New Central Park is the home of Kelty Hearts FC.

It’s a tidy traditional Scottish football ground.

The photographs are from the day of Sons’ first visit to it on 9/11/2024.

Entrance:-

East side of ground:-

South side looking west from entrance:-

North from entrance:-

Looking west at north end:-

Looking south From northwest corner:-

From northwest corner:-

SPFL Tier 3, New Central Park, 05/04/25.

Or maybe I should go….

Selection bingo obviously works.

We controlled this from the beginning even if I was nervous every time they moved up the park before we scored but at times it looked a bit like an old-fashioned end of season game.

Then Joel Mumbongo scored with a header from a Kalvin Orsi cross. A collector’s piece.

Then Kalvin got the ball on the wing, skinned his man and proceded to waltz past three of their defenders before striking his shot from about the D.

The next was a peach. Their keeper had just hit the ball aimlessly out for a throw-in, which was taken – to Carlo Pignatiello. Carlo moved infield and curled a Froxyesque curler into the top corner.

There was one strange moment when the ball looped up in our box and keeper Shay Kelly was in two minds about how to deal with it. He kept it out somewhat awkwardly.

Mouhamed Niang and Joel Mumbongo had picked up bookings in the first half and at three-nil up it made sense to remove Niang for the second half as being more likely to pick up another. Craig McGuffie was the replacement with Michael Ruth on for Orsi at the same time.

A telling sub as within five minutes a Kelty defender didn’t get his header in and Ruth was able to run in from just past halfway before slotting it past the keeper and inside the post.

Just after Joel Mumbongo went down after a challenge in the box and had to be stretchered off the pitch.

However, things went from bad to worse for Kelty when one of their players got a second yellow card for a trip.

A few minutes later Matt Shiels – on for Tony Wallace – nudged a Ruth free-kick past the keeper.

I just about missed our sixth. A cross looked to be Michael Ruth’s to head in but he was shoved in the box. I looked at the ref expecting him to blow but instead Craig McGuffie put the ball in the net.

By this time we were full of flicks and backheels and generally playing exhibition stuff.

Football is really bizarre. Where did this display come from? I know Kelty were poor but we were more than good enough to take advantage.

The lads obviously took confidence from winning last week. They should take even more from this.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 28/12 24.

Well that’s the first time we’ve played Kelty and I’ve not been at the game. Maybe I should always miss them.

It sounds like it was pretty uneventful and that Kelty were toothless, which is strange given they were the division’s highest scorers at the day’s start. (They’re still joint highest.) It’s our first clean sheet in the league too.

From the outside it looks like the red card for Kelty’s Scott Allan might have changed the game. It’s good we took advantage of it though, we usually don’t.

And a brace for Kalvin Orsi is beyond rarity, he rarely ever scores, never mind twice.

All in, a good way to end the year.

SPFL Tier 3, New Central Park, 9/11/24.

My – and Sons – first time at New Central Park, a very tidy ground with two enclosures on the east side, a smallish stand on the west with standing areas behind the goals.

Well, the better team won. As in the game at the Rock, they looked confident on the ball, but the first half was pretty uneventful on the whole, though they did seem to force a lot of corners.

Early in the second half a neat exchange between Michael Ruth and Jinky Hilton set up the former with an excellent chance but his side-footed effort went wide.

Their first goal came almost out of the blue. Their guy suddenly found himself in some space and leathered it from the edge of the area across Brett Long and into the net via the top of the post. No goalie was going to stop that one.

Jinky Hilton then created a chance for himself down the left cutting in past the defender but again the shot just went wide.

Their second killed the game. A corner went all the way over the box and when it reached their attacker he hit a shot through a forest of legs and it ended up in the net.

We did come into things towards the end but by that time they were managing the game.

We need to start taking any chances we get – and soon – or there’s no  prospect of us climbing the table.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 2/11/24.

Well, after the last two results this is disappointing.

Apparently we were all over them in the first half but their keeper made some great saves.

A different story in the second half where it sounds as if we were dismal.

Being a Sons fan is never easy.

Next week we’re at Kelty Hearts for the first ever time.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 31/8/24.

Well. Here we are again.

Yet another draw.

And yet again coming from behind. Twice this time.

We were the better looking side in the early exchanges. Indeed Kelty really didn’t have an attack worthy of the name until they scored, a quick break showing an alarming fragility in our back line, waltzed through as if it were not there.

They looked extremely confident on the ball after that with a great awareness of where their teammates were and making seemingly blind passes. They were also very well organised defensively, always able to get a man in to make the crucial tackle or block. And if that failed their goalkeeper managed to make the save.

Not until the 43rd minute, after a few corners from the left had produced nothing, one from the right found Mark Durnan able to head in at the far post.

The second half followed a similar pattern. They scored when we lost the ball in midfield and worked the ball well into the area where the free guy stuck it through Brett Long’s legs.

It looked like the unbeaten run would end but then another Craig McGuffie corner was again headed in by Mark Durnan. That could almost have been a response to the immediately prior announcement of Durnan as man of the match. Personally I thought he was uncomfortable on the left of the centre back pairing.

Still, a draw against the team at the top of the league can’t be bad.

So it’s five league draws in a row now to start off the campaign (albeit with a Challenge Cup win against Berwick mixed in.) That sequence surely must be a club record.

But draws don’t get you up the league table. Not in these days of three points for a win. We really need to get one of those on the board.

There’s a break next week for the next round of the Challenge Cup, a long trip to Peterhead, before we’re down at Annan in a fortnight.

Well, we managed to navigate (albeit narrowly) a first tie in the Challenge Cup* – not a common achievement for Sons. We usually get papped out at the earliest opportunity.

Our reward is a home tie against Kelty Hearts, most likely on Sep 9^th.  This will be the first time we’ve played them.

It’s a pity it’s not an away game as Kelty is not far from where I live and it’s a ground I’ve not yet visited.

*SPFL Trust Trophy.

Kelty is a former mining village in Fife.

Incidentally their football team recently won promotion to the SPFL.

These photos were taken in October 2019 though.

On Main Street there’s a 1930s/Art Deco bank building. Horizontals, verticals, flat roof. The glazing looks updated but has kept the 30s style:-