Just two seasons ago Dumbarton finished third in Division 2 of the SFL. Arbroath ended five points and one place better off.

Despite that apparently greater pedigree it was Dumbarton that prevailed in the play-off semi-final between the two, consigning Arbroath to another season in Div 2, while the Sons climbed, via their play-off win, onwards and upwards to SFL Div 1 (now the SPFL Championship.)

That mere two years later Sons have ended the season fifth in Tier 2 while Arbroath finished bottom in the next league down and so the clubs will play two divisions apart next season.

Morton were runners-up in Tier 2 last season. This year (despite beating Sons twice!) they were more or less dreadful and finished a poor last.

Things can change so quickly in football.

I’ve just seen on the club website the announcement of the death of Colin McAdam.

“Hoof,” as he was known, was one of the first of Sons then youth players to break through during that golden period when we were promoted from Div 2 in 1972 and the few glorious years afterwards. (Glorious in Sons terms.) His brother Tom also played for the Sons.

Colin scored one of the most remarkable goals I’ve ever seen awarded. In a game where we were two down to Arbroath one of their players was given offside three yards inside our half. Colin hoofed the ball up into the box and it skited rather than bounced – straight into the net without anyone touching it. The goal was given. As an offside free-kick it ought to have been indirect. We won the game 5-2.

Colin McAdam: 28/08/1951 – 1/08/2013. So it goes.

So sad to hear of the death of a true Sons legend, Hughie Gallacher.

Despite his relative lack of height – only 5′ 7″ – his goal scoring record for Dumbarton is outstanding, 205 goals in 231 games. That 205 is the club record for goals scored.

He was part of that late 1950s team over whom grown men drooled in nostalgia in later years and I actually saw him play – maybe in his first spell with the club but certainly in his second. (I was very young then.)

Hughie scored all four of Dumbarton’s goals in an amazing game at Gayfield in season 1958-9 when Dave Easson got all five for Arbroath.

One of my earliest Sons memories is of Hughie taking over in goal one game against Cowdenbeath – no substitutes at all, never mind goalies, in those days. He was pretty good at stopping them as I recall, but we still lost that game.

Hughie Gallacher: 26/11/1930-14/06/2013. So it goes.

SFL Div 1 play-off, second leg, Gayfield Stadium, 12/5/12. (Aggregate 1-2.)

Why do we do this to ourselves?

This was torture. As Onebrow said to me at the end, “That was the best and the worst 0-0 draw I’ve ever seen.”

Arbroath are the best footballing side I’ve seen this season (in the game at Gayfield on 10^thMar; Cowdenbeath, though, were the most effective.) In the first half here however they abandoned their measured approach and were much more direct.

The omens were clear inside five minutes. Alan Lithgow made a mistake allowing an attacker in on Stephen Grindlay, who forced him wide, but he still got his shot in. Lithgow had recovered to head it off the line. A goal then might have sunk us.

We were barely in it for twenty minutes, Arbroath having several shots/headers on goal – a one-on-one save by Stephen Grindlay and other efforts put wide, but gradually we managed to foray upfield. Craig Dargo was through on their keeper but took it just too far past him and had to turn it back from the bye-line but his cross in was poor. Prunty was then right through but the keeper deflected it for a corner.

Arbroath came out for the second half much more settled and started to stroke the ball about. There followed a succession of chances for them. It didn’t feel like backs to the wall stuff, though, we just couldn’t seem to pass the ball to our own players. Stephen Grindlay had a very good save from a free kick and then an unbelievable one from a close range header. He without doubt saved the jerseys, Dumbarton’s man of the match, no question. He rode his luck a few times, though, when coming for the ball.

The second half was excruciating, with us mostly not able to get out of our own half and unable to keep it for long when we did.

Edited to add:- I forgot to say Lithgow had one magnificent tackle when an Arbroath forward seemed right through.

Late on, in one of our few flurries, sub Pat Walker nutmegged a defender by the bye-line, crossed it in and Mark Gilhaney forced the keeper into a save.

There was still time after that for Arbroath to force a couple of corners. The final whistle was a relief and a release.

Given our defensive record this season it’s a minor miracle we managed to keep a clean sheet. This was a magnificent and remarkably disciplined effort (Kevin Nicoll’s booking apart) by the lads.

We have to do it all again on Wednesday and Sunday, though.

Edited to add:- I was drained at the end of this. I hope I’ll be as drained (in a good way) next Sunday!

Sons players celebrate:-

Sons fans celebrate.

Just to show what an unusual day it was here’s a man in his shirt sleeves at Gayfield. The sun was out for most of the game. Normally you have to be well wrapped up. The wind got up as usual, naturally. It’s a vintage Palermo shirt apparently.

Europa League* Final, Arena Națională, Bucharest, 9/5/12.

The difference here was in a striker who could fashion goals for himself from very unpromising situations (Madrid’s Falcao) and one who may have been carrying an injury (Bilbao’s Llorente) though Madrid’s defending contributed to the latter’s ineffectiveness. Bilbao laboured in the first half and, apart from Falcao, so did Madrid.

In the second, Bilbao had to chase the game and swarmed all over the Madrid half but weren’t able to create a clear cut opportunity – except once when Courtois made a great block. Bilbao also seemed unable to get enough width into their play.

Vulnerable to the break, Bilbao fell to the sucker punch from Madrid’s Diego, another goal created from an unpromising situation. It might have been better defended just the same.

Bilbao’s players are mostly young so may come again. Muniain, with his scurrying run and combative attitude, reminded me of ex-Son Andy Geggan (but an Andy Geggan who can play.)

Speaking of the Sons, a narrow 2-1 win over Arbroath last night makes Saturday’s second leg (with our rank record up there) very iffy.

*So-called.

Nerves are beginning to jangle as our play-off semi-final looms.

I’ll not be at the Rock tonight – the logistics were against me – but I hope that, at the very least, we haven’t already lost it before Saturday.

It’s 12-9 to Arbroath in our games so far this season (6-6 at the Rock) so a 0-0 draw is unlikely.

I’ll have the Europa League* final on the TV to take my mind off things, though.

*So-called.

SFL Div 2, Forthbank Stadium, 28/4/12.

So for the second year in a row our post-season destiny is settled with a game to spare. And we’re in the play-offs!

This is an outstanding end to a campaign where I’m sure most Sons fans would have been happy with survival in the Division. Very well done to Manager Alan Adamson, the backroom staff and the players.

The game itself wasn’t a classic. There was perhaps too much riding on it with Stirling hoping to avoid relegation. We had the better of the first half with Pat Walker coming close twice early on, Brian Prunty almost converting a Scott Agnew cross-come-shot and Stirling only the one really threatening effort on goal.

Their goal was well taken if a little out of the blue. Stirling hadn’t really looked threatening with too many wrong decisions on the ball and misplaced passes or shots.

Arlan Mptata came on and looked skillful, if perhaps too inclined to elaborate a bit – at this level players sometimes get in the way by accident rather than design – but he glided past his defender with ease a couple of times.

Our equaliser was bizarre. It’s the sort of goal you lose when you’re bottom of the Division, nothing is going for you and you’re doomed to relegation. A cross was headed into the air by Stirling’s no 2, it looped up and the keeper grabbed it as it came down but it had carried over. The lino flagged straight away. The keeper was maybe hampered by the injury he’d sustained earlier in the half but both should have dealt with it better.

After that Stirling threw the kitchen sink at it, playing men up. They had a four on two at one point where the attacker still managed to let one of the two get in a tackle. They also had what looked a penalty from where I was sitting up the other end but the ref blew for a dive and booked the attacker. A let-off I thought, but seeing the footage on Sons Player the ref got it spot on.

Then in stoppage time, at a corner, sub Craig Dargo was left totally unmarked to head the winner. Third in the Division sewn up – our highest finish in the SFL since 2004.

So there’s a nothing game next week against Brechin but the boys need to keep focused.

Then the play-off with Arbroath. Not a team we have an especially good record against.

SFL Div 2, Central Park, Cowdenbeath, 24/3/12.

We were well beaten. Cowdenbeath may not be the best footballing team I have seen this season – Arbroath remain that – but they are probably the most effective. None of our players got a moment’s peace. Their players’ willingness to chase, harry and press, their eagerness to get to the ball, was an object lesson. This is how to deny the opposition the opportunity to play.

Add to that our continuing inability to defend set pieces and, in this game, to clear our lines or even simply pass the ball and it was a recipe for heavy defeat. Kevin Nicoll had a terrible game in midfield – absolutely awful – and I lost count of the number of times two of our players went for the same ball or one hit it against another and so lost possession. And having two smallish strikers up against tall defenders isn’t perhaps the best recipe for success.

We started brightly enough – without ever threatening their goal – but the signs at Cowden corners were there from early on. And so it came to pass that from one of those, Stephen Grindlay let the ball through him for the second game in a row. Their second came after we had again failed to clear the ball and it broke to the guy who had an easy chance.

Then, a minor miracle. Against the run of play and out of nothing Craig Dargo eventually made the most of a Joe Mbu mistake to score his first for Sons across the goalkeeper. It seemd to take an age to hit the net.

Faint hopes of a comeback were extinguished when Mbu was left unmarked from a free kick.

I was going to say we dominated the second half but that would only be true of possession. We threatened about twice and the keeper saved them both. At least we competed a bit better and started trying to stretch them wide.

Their fourth was a direct result of our (ridiculously late) double substitution as Cowden exploited the space left by Ryan Finnie’s removal to surge down the left and whip in a cross.

They should have got a fifth a minute later but somehow their forward hit it into Grindlay from 5 yards out.

After our straight losses to Cowden and Arbroath two weeks ago I had feared that after this one we’d be level with Stenny, but they lost today too.

Still four points ahead of fourth (with a negative goal difference!) but E Fife are coming up on the rails.

A few photos of Gayfield Park, home of Arbroath FC, from last Saturday.

This is the view of the ground from near Arbroath War Memorial.

The next was taken from an excellent vantage point to see that Mark Gilhaney’s shot last Saturday did cross the line after bouncing down from the bar. It also shows the north covered terracing.

These next two remind me so much of Boghead.

All that’s missing is the pie-stall set into the side of the stand (but that went when they replaced the old pavilion at Boghead.)

And, yes, Gayfield is only five metres from the high-tide line.

Some more photos of Gayfield are on my flickr.

Cenotaph-like, this is an imposing structure on a hill above the southern approaches to Arbroath, overlooking the Firth of Tay and the North Sea.

WW1 names are on the front and back, WW2 on the sides. There is also one name from 1972 on the plaque added on the lower left.