot easier.”
He joined after helping Dundee win the Championship and he has found the change of season — and, as a result, football — to his liking.
He explained: “I probably didn’t realise how much travel there would be involved for Derry for games.
“We were down in Dublin twice over a weekend a few weeks ago, which was tough, but you get on with it.
“I think teams play a touch more football here than the Scottish Championship. I don’t know whether it being a summer season helps that.
“In Scotland, from October to March it can be pretty miserable. You’ve to get out there and get on with it when it’s peeing down or there’s snow but it’s a wee bit nicer when you turn up and it’s sunny.
“It’s a good league and I’ve enjoyed trying it out. I don’t particularly like the cold so it suits me.
“I know summer football has been talked about in the past in Scotland but it was maybe more of a thing when our clubs weren’t doing as well in Europe and they were looking at ways of improving that.”
The national team is doing all right, with Steve Clarke’s men qualifying for Euro 2024 — and McMullan has played alongside Scott McKenna at Under-19 and Greg Taylor at Under-21 level.
With Derry’s game against Bohemians the previous night marking the start of the mid-season break, he will be watching on when Scotland play hosts Germany in the opener in a fortnight.
He said: “Hopefully we cause an upset.”