Departed captain and star striker Joe Jagger has backed Des Macorison to be major success at Harrogate Railway.
Railway’s top-goalscorer Jagger rejoined Brighouse Town after five years away earlier this week.
The departure has come at a bad time as Railway are in the midst of a tricky run of fixtures, but Jagger says Macorison will find gold for Harrogate in the long term.
“The quality is there, you look at the players Des has brought down.” Jagger told Non League Yorkshire.
“The lads are so experienced. You have the likes of Brad Riley, Dan Walker and there’s a couple of other lads they’re looking at bringing in.
“You have the big man Toby (Harris) who I’m sure will be stepping into my shoes as captain.
“The ability, technique and quality is there and it is only a matter of time before things take off.
“There’s always going to be bumps in the road at the beginning. With an ambitious manager, the coaches, the fitness coach, the physio, Harrogate have such a strong foundation. It just needs something to click and they could go on a very long unbeaten run.”
Jagger previously said he had no plans to leave Railway this season, and recently turned a seven days’ notice approach from North Ferriby down.
But the lure of his former club Brighouse proved too much and even Macorison persuaded him to take the move.
“My first thought when I got told Brighouse had put seven days in was that I’d played there before and that Des would know it would be hard for me to turn it down,” Jagger said.
“He told me that it was a great opportunity, but in the back of my mind I thought ‘well I love it here at Railway with the players, management, the committee’.
“I know it will sound strange me saying that because the last five or six weeks we haven’t performed as well as we can.
“The whole scenario though, the environment, it is class at Railway and made the decision harder.
“Des was fully open with me and he kind of said ‘you’d be stupid not to go because it is a cracking opportunity’.
“It is also an opportunity to finish some unfinished I feel I have at Brighouse.
“Des has opened it by saying you are more than welcome to come back it things don’t work out.”
The striker was a member of Paul Quinn’s famous 2014 Toolstation NCEL Premier Division title-winning team side.
He remained with them until the November of that year, but left after struggling for game-time and dropped out Non League Football to play for Littletown in the now defunct West Riding County Amateur League.
Struggling for a place in the Brighouse side five years ago was in the back of his mind, but he felt reassured after speaking to Vill Powell.
“I spoke to Vill for about half-an-hour on the phone and he was totally honest with me, straight down the line,” he said.
“He told me that he’d seen me play and knows I have quality and what it takes. He’s told me there’s a chance I could become one of the players down there that has his name down for a shirt.
“I also said to Vill that I’m at an age where I want to be playing at the best level I can. I know it is going to difficult, but I’m much more experienced than I was five years ago.
“I was there five years ago and I left because I wasn’t playing as much as I wanted to.
“Over the five years though I have learnt so much and I’m more than ready to step back up to that level.
“The opportunity could have come a couple of years ago if I had wanted it. When I left Brighouse five years ago they said it would be better if I went and out played at a level similar to Brighouse.
“I didn’t, I took the easy option by going to Littletown with my friends.”