Jamie Devitt opens up on his nightmare spell with Blackpool following recent departure from Bloomfield Road

Jamie Devitt has opened up on his nightmare spell with Blackpool following his recent departure from Bloomfield Road.

The 30-year-old had his contract cancelled by mutual consent earlier this month, freeing him up to join League Two side Barrow on a permanent deal.

Devitt left Blackpool having failed to make a competitive appearance during his 18 months with the club.

Initially brought to the Fylde coast in July 2019 by Terry McPhillips, the former Carlisle United man would find himself ostracised shortly afterwards when the manager opted to resign.

In an extensive interview with the News & Star, Devitt opened up on his frustrating spell with Blackpool and the niggling injuries that saw his game-time fairly limited during loan spells with Bradford City and Newport County.

“It’s been really tough,” Devitt admitted. “You don’t expect everything that could go wrong to go wrong.

“I signed for Blackpool and then within five days, the manager had left. I missed the first day of the pre-season trip because my little baby was born, and then when I went up, I don’t think the new manager [Simon Grayson] really knew who I was.

“After a day or two I thought, ‘he doesn’t want me at the club and I’ve just signed. What happens now?’

“Then I went to Bradford with Gary Bowyer. He was brilliant, but then I got the bad [hamstring] injury which put me out for a long while.

“I came back, played a couple of games behind closed doors, the manager left and a new manager came in…and then all of a sudden it was Covid.”

Devitt also revealed he tested positive for coronavirus as soon as he arrived at Newport, where he ended up making 11 appearances, scoring twice.

The attacking-midfielder also required surgery on his hamstring the previous season after playing just six times under former Pool boss Bowyer at Bradford.

During the summer, Devitt had been linked with a return to Carlisle, where he was considered a fans’ favourite having made over 100 appearances between 2016 and 2019.

“There weren’t really any sit-downs,” Devitt said.

“I spoke to Carlisle once or twice but it was never, ‘oh yeah, I’m gonna come back,’ or, ‘oh yes, we want you to come back’. It was just a normal chat.

“You’ll know as well as I do how many players Carlisle have been linked with in past years when there isn't any truth in it.

“I was at Blackpool just working hard; the manager there, Neil Critchley, really looked after me and I just got my head down over the summer to get as fit as I could for when I did go to a club.”

Devitt has ended up returning to Cumbria, only to link up with Michael Jolley at Barrow, who had previously been interested in bringing the midfielder to his former club Grimsby Town.

Before making the move, he consulted his former Chesterfield teammate and Blackpool legend Ian Evatt, who led Barrow to promotion from the National League last season.

“It was a no-brainer, really, once we had a good chat,” Devitt explained.

“He [Jolley] named three or four of the lads he wanted to bring in, and they’re in the building already. I hope we can repay him by getting the results and moving up the table quickly.

“When you look at the players they are signing [including Ollie Banks, Tom Davies and Neal Eardley], they’re not thinking of being in the bottom two come the end of the season. They have ambitions of fighting at the other end of the table next season, but we have to see how this one goes first.

“I want to play continuous games. If I can get back to what I did at Carlisle in those last two seasons, who knows?

“I feel I’m at a good age where I'm ready to kick on again. But I don’t want to look too far into the future. Anything can happen in football, as I saw when I signed for Blackpool.”

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