I was profoundly sad to read from the club’s website that the midfield inspiration of the Sons Second Division title winning team of 1971-72, the side which ended a fifty year absence from top flight football, Charlie Gallagher, has died. It is safe to say that without his promptings from midfield Sons may not have won promotion that year.

He was probably past his best when he joined the Sons from Celtic, with whom he’d been in the Lisbon Lions squad, mainly as an understudy to Bertie Auld, but was, according to the grey sage Bob Crampsey, much underrated. Nevertheless he gave that Sons team a creative midfield presence essential to its eventual success.

His displays included a magnificent performance in a 3-3 draw away at Partick Thistle in the League Cup quarter-final of 1970. We won the second leg 3-2. In the semi-final we drew 0-0 with Celtic (a team which had reached the European Cup final less than six months before) after extra time before losing the replay 4-3 in extra time after being 2-0 down in the 90 minutes. (In that extra time, at 2-2, one of their goals ought to have been disallowed for a crossed ball going out before coming back in. The linesman raised his flag but put it down again when the ball went in the net. After that goal they scored again and started to try to play keep ball. Once we got it back we did the same but then launched a counter attack up the left which ended with us scoring in a supreme get-it-up-ye moment.) Charlie played so well that it is said during the game Celtic’s manager Jock Stein told his team to “break that bastard’s legs.”

From that 71-72 promotion season I remember in particular Charlie’s free-kick against Alloa at Recreation Park – my first ever visit to the Recs. The goalie had lined up his wall and the ref was striding away towards his vantage point when Charlie carefully moved the ball aside about six inches. He then blasted it past the wall and the keeper for the only goal in a 1-0 win. (Vital at the end of the seaon, but all those wins were.)

This photo (taken from Pie and Bovril) shows Charlie about to score from a free-kick against Celtic in the Drybrough Cup (remember that?) Sons players also in frame are Johnny Graham and Kenny Wilson. Great days.

His skill from free kicks meant they were almost as good as penalties. In all Charlie scored 29 goals for the club.

He will forever be remembered as a club legend.

Charles Gallagher: 3/11/1940 – 11/7/2021. So it goes.

Scotland’s Football Grounds in the Black and White Era, D C Thomson Media, 2018, 257 p. With a foreword by Chick Young.

Annfield, Bayview, Boghead, Brockville, Broomfield, Cathkin Park, Douglas Park, Firs Park, Love Street, Muirton, New Kilbowie, Shawfield, Telford Street, Kingsmills. Names to conjure with – and all gone to dust (or housing, or supermarkets.)

To Scottish football fans of a certain age (which I am) this book is a magnificent nostalgia fest. It features 41 of the historic grounds of the present day SPFL football clubs, plus two more, Shielfield (at time of publishing Berwick Rangers were still in the SPFL,) and Firs Park. The only ones missing are Peterhead’s former ground at Recreation Park and Annan Athletic’s Galabank. The criterion for inclusion in the book was that a photograph had not been widely published before or else illustrated some quirk of the ground concerned. (I was somewhat disappointed that only one photo of Boghead, former home of the mighty Sons of the Rock, appears; but I have my own memories to savour.) And of course for Inverness Caledonian Thistle you get two former grounds, Telford Street and Kingsmills. In the course of following the Sons I have visited most of the stadia here in their heydays, excepting only those belonging to the ex-Highland League clubs (though I have walked past Telford Street Park several times and even been to Clachnacuddin’s Grant Street Park in Inverness for a game – a pre-season friendly they played against East Fife; in 1976, while I was in the town.) I have frequented many over the years since.

The book is a delightful celebration of the history of the beautiful game in Scotland – and also a memorial to what has been lost. Cathkin apart, all of the grounds on the list above have been replaced by bright(ish) new(ish) stadia but most of those have yet to invoke the glories of these now mouldered (Cathkin again) or vanished (most of the rest) temples to Scotland’s abiding sporting obsession. With only one exception, Hampden, the book tends not to delve as far back as pre-World War 2, hence the absence of even longer gone grounds such as the Gymnasium, home to St Bernard’s FC, of which photographs would in any case be vanishingly scarce.

There is a 1930s, Art Decoish-looking, building in the pictures of Shawfield that I don’t remember from my only visit there and which I assume was demolished years ago. My favourite old ground, Firs Park, is shown in the days before that huge concrete wall was erected at one end to stop the ball going on to the access road to the retail park beside the ground; before, even, the office building that overlooked that end of the park in the 1970s. That other redolent relic, Cliftonhill, is shown lying in a natural bowl perfect for siting a football stadium.

The text is studded with various titbits of arcane information. Glasgow had at one time three of the biggest football grounds in the world in Hampden, Celtic Park and Ibrox. And there were plans to extend Shawfield’s capacity to add to that list of superstadia. The world’s first penalty kick was awarded against Airdrieonians (away at Royal Albert in a charity Cup match) and was scored by a James McLuggage. (Not from a penalty spot, that had yet to be invented; from any point along a line twelve yards from goal.) A WW2 pillbox was constructed at Borough Briggs with slit windows/gun ports all round (those sly Germans could after all have attacked from any direction) and remained in place till Elgin City joined the SFL in 2000. It was Ochilview which hosted the first ever floodlit match in Scotland. Falkirk once held the world record for the highest transfer fee and Brockville was the venue for the first televised floodlit game. Rugby Park used to be ‘mown’ by a resident sheep – three in total over the years. Hampden’s square goal posts now reside in St Etienne’s museum as they were held by that club to be responsible for their defeat at the hands of Bayern Munich in the European Cup Final of 1976 since two of their team’s efforts rebounded out from the goal frame instead of scraping over the line. Les poteaux carres is still used as a phrase for bad luck in the city.

Attending football matches is no longer as economical as it was back in the day. One photo shows a 20p entrance fee at Firhill in 1970. After inflation that 20p would equate to £3 in 2018. Try getting into even a non-league ground for that now! Some things definitely were better in the good old days.

Pedant’s corner:- “the current club were established” (was established,) “the club were on the up” (the club was) sprung (sprang, x2.)

SPFL Tier 2 Play-off Final, First Leg, Recreation Park, 9/5/18.

This could have turned out a lot worse. They’ve been going well and we haven’t really.

They had most of the ball in the first five minutes and then we scored in what was in effect our first attack. They didn’t clear the ball properly, left us a lot of space in midfield in their half and Danny Handling fed the ball to Stuart Carswell who fair thumped it. Outbursts of almost disbelieving joy in the away covered seating area. (It’s not a stand.) Carsy never scores. (His only other goal had a big deflection on it but this was an absolute belter, straight in.)

I remarked to Onebrow, “80 minutes of sitting in to go.” It wasn’t quite that but they did have a lot of the ball.

Carsy had our second effort too – again on target. On this evidence he should shoot more often.

They had a cute effort through ex-Son Jordan Kirkpatrick which it seems Scott Gallacher tipped on to the post – from my angle I couldn’t tell he’d got the touch – but apart from that there were only other long range efforts to worry about in the first half.

Second half Robert Nisbet really came onto a game up front before he was shifted into midfield after the substitutions. That’s the best I’ve seen from him. We had a good few efforts, notably Nisbet (just over) and Kyle Hutton (a great ping just past the post.) With a bit more care in the final pass we could have got even better chances.

They only really looked like scoring when we lost possession in their half and they sprang at us. Craig Barr had one superb defensive block (but the guy ought to have pulled the trigger earlier) and Scott Gallagher made a good save the one time he was really called on.

It’s going to be really hard to take if we blow this now, but we can’t afford to get ahead of ourselves; Sunday’s going to be a hard battle again.

Still.

I was there when Carsy scored!

Sons are off to the Recs* tonight for the SPFL Tier 2 Play-off Final, First Leg, against Alloa Athletic.

More torture to endure. You can catch it yourself on BBC Alba.

Kick-off is 7.45 pm.

*Recreation Park as was, now called the Indodrill Stadium.

SPFL Tier 2, Recreation Park, 18/1/14.

Stunning. Simply Stunning. I’d never envisioned this when I looked towards this match.

I can’t remember seeing such a one-sided first half when we were the side on top – especially away from home. (Even the 6-0 at East Fife two and a half years ago wasn’t so lop-sided.) We were two-nil up, at 30 mins in, before they had a decent attack. Stephen Grindlay had had only pass backs and one pick up to deal with until after Mark McLaughlin deflected a cross in and Chris Turner got his head onto another. He did have to make a save from close-in header at 2-0, though. Chris Kane had hit the bar about 5 mins in and late in the first half converted a chase with their keeper to the corner of the box into a penalty which he took himself. There was contact but he’d seen it coming and didn’t avoid it. 3-0 at half time was already dreamland. I’d worked out that our goal difference – not to mention our points – was now better than Alloa’s.

They came out a bit more fired up in the second half but couldn’t make any impression. Jordan Kirkpatrick set up a shooting chance for himself but his piledriver just cleared the post, Mark Gilhaney had a great chance, one-on-one with the keeper whom he rounded but sent his shot over. (Well, we were shooting downhill by then.) They, however, ran up the park and scored but only while Mitch Megginson was temporarily laid out in our penalty area.

Any thoughts of a comeback were snuffed out when a cross reached Chris Kane – what a worker he is; brave too – he played for about an hour with a bandage up his nose after a clash. He ought to have put the cross in with his first touch but instead it teed up for him to belt it past the keeper.

The best was the last, a peach; a superb cross from the right was hit first time on the volley by Jordan Kirkpatrick and rocketed into the net. Jordan’s reward was an immediate substitution! That gave Scott Agnew some game time though.

Brilliant performance. Pass marks all round, I even noticed Colin Rhyming Slang making defensive clearances. Alloa were much poorer than I’d thought they would be. No need for Paul Hartley to chuck in the towel as their manager after the game, I’d have thought though.

Moreover, an unlikely concatenation of results means we’re now fourth in the table. In a promotion play-off spot. Our highest league position in 30 years.*

When will I wake up?

*Edited to add: Our highest league position in nigh on 30 years.

Shielfield is the home of Berwick Rangers FC.

There are two qualifications to this post. The category* I’ve placed it in is actually not quite accurate. Though Berwick Rangers play in the Scottish Leagues the ground is of course situated south of the border so is not technically a Scottish football ground. Shielfield is also south of the River Tweed so I suppose it’s really in Tweedmouth rather than Berwick.

There is a grassed lane leading from the road to the ground. The away terrace can be viewed from it.

A little to the left of the above is the main entrance.

Entering through the turnstiles you can see the main stand.

The nearest goal to the entrance. Wide spaces between it and the spectator area.

The away terrace with covered enclosure.

With the low slung stand and slope the ground has similarities to Recreation Park, Alloa – though the terracing and cover there was removed a couple of years ago and replaced with temporary seating. This is the goal at the lower end of the slope at Shielfield.

The nearer goal and stand.

Looking back up the slope.

*Edited 22/9/14 to be in new category of English Football Grounds.

Home of Alloa Athletic FC. Situated on Clackmannan Road (the A 907.)

Home Support Entrance with main stand in grey:-

Boundary wall on Clackmannan Road:-

Away support entrance:-

View from away support entrance, down slope to Railway end, Ochil Hills in background:-

In all my visits to Recreation Park up till a couple of years ago there was no railway behind the ground: it had been Beechinged. However, my elder brother told me of some Dumbarton player in the long ago putting a penalty onto the railway. The modern line from Stirling to Alloa (and beyond for goods trains) opened three or four years ago.

The next photo is shifted right slightly to show the away support area. Note temporary stand halfway down. There used to be a large mound of terracing on this side, with a covered area well back from the pitch. It was taken away a few years ago and replaced with this flatter viewing area. Again a nice view of the Ochil Hills in the background.

Terracing, Clackmannan Road end:-

Main stand from away entrance. The artificial turf is obvious here:-

The stand replaced one damaged by fire quite a few years ago now. This is it from the Railway end.

The Railway end terracing still has the mound of earth type of terrace with some railway sleepers for stability:-