Neil Lennon says the death of his father in December meant losing his “biggest influence”.
The Dunfermline Athletic manager will come up against his former club Hibernian in a Scottish Cup fourth-round tie on Saturday.
Lennon, who has also managed Celtic twice, said of his recent bereavement: “It was huge. He was my father. He was my best friend. He was the biggest influence on my life.
“He was never any further than a phone call away. He enjoyed all the highs and supported all the lows. I couldn’t have asked for a better guy than Gerry Lennon.”
Lennon says he still misses his father “awfully every day”.
“There’ll be maybe 10,000 or 11,000 here on Saturday,” Lennon said.
“He’d be loving it. ‘Just go and do your stuff, son. Just trust your gut instinct.'”
Lennon regards Saturday’s match as “a very old-fashioned sort of cup tie”.
“I don’t think we could have got much better in terms of size, in terms of prestige, in terms of two sets of supporters to support traditionally big clubs,” Lennon told BBC Scotland.
“I want them to turn up and play and compete and match Hibs and try to beat them. They’ll think maybe we can get a run at this. But we want a run at it as well.”
Having taken over at East End Park in March, Lennon steered the club clear of relegation trouble and the Pars are currently fifth in the Scottish Championship, three points off the play-off zone with a game in hand.
“We knew that promotion would probably be a bit of a long shot this year,” Lennon said.
“We want to finish as high up the table as possible. We’ve developed and we’ve got some good assets in the team. We try to play a good style of football, good style of attacking football.
“[It’s] a two, three-year sort of thing really to get out of this division. It’s a tough division. There’s only one place that guarantees an automatic promotion, which makes it even tougher.”