Tranent Juniors have appointed Gary Small as their new manager, succeeding James Thomson in the Foresters Park hotseat.

Small left his position as Johnny Harvey’s assistant at Haddington Athletic earlier this month, before applying for the role with Tranent.

The club had been looking for a new manager since Thomson’s resignation at the end of January.

Thomson’s four-month tenure brought just one win, and Small got off to a losing start in his new role, as Tranent were defeated at Falkirk Juniors 3-2 on Saturday.

Club chairman Colin Martin was delighted to have secured Small’s services.

He told Courier Sport: “Gary was assistant to Johnny Harvey at both Edinburgh United and at Haddington and we were pleased to see he had applied.

“We know him from the time he and Johnny spent in interim charge before Hamish Colgan [manager before Thomson] finished up with the under-21s and we’re delighted to have him on board.

“His experience of the juniors will be valuable moving forward.

“We had a very good interview process and I’d like to thank all the other candidates and everyone involved in the process, but we felt Gary was the right man to take Tranent Juniors forward.” While defeated at Falkirk in his first match in charge, Martin felt the county side were unlucky not to claim a point and is hopeful of improved performances until the end of the season.

He added: “We’re not going to be kidding ourselves, we know it’s going to be tough, but hopefully peformances and results will improve and we’ll get people coming down to support the boys.” The new manager is yet to finalise his coaching staff, something Martin believes will wait until the end of the season, and the former Haddington assistant faces a trip to Millfield today (Saturday) to pit his wits against Harvey’s Haddington Athletic side.

Martin added: “We’ve got six games left if we can produce some performances between now and the end of the season, hopefully we will see the people of Tranent getting right behind us.”