Home of Albion Rovers FC.

The “Wee Rovers” heyday is long gone, being just after the First World War when they reached the Scottish Cup final and had a run in the First Division. They also achieved promotion in 1934 and mostly remained in Division 1 till the Second War. Thereafter they have been mostly in the lower divisions. For a fuller account see link.

Below is a view of the Stand and entrance gates of Cliftonhill from Main Street, Coatbridge (the A 89.)

The stand and its immediate surroundings is the only area where spectators congregate.

The Stadium is unaffectionately called the “Stadio San Giro” by its detractors.

It’s fair to say the ground has seen better days but any disparagement is out of place. It’s very homely and has a friendly atmosphere.

This is the west end. Standing may once have been allowed here but not for a long time, I think.

The east end is similar, only a mound of earth.

The North Terracing (below) is now, I believe, closed to spectators for safety reasons but it was from here that I saw Kenny Jenkins deflect with the neatest of touches with his head a Charlie Gallagher free kick to score in a 1-0 win in 1972, vital to the championship win that year.

SFL, Cliftonhill Stadium, 7/4/12.

I had mixed feelings about this one. I have a bit of a soft spot for the “Wee Rovers” and about half their team is composed of former Sons players.

Yet once the game started the atavism kicked in, I was as partisan as usual and I wanted us to win.

We had the better of the first part of the game but the bobbly pitch did us no favours and led to a few mistakes. Mark Gilhaney had a great chance to score – though Craig Dargo was actually offside in a previous phase and not given – but the keeper made a good save. A few minutes later Dargo was put through clearly onside but the flag went up. James Creaney also stung the keeper’s hands with a fierce shot.

An unstoppable drive from ex-Son Danny Ferry then put Rovers ahead. The ball was in the net from the moment it left his boot – I don’t remember him ever hitting a shot like that when he was with us.

A corner for us was wasted when it was taken short and on the next I was about to moan, “Don’t try that again,” but it was given quickly to Scott Agnew whose cross was turned into his own net by a defender.

I felt we lost a lot of our forward momentum when Ryan Finnie went off injured.

The second half was pretty scrappy. I think we only had two shots on target, one of them Gilhaney again. The keeper saved again. Craig Dargo couldn’t even let the ball bounce off him into the net, it skied over. He tried to place another but it was just wide. I can’t see what Dargo gives us that Pat Walker doesn’t. Yes, he’s a clever player, but he’s not a natural goal scorer. And I like Pat Walker’s industry.

James Creaney had a good game and saved the jerseys twice late on, putting off an attacker who looked likely to head in a cross and making an incredible block in the last minute.

Four points ahead of fifth with four to play and Airdrie Utd and East Fife still have to play each other the week after we have Airdrie Utd at home. There will be no easy games though. Everyone we still have to play has something to play for themselves.

Take a look at these historical league tables (top four only) which show when Cowdenbeath FC has won the Scottish Second Division.

Scottish League Division Two 1913-14

1 Cowdenbeath P 22 pts 31
2 Albion Rovers P 22 pts 27
3 Dundee Hibernian P 22 pts 26
4 Dunfermline Ath P 22 pts 26

In those days promotion wasn’t automatic so Cowdenbeath were in Division Two the next year. Cowdenbeath were one of three teams on equal points at the top.

Scottish League Division Two 1914-15

1 Leith Athletic P 26 pts 37
2 St Bernards P 26 pts 37
3 Cowdenbeath P 26 pts 37
4 East Stirlingshire P 26 pts 31

A three-way play-off decided the league winners. Cowdenbeath defeated Leith Athletic at East End Park and St. Bernards at Easter Road to take the title.

Scottish League Division Two 1938-39

1 Cowdenbeath P 34 pts 60
2 Alloa Athletic P 34 pts 48
3 East Fife P 34 pts 48
4 Airdrieonians P 34 pts 47

Cowdenbeath’s only other Championship was in Div 3 in 2006. Their other promotions came as runners-up, through play-offs or as a result of another club’s financial problems leading to a readjustment in the leagues.

So does anyone spot something here?

Well, I notice that every time Cowdenbeath have been Champions of a Division 2 in Scotland the UK has been involved in a major (world) war the next September.

Now take a gander at the present position in the SFL Div 2 (as of 7/2/12) :-

1 Cowdenbeath P 20 pts 41
2 Arbroath P 20 pts 39
3 Stenhousemuir P 20 pts 31
4 Dumbarton P 19 pts 28

Gulp!

Come on Arbroath!!! (And the Sons, obviously.)

SFL Div 2, Ochilview Park, 15/10/11.

You may have picked up from my mentioning a pub in Cambridge two posts ago that I’ve been away. As a result of being knackered by the driving I hadn’t intended to go to this one but Onebrow said he would if I would and so I went.

I wish I hadn’t.

I now know what the poor home fans at The Rock have had to suffer. It was the bad Dumbarton that turned up for this one. We were appalling.

Stenhousemuir were much more up for it. Scott Agnew wasn’t given a moment’s peace. Two Stenny players were snapping at his heels every time he got the ball and so he couldn’t make any play. Mark Gilhaney tended to wander infield and lose the ball, Martin McNiff had a dreadful game after a not bad start. James Creaney again looked better with Ross McKinnon in front of him but their third goal came from his side. Pat Walker gets pass marks for effort.

The first goal was offside. I was in line when the pass was played forward, the linesman was ten yards upfield of the back four and couldn’t see the offence. The second, a more or less free header from a corner just before the half-time whistle killed the game.

We did get the ball in the net early in the second half but Pat Walker was given offside (by the same sodding linesman) as being in front of the play when Gilhaney shot. We might have made a game of it if that had counted but I doubt it. Stenhousemuir were better in all departments.

Their third was a totally free header by their centre half when the ball came back in after a corner had not been cleared thoroughly.

Scott Agnew’s late free kick was beautifully placed but not much consolation for a poor afternoon.

I also forgot my camera – which was in any case loaded with pictures from my trip away – so there’ll be no photos of Ochilview from this visit.

Next up, on Tuesday night, we’re at home (no points there yet) against an Albion Rovers side stuffed full of ex-Sons. Even though they’re below us and have scored only eight goals I’m fearing the outcome.

The actor Edward Woodward‘s death was in the news today but from a personal perspective the fact that the Dumbarton FC club website has just announced the death of Kenny Jenkins affected me more.

Kenny, known to my generation as “Gilbert” for some strange reason which I can’t recall, was a member of the fabled promotion winning team of 1972. One of his key contributions to that success was the goal he scored at Cliftonhill in the 1-0 win over Albion Rovers where, with his back to goal, he gave a driven free kick the merest of deflections with his head to take it past the keeper.

He was an exponent of the “mazy dribble” when playing in midfield but later in his Sons career he dropped into central defence.

He had a really peculiar pecadillo, though, (or superstition, perhaps) in that he always used to trot into the opponents half of the field during the warm up and have a wee meander as if the other side weren’t there. This was something that was just not done. Players stayed strictly in their own half until kick off, then as now.

I think it was a subtle form of gamesmanship.

Edward Woodward 1/6/30-16/11/09. Kenny Jenkins -16/11/09. So it goes.

This Sunday (15^th Nov) a football match in memory of Gordon Lennon, Dumbarton FC’s former captain who died tragically in June, will take place. The game features players from all the teams Gordon played for from youth side Harmony Row through to Partick Thistle, Albion Rovers and Dumbarton.

Big Rab – who chaired the organising committee for this – has the details here.

There are tickets available on the door.

Sadly I won’t be able to make it but if you’re close by and wish to contribute to the cause, I encourage you to go along.

Last week I watched a TV programme fronted by Jonathan Meades which was an annotated travelogue through post-industrial Scotland. Meades’s starting point was the almost poetic litany of the names of Scottish football clubs as heard in the results on Saturday afternoons.

Unlike those from England, very few of whom have names that are geographically indeterminate, at least at first glance* (the exceptions are Arsenal, Aston Villa, Everton, Queen’s Park Rangers, Port Vale, Tranmere Rovers; at a pinch Crystal Palace) and most of which are relatively prosaic (Swindon Town, Derby County, Bristol City) – only Nottingham Forest, Sheffield Wednesday, Plymouth Argyle and Crewe Alexandra have any rhetorical flourish – a disturbingly large number of Scottish teams’ names give no clue to their geographical location.

*I know Arsenal were once Woolwich Arsenal and that Everton is a district of Liverpool – as Tranmere is of Birkenhead – but Port Vale (the club plays in Burslem) isn’t on maps any more – if it ever was – and the Crystal Palace is long gone: which just leaves QPR and Villa – which may well be a Birmingham geographical locator of which I am ignorant.

The list of obscurely named Scottish clubs is much longer.

I have already, of course, mentioned Kirkcaldy’s finest, Raith Rovers (dancing in the streets of Raith.) There are two Saints – of Mirren and Johnstone (and until World War 2 there was a third; of Bernard’s) – a Clyde, a Hibernian, two Queens, Queen’s Park and Queen Of The South – famously the only football team mentioned in the Bible – an Albion Rovers and two Easts, of Fife and Stirlingshire, which could be located anywhere in their respective counties. In the case of East Stirlingshire their peregrinations actually took them as far west as Clydebank for a season before returning to their Firs Park home in Falkirk, which they have now had to leave; renting space at Stenhousemuir’s ground nearby.

In this context Rangers and Celtic do not count as their full names include the prefix Glasgow. Similarly it is Greenock Morton. While Midlothian as a county no longer exists, Heart Of Midlothian – the actual heart of the county is in the centre of Edinburgh, not off Gorgie Road; and there is a mosaic over the spot which is supposed to confer luck if you spit into it (Edinburgh is not quite the douce place you might take it for) – are named for a Walter Scott novel, apparently via a local dance hall. Likewise the County of Ross is no more; in any case the eponymous club plays out of Dingwall. Was there ever a county of Stockport by the way? Yes, and no. A county borough apparently.

There is a Raith estate in Kirkcaldy – and a former Raith cinema – so the name makes some sense; but it’s not on any maps of Scotland. Clyde are somewhat disappointingly so called because they first played by the banks of that river, though they now rent a ground in Cumbernauld from the local council.

The Paisley club St Mirren are named after the local Saint, Mirin; St Johnstone from Saint John’s town (of Perth,) and the now long defunct St Bernard’s after a local well by the Water of Leith.

East Fife are located in Methil in – err – east Fife. Like (Glasgow) Celtic, Hibernian FC’s name reflects the Irish roots of its founders but otherwise has no relevance to Edinburgh, or Leith if you must, where they are domiciled.

Albion Rovers play home games in Coatbridge and were formed from a merger between teams called, rather prosaically, Albion and Rovers.

Queen’s Park is obvious but its city isn’t. (Compare Queen’s Park Rangers.) There was, too, once a King’s Park club, but that was in Stirling. Queen Of The South is an epithet given to the town of Dumfries by the poet David Dunbar. The club which took the name amalgamated in 1919 from other teams in the area including 5th Kircudbrightshire Rifle Volunteers and 5th King’s Own Scottish Borderers. In this regard the former Third Lanark team (based in Glasgow, not Lanark) were also geographically obscure, and were again derived from a military source, the Third Lanarkshire Rifle Volunteers.

Historical teams in this vein are Northern, whose ground was in Springburn in Glasgow, and Thistle who also played in Glasgow at Braehead. This last is not to be confused with Partick Thistle whose ground is actually in the Maryhill district of Glasgow and not in Partick itself. Other former Scottish League clubs Solway Star, Nithsdale Wanderers and Mid-Annandale (originally Vale Of Dryfe!) had, though, some geographical pointer in their names, albeit to a wide area.

The daddy of all such non-geographically named teams is Royal Albert, for two and a half years in the 1920s members of the Scottish League. Based in Larkhall, they now play junior football. The name comes from a ship their founder also owned. They apparently bear a relationship to the Hawick team, Hawick Royal Albert, who were founded by a man from Larkhall.

I hope all is clear now.

Cliftonhill, 17/3/09

I spent the last half hour of this game flicking to the BBC live score page and fulminating at it because nothing was happening. I gave up and came back later for confirmation of the defeat and what had we done? Only equalised in the last minute.

Stop doing this to us, guys.

So we’re now second. Not as good a position as it would have been say 5 years ago (before play-offs) as it now means very little.

Home game on Saturday; a wee break then three away in a row, hard on each other’s heels. Ouch!

Our recent away record is dismal, a contrast to early in the season. Sharp improvement needed here.

The Rock, 7/3/09

Another three points, another clean sheet. What is the world coming to?

A scrappy game by all accounts. Still, I’ll take a scabby 1-0 win against the division’s form team – which Rovers were (and still are, along with the Shire)* – any time.

Our result on Tuesday night looks even better now.

Is this Tuesday going to be a banana skin? We’re playing the bottom team who are just off a hammering, after all. That’s the sort of match, where we could go up at least one place, we quite often don’t do well in.

*Edited to add:- not now.

The Rock, 22/11/08

Have we been found out?

Things are no longer looking so good. It feels like a long time since we had a win.

Our lack of clean sheets is costing us. That and the fact that (judging by the personnel) we seemed to be playing 4-2-4 again. It is rare for a footballing team to escape from Div 3 – though we did manage it last time – but rarer still if you neglect to shore up the midfield.

Is it a coincidence that the game at Montrose, where both Stevie Murray and Derek Carcary were missing and Chissie and Cusack were playing like orthodox midfielders, was the best Dumbarton display I’ve seen this season? I only ask.

After these last two results I now fear a gubbing in the Cup up at Dingwall next week.

Not only that: at the end of our next league game we could have lost touch with third place.

But it’s at Cowden, so I suppose I’ll be there.