This week, we sat down with Oldham Athletic’s Davis Keillor-Dunn to chat about his time at Ross County, Falkirk, Wrexham and Oldham Athletic.

Keillor-Dunn spent most of his youth career in and around his native North East before joining Chesterfield’s Youth Team. He was going to commit his future to The Spireites before speaking to a scout, and a change of manager at Chesterfield set him on his way to Scotland.

“I was playing a reserve game for Chesterfield and a scout asked me if I was staying at Chesterfield and told him I think so, I think I’ll commit my future here.”

Following the departure of the manager and changes at the club, the 23-year-old moved to Scotland with Ross County but was shocked by the lack of things to do in the area.

“The scout asked if he could take me to Scotland and I said yeah.”

“He told me before I went up there, that there’s not a lot up there and I thought he was just exaggerating,” he said. “Being from a big city I was expecting a few things to do.”

He then broke into the first team and scored his first goal against Hearts.

“It was massive for my career, being a young kid”

“My first goal was just a nice easy goal, you’d take a few of them in a season, no problem. You’d want it to be a fantastic long ranger, but they all count.”

He then played 90 minutes on a regular basis for Ross County and had a standout game against Dundee where he scored a goal – a beautiful curling effort – and bagged two assists.

“We were near the bottom at the time and a lot of people were thinking ‘is it the right thing to do, to play a kid’, and I knew I had to step up. That game cemented me being one of the key players at the time, at such a young age. It was good to get the goal and two assists which I think sparked the season”

The following season, during the January transfer window, the then 21-year-old got a loan move to Falkirk, who were struggling down near the bottom of the Scottish Championship.

He made his first start for the club at home against Queen of the South and it was going brilliantly for him, scoring a header after just 8 minutes.

“It started off really well with a header, I thought I’m going to have a really good game here, I passed it back to get back into position and not let them take a quick free-kick and the ref booked me for it. Then they were breaking and he got away from me, I just tugged him, I thought it was really really harsh to send me off.”

“I was worried about missing games because I knew I only had six months to play for Falkirk”

A few months later, again, against Queen of the South, it’s a 0-0 snoozefest and Falkirk get a penalty in added time.

“Our penalty taker had come off the pitch and all the lads went ‘look who’s gonna take it’, and I said I’ll take the pen. I took the penalty, scored it, but I was on a yellow card and the fans were on the pitch and I took my shirt off – I totally forgot I was on a yellow card – all the boys were buzzing and the ref, standing there, just gave me a second yellow card.”

His loan with Falkirk ended as they were relegated and he cancelled his contract in September which left him as a free agent going into the January transfer window.

“Just before I signed on loan at Falkirk there was a lot of interest from Wrexham at the time. I was always speaking to people, who taught me about Wrexham, let me know about [the club]. I started doing a bit of research and I thought that’s a good little club, if that ever came off, it would be a good little move.”

“Once I became a free agent, I heard they were interested again and I thought get me down there, it’s a big club, heard good things about the fans, they play good football, the manager when I spoke to him, had great intentions.”

Keillor-Dunn was thrown in at the deep end as the club were in the bottom third of the table, but he saw that the team had some good players.

“When I signed for Wrexham, I saw the squad they had, I was gobsmacked at the fact that they were in the bottom half, the quality they had in the dressing room was tremendous.”

On his manager at Wrexham, Dean Keates, Keillor-Dunn heaped praise on the 42-year-old.

“He took the team when they were down near the bottom, there was a real change in mood, in style, in everything since he’d came in, everything was positive. You could really see it was going in the right direction.”

His time at the club was cut short due to the global situation, but he did manage to score a goal against Bromley.

“I really enjoyed that game, I had a few chances and put a few on a plate for the other lads. Your first goal for every club you sign at is massive, when you wait so long you start to think ‘when’s it gonna come’ and start overthinking things, so once you get the first goal it’s perfect and I was really looking forward to seeing what was going to happen in the next few games”

National League football was ended at the start of March, and Keillor-Dunn’s contract was up at the end of the season.

“Oldham showed a little bit of interest, I was out of contract, I could speak to anybody. I thought that it was the right time for me to move into the league, I’m at that age where I’m not getting any younger and I want to get back playing at the highest level.”

On his reasons for joining Oldham, he cited the direction of the club as one of the reasons.

“It was quite similar to when I signed for Wrexham, I could tell there was a good vibe and that it was going in the right direction, they really wanted to turn things around. The gaffer said this was the season he wanted to change Oldham’s fortunes and get us back towards the top of the table, and would get in the right sort of players to do that.”

Having scored five goals in his last 10 league games, three of which came in January, Keillor-Dunn picked up the PFA Fan’s Player of the Month for January, he was happy with his development during his time at Oldham.

“The best things in the world take time… When you sign for a new club, you get used to the players you’re playing with, the way the gaffer wants to work. Every week I feel more comfortable, and hopefully the flourish of goals that have happened can keep going.”

One stumbling block for Oldham this season has been the stark contrast between home and away form.

“I’m not too sure about it, because we’re a confident bunch and we play good stuff. Since the second half of the season, we’ve beat Newport and we’ve beat Salford so hopefully, that’s a little turning point in the season where we can put home and away wins together now. If we start winning at home and make that place a fortress, going along with our away form as well we can be right up there.”

In December, Latics travelled to Newport who were top of the table at the time and unbeaten at home all season in the league.

“We had to play with no fear because we knew what they were going to do. We went 1-0 down, I scored to make it 1-1, then they went 2-1 up but we were actually playing well in the game. I went in at half time and told the lads ‘we can beat these, I know we can’, and all the lads seemed confident.”

A personal highlight for Davis was a game against Salford where he scored a wonderful goal from just outside the box.

“It was a game of two halves, the wind was bearing down on our goal in the first half and it was tough to get out. We knew in the second half the tables were going to turn, and we were going to have a right go. We came out in the second half and we played really well and I thought we absolutely dominated the second half.”

“We scored the equaliser, and we needed another chance to get another goal, and the ball just fell to me at the time, and I thought if I take a touch I’m going to run into bodies here. I saw the keeper in a strange position, he wasn’t ready for the shot, I thought if I take a quick shot here, it’ll start off outside the post and hopefully come inside – get good contact with the ball, and it’s got a good chance, luckily it did and it went in.”

With Oldham sitting in mid-table but only a few wins away from the play-offs, Davis was open and optimistic about a good second half to the season.

“Anything can happen with us, we’ve got a good squad in there, we’re always building, we feel we’re getting better every week. I think consistency is the biggest thing in this league, if you start putting a few wins together you can be right up there, and we feel like the wins are coming”

Thanks to David Keillor-Dunn for agreeing to chat, if you’d like to watch or listen to the whole interview you can find it on our Youtube channel, here: