So Tottenham Hotspur have appointed Jose Mourinho as manager after sacking Mauricio Pochettino.

Really?

Granted Spurs haven’t been doing well in the league this season and are well off the top four – much nearer the relegation spots in fact – but they’re well placed to qualify out of their Champions League* group even though they got gubbed 7-2 at home against Bayern Munich. And the players surely are as accomplished as they were last season. If it is true they may be a little stale that can be laid at the foot of the club’s hierarchy, notoriously unwilling to make the outlays necessary to attract players to the club. (Okay, the new stadium’s costs are a factor in that.)

But Pochettino has surely outperformed his resources and is still young in managerial terms. Will his sacking come to be seen as a huge mistake?

Given Spur’s traditional style of play Mourinho’s pragmatism seems an unlikely fit – as it was at Manchester United – and will inevitably lead to dissatisfaction among the fans, and probably quite quickly at that.

This may be a hostage to fortune as it is possible (if unlikely) that Mourinho (whose best days seem to be behind him) will lead Spurs to a Champions League win this season. But.

If Jose Mourinho is the answer to Spurs’s problems what on Earth is the question?

*So-called

Home of Wigtown & Bladnoch FC.

Wigtown & Bladnoch play in the South of Scotland League.

Like many clubs in this sparsely populated are of Scotland it sometimes has difficulty raising a team. I believe that last season (2018-2019) they took time out from the league due to this.

After a long day travelling round the Machars and Rhinns peninsulas (penisulae?) I found the ground on a late evening stroll down the road to Bladnoch from Wigtown past Wigtown golf course, from where this first picture was taken:-

Ground entrance, bathed in late summer evening sunlight:-

I had to balance on a round-topped wall to get these last three photos of the pitch, stand and entrance:-

I couldn’t help recognising the scene in this photo from Saturday’s Guardian Review:-

It was illustrating an ensemble piece about various writers’ relationship with Europe.

The photo brought back memories of that wonderful trip we took down (and up) the River Douro from just that jetty in the picture and which I featured in this post:-

And this one:-

Curiously an item on Reporting Scotland on Thursday? night about the trip of Rangers to Porto for a Europa League* game also showed scenes of the same jetty. Synchronicity.

*So-called.

Home of Dalbeattie Star F C, who currently ply their trade in the Scottish Lowland League.

The stadium lies to the side of Colliston Park, Dalbeattie.

Exit gates:-

Turnstiles:-

Stand:-

The stadium was closed when I visited Dalbeattie so these views of the pitch are somewhat restricted being taken through or over the fence:-

The club’s name seems all too appropriate now.

And so a club with 134 years of history behind it – and an illustrious history at that encompassing two FA Cup wins, one of those with the highest winning margin in a Cup Final [albeit now shared,] from the heartlands of the early Football League, industrial Lancashire, has now gone, from the highest levels of the sport anyway.

I can only feel sorry for the fans. Supporting a football club means it is part of you, a family member almost. Its loss must feel devastating, the more so because most clubs have existed over several life-times and you don’t really expect yours to disappear.

But Bury’s fate serves as a terrible warning to us all about how owners of a club are more or less laws unto themselves, with little to no restraint on their activities – and nothing the average fan can do to influence their behaviour.

Any such shadowy creatures need to be scrutinised with a hawkish eye, ever vigilant, or your club might vanish in a historical blink.

Brabco, I’m looking at you.

I’ve been aware for a long time that though I have a category for Scottish Football Grounds in which I post pictures of those theatres of disappointment I’ve never actually featured what Sons fans know as The Rock.

Given that this season promises to be one of the most dismal in over twenty years for said fans what better sight to lighten the mood?

The stadium has had several sponsored names over its years since the club moved from the traditional Boghead: Strathclyde Homes Stadium, the Bet Butler Stadium, the Cheaper Insurance Direct Stadium,* the YOUR Radio 103FM Stadium, and now the C&G Systems Stadium reverting to Dumbarton Football Stadium in times between sponsorships.

It really is in a fantastic location.

Dumbarton Rock and Dumbarton Football Stadium from Castle Road:-

From car park and pedestrian access. The turnstiles here are for the home end:-

Stadium, Stand and Dumbarton Rock from main car park:-

Stadium and Dumbarton rock from western part of car park:-

Showing Stand seating:-

Stand from River Leven side:-

Stand from west car park:-

Main Entrance from car park entrance:-

From Home support end of Stand. Kilpatrick Hills (known locally as the Long Crags) in right background:-

Pitch panorama. Dumbarton town in background. The large red brick building, once part of Ballantine’s Distillery, has now been demolished:-

Away end of pitch:-

I caught this disniterested spectator before a game once:-

*When that one was first referred to by a BBC Radio Scotland reporter at a game I remember the programme’s presenter Richard Gordon wailing, “Noooo.” It was bit of a minter.

Home to Inverness Caledonian Thistle FC.

This sits just off the A 9 immediately south of the Kessock Bridge. It has three stands. The western side is open, without seating or standing area. I visited it for the first time in April last year when the Sons were up there for a league match.

Stadium from Kessock Bridge:-

North Stand from access road. (Emblazoned with the legend “Tulloch Caledonian Stadium”, as was the South Stand. This may be a sponsorship which has now lapsed):-

Main Stand. (The Jock MacDonald Stand):-

Main Stand from south:-

South Stand:-

Main Stand seating:-

North Stand from Main Stand:-

South Stand from Main Stand:-

McDiarmid Park is the home of St Johnstone FC, and was the scene of the Challenge Cup* Final, 24/3/18.

My posts on the final are here, here and here.

Ormond Stand from access road:-

Ormond and Main Stands:-

Main Stand (stitch of two photos):-

View of North Stand:-

North Stand from Main Stand:-

East Stand:-

Ormond Stand from Main Stand:-

*Irn Bru Cup

Barely a week after the sad demise of Billy McNeill comes news of the death of his Lisbon Lion teammate Stevie Chalmers.

But Chalmers wasn’t just a teammate. He was the scorer of that goal. Not the best, not the most spectacular, not the most intricate, but perhaps the most precious goal in the history of Scottish football. It was the foot of Chalmers that deflected the course of Bobby Murdoch’s shot into the Inter Milan net and so made sure that Celtic would become not only the first (and so far – and likely forever – the only) Scottish, but also the first British (and first North European) team to lift the European Cup.

Bill Shankly is reported to have said to Celtic’s manager that day, Jock Stein, when they won the trophy, “Jock, you’re immortal.” Well, so too is Chalmers; or at least his memory is.

Looking at his Wikipedia page I see Chalmers turned out for the Sons of the Rock (for one game; as a trialist. Looks like we missed a good one there.) Our loss was Celtic’s gain. He ended up the club’s fifth highest ever goalscorer.

Thomas Stephen (Stevie) Chalmers: 26/12/1935 – 29/3/2019. So it goes.

New Meadow Stadium is the home of Shrewsbury Town FC of the third tier in English football.

On the Saturday we had seen that there was an antique fair taking place in the main stand on the Sunday so we headed there after visiting Powis Castle and Welshpool.

New Meadow replaced the club’s old ground (called Gay Meadow) which was closer to the town centre near the Abbey and the River Severn. For many years in that old location local coracle maker Fred Davies used to use one of his coracles to retrieve any balls which happened to end up in the river.

New Meadow Stadium, Main Stand From Car Park:-

Main and North Stands:-

Shrewsbury Town FC Heroes:-

Main Stand from south-west:-

South and Main Stands:-

West and South Stands:-

If you look at the above there’s a blue set of doors between the stands. I took this photo of the main and north stands from the gap in the door:-

Inside the main stand this poster for the previous day’s game was still in evidence:-

I took the opportunity to photograph the other three stands from inside the Main Stand.

West Stand:-

North Stand:-

South Stand:-

The club has a distinctive badge featuring three lions’ heads* and the legend Floreat Salopia (May Shrewsbury flourish.):-

When I visited the team was going well at the top of their division. Sadly their performance tailed off and they missed out on automatic promotion and also lost in the play-offs. Some of these players left the club for better things in the summer and this season they have struggled a bit, flirting with the relegation places for a while. But I see now they are in thirteenth place with four games to go (though only six points clear of the relegation zone.)

Given that Rochdale have also had a run of poor results since I attended their stadium in November maybe I’m a jinx. Rochdale have also revived a bit recently but are only one point above the danger area with a terrible goal difference – much the worst in the bottom half of that league.

*Edited to add (16/4/19): According to this website they are actually leopards’ heads (known in heraldry as loggerheads.)