Giving the Names You’ve Heard the Story They Own

Pitch, 2021, 254 p, including ii p Bibliography.

It is a little odd that the introduction to this book focuses on a football club that isn’t lost at all – has in fact gone from strength to strength in recent years – but that club is the pioneer of football in Scotland, Queen’s Park, without which the history of Scottish football would have been different, and perhaps (though this is an unlikely altered history) not have started at all.

Then there is a chapter on the setting up of the Scottish Football League – at the prospect of which and of the impending professional status which it portended Queen’s Park balked, only relenting in 1899 – and its history up till its merger with the SPL to form the present SPFL.

There follow chapters on individual lost clubs starting with the first World Champions from Scotland, Renton, and of Vale of Leven both of whose stories a Son of the Rock brought up a couple of so miles away knows quite well. These clubs were both in the end victims of that professionalism which Queen’s Park stood against for so long. The Vale’s name, though, did not disappear entirely. After an interregnum where Vale OCOBA (Old Church Old Boys’ Association) played on their Millburn Park ground it was revived when OCOBA became a Junior Football club. (I have mentioned Junior football’s separate status several times before.)

Like Renton and Vale of Leven, Third Lanark won the Scottish Cup more than once. Formed as the Third Lanarkshire Rifle volunteers their heyday was in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries but their demise due to a reckless/unscrupulous owner (delete as appropriate) in the 1960s – their last game was a heavy defeat against Dumbarton at Boghead – was one of the saddest and potentially avoidable of the losses discussed in this book.

Arthurlie never reached the heights of a Scottish Cup win but enjoyed many seasons in the SFL before the financial crisis of the late 1920s forced them to resign. They can not really be described as lost though, since they seamlessly joined the Junior’s ranks – with some early success.

Cambuslang were founder members of the SFL, ending a creditable fourth in its first season but finishing second bottom the next and not being re-elected. They also managed to reach the Scottish Cup final once, only to suffer the biggest final defeat in the competition’s history, losing 6-1 to Renton in 1888. Like so many others they fell prey to financial problems due to travel costs.

At one time the town of Helensburgh had no fewer than five football teams – Victoria, Merchants, Hermitage Former Boys, West End and Helensburgh FC but only the last of those (and that the third club of that name) ever played in the SFL – in the short-lived Division 3 in the mid-1920s. They were at the top by one point when the league was dissolved and that disappointment resulted in the club folding.

Edinburgh’s earliest officially formed football club, St Bernard’s, started life under the name Third Edinburgh Rifle Volunteers but soon so much of the soldiers’ time was taken up with football that discipline had begun to slip and the military stepped back. The committee then took its new name from St Bernard’s Well by the Water of Leith. The club won the Cup in 1895 during a decade that also saw them have their most sustained success in the top Division of the SFL. After failing a re-election they were never gain to reach such heights (despite winning the Second Division twice) and had to be wound up when a deceased director’s loan was called in by the executors in 1942, having to sell their home ground, the magnificently named Royal Gymnasium, to pay the debt.

King’s Park were a club from Stirling which never made it to the top Division, though once, in 1928, narrowly missed out on promotion. Their demise can be directly attributed to one Adolf Hitler, as their ground, the original Forthbank Stadium, was hit by one of only two bombs to land on Stirling in the entire Second World War, (both dropped by a bomber trying to lighten its load to get back to base.) The explosion ruined the north terracing and made a 30-foot crater in the pitch.

Cowlairs were formed in the railway works at Springburn in Glasgow. Though not regarded as a top club they were nevertheless founder members of the SFL. The club’s stay lasted only that first season, as financial mismanagement saw them suspended for a time and their pitch was not maintained. After a few years outside the SFL the new Second Division’s formation saw them admitted but their second-place finish was to be their best. After one more season they were not re-elected and with no other league willing to admit them, haemorrhaging players and money, their fate was sealed.

Abercorn were a team from Paisley who were founder members of the SFL but only ever had a total of three seasons in the top division and not much more than that in Division 2. Their demise was due to lack of a fixed ground (five in total from 1879-1919) resulting in them having nowhere to play when their landlords refused to renew their lease in 1919.

Airdrieonians were the longest surviving of the clubs covered in this book. Founded as Excelsior FC in 1878 (changing to Airdrieonians in 1881) their glory days were in the early 1920s, finishing second in the top Division no less than four times and winning the Scottish Cup in 1924. They also managed a European Cup Winners’ Cup appearance in 1992 due to losing to champions Rangers in the Cup Final that year but lost to Sparta Prague 3-1 on aggregate. Their demise was due to new stadium requirements for admission to the top flight to which they aspired. Since their quaint Broomfield ground wasn’t suitable for adaptation the debts incurred on building a new one and the loss of spectators while sharing Broadwood in the interim crippled them. They folded in 2002.

Leith Athletic lasted from 1887 till 1955. Like St Bernard’s, living in the shadow of Hearts and Hibs cannot have been easy. They finished fourth in their first season in the SFL in 1892 but never reached that height again. Most of their SFL existence was in the Second Division but post World War 2 they were placed in the ‘C’ Division (which included reserve teams to which they objected.) They were thrown out when they refused to fulfil fixtures, folding in 1955. Ironically the season after that the ‘C’ Division was wound up and the non-reserve teams absorbed into Division ‘B’.

Clydebank has had two clubs of that name in the SFL. The first had relative success in and around the war years of 1914-1918 with several seasons in the top flight. It was the Depression of the late 1920s which did for them. The second came after the Steedman brothers’ attempt to move East Stirlingshire to the town, merging with Clydebank Juniors as East Stirlingshire Clydebank and playing for a season at their Kilbowie Park, was quashed by a court ruling. The Steedmans then carried on at Kilbowie by forming Clydebank FC, who were voted in to the SFL a year later. This club had better success than the earlier one till the decline of the town’s economy (the shipyards and Singer’s sewing machine factory having closed) forced them to sell the ground. Seasons at Boghead and then Morton’s Cappielow saw spectator numbers fall off a cliff – mainly in protest at the moves. The club didn’t actually fold though. It was taken over by the new Airdrie United, set up following on from the demise of Airdrieonians, who had both the money and the ground to house them.

Dundee Wanderers, formed by a merger of two of Dundee’s oldest clubs, Wanderers and Strathmore, had only one season in the SFL and in it managed to suffer the biggest ever defeat in league football, 15-1 by Airdrieonians. They then had a few seasons of non-SFL league football at Clepington Park before the lease was snatched from under them by Dundee Hibernian (now called Dundee United.) In return for this treachery, Wanderers club members removed certain items of equipment from the park – including the small grandstand. Only the grass was let. Homeless for two years, they lost fans and money, and even at their new home in Lochee couldn’t survive.

Armadale had a decade in the Second Division after it was revived following the Great War but were another club which succumbed to the Great Depression, not having enough income to provide opponents with their match guarantee fee.

The original Edinburgh City formed as amateurs in 1928 and applied to join the SFL in 1931. Surprisingly they won the vote handsomely but life in the League as an amateur side – when Queen’s Park had the draw of playing at Hampden to entice the best players – was too difficult. Only twice did they not finish bottom of the pile. Post World War 2 they were assigned to the ‘C’ Division but moved to the Juniors in 1949. In 1955 they lost the lease of City Park and decided to stop playing football. Their name survived as a social club though, and was allowed to be taken over by Postal United in 1986. That club has since advanced to the SPFL. (However their permission to use the name has been revoked since this book was written.)

Gretna receives a somewhat extravagant 30 pages perhaps because its story is a classic rise and fall, both a potential encouragement and a warning. Formed after Word War 2, most of the club’s existence was spent playing in the English football system and in 1983 it became the first team based in Scotland to play in the FA Cup for nearly a century. It reached the First Round proper in 1990 and made a final appearance at that stage in 1993. Its success in the Northern Premier League would have meant much higher travelling costs and so application was made to the SFL, with two disappointments in 1993 and 1999 before succeeding on the demise of Airdrieonians in 2002. By this time millionaire Brooks Mileson had become Gretna’s owner. His backing meant the club went on a meteoric rise through the divisions, played in a Scottish Cup Final and made a UEFA Cup appearance. It was already beginning to fall apart when Mileson fell ill and it later turned out his fortune had evaporated. In his lifetime he had given money to or in various ways sponsored around 70 football clubs. His stewardship of Gretna, though, meant that a hitherto successful club existing within its means went under. Meteors do tend to burn out.

We end with portmanteau chapters containing brief overviews on clubs from the West of Scotland; Beith (in Ayrshire,) Dumbarton Harp, Galston (again Ayrshire,) Johnstone (by Paisley,) Linthouse (like Cowlairs connected to the Springburn railway works,) Northern (also from Springburn,) Port Glasgow Athletic, Thistle (South Glasgow): the South of Scotland; Mid-Annandale (Lockerbie,) Nithsdale Wanderers (Sanquhar,) Solway Star (Annan): and the East of Scotland; Lochgelly United, Bathgate, Bo’ness, Broxburn United, Clackmannan, Dykehead (Shotts,) and finally current clubs, Ayr United (merged from Ayr FC and Ayr Parkhouse,) Dundee Hibernians (Dundee United,) Peebles Rovers, Royal Albert (from Larkhall) who were the first team in Scotland to be awarded a penalty kick – which was scored by the improbably named James McLuggage – and Meadowbank Thistle (formerly an Edinburgh works side, Ferranti Thistle, but now Livingston FC.)

Some of the clubs mentioned above have not disappeared per se since they morphed into or merged to become Junior clubs or otherwise evolved as noted above. Clydebank’s fans formed a phoenix club (Clydebank) as did those of Gretna (Gretna 2008) while a new Leith Athletic was set up in 1996. With the movement of Junior clubs into the pyramid system all survivors have the opportunity to progress to the highest tiers once again.

Pedant’s corner:- On the inside front cover; “27 Mid-Annabelle” (Mid-Annandale.) Otherwise: “cities sprung up” (sprang up,) the text implies Queen’s Park created the passing game. I have read elsewhere that that honour belongs instead to Dumbarton FC, “played 22 matched” (matches,) “outside of (several times, just outside, no ‘of’,) attract (attract,) “the creation a Scottish league” (creation of a,) “had its application their join” (application to join,) “a very credible draw” (x 2, creditable,) “as pulled off something of a coup” (as they pulled off,) “were starting to be need” (no ‘be’ required,) “from the get-go” (get-go is a USian expression, ‘from the start’ is much more elegant,) “but that the AGM came around” (but when the AGM,) “they finished on the same points told as” (points total as,) “to not have” (not to have,) “seemed too be good” (seemed to be good.) In the East of Scotland section; Bathgate (ought to be 2: Bathgate with subsequent numbers in that section advanced by one,) “Shell oil industry” (shale oil,) “pull their resources” (pool,) “off of” (just ‘off’; no ‘of’.)

Scenes and stories from the heartlands of Scottish football, Nutmeg, 2020, 208 p.

The introduction claims this book to be “a love letter to the charms of football …. a portal into a different kind of Scotland.” Well, maybe; but it’s a portal through which many people have travelled.

As an aside I notice on the cover photo (of a pitch on Eriskay) there are flags marking the halfway line. I thought those had been done away with years ago.

For each “chapter” we have a page or three of narrative. These describe in turn the unsung background people, the beating heart of every club, “ensuring our Saturdays have purpose, comfort and melancholy;” the return to normality and focus of a new season’s start; the contrasting fortunes of the two “wee” Rangers, of Berwick and of Cove; the bright promise of a ground you’ve never been to before; the “gentle pleasures” of football in the Borders (notwithstanding the brutalist concrete splendour of Gala Fairydean’s main stand;) the rigours and dangers of blaes pitches; the magic of a floodlit game, forever enchanting; the glory and misery of away trips; the local team as the heart of a community, embodied in its social club especially in Junior football; the joys of park football; the content the writer senses in the Highland League.

The match day experience of attending a midweek floodlit game in a minor league is highlighted by a photograph of a neglected bottle of orange juice and a mug with the word “Twat” printed on it sitting on top of a dugout.

Football’s past is given its due with photos of an iron fence and gate before where the main stand stood at The Gymnasium; trees striding down the terraces of Cathkin Park; a single Art Deco style wall still bearing the name Shawfield; the sole survivor of Brockville, a turnstile acting as a memorial in the car park of the town’s Morrisons; the overgrown terraces of Tinto Park, Benburb; Meadowbank stadium’s “oddly alluring air of otherness …. a little pocket of Leningrad tucked behind Arthur’s Seat.”

An even more melancholy note is struck by the mention of two Hibs supporters, one photographed on an away trip, who succumbed to Covid-19, with the final paragraphs devoted to the loss the average fan has experienced as a result of the pandemic’s suspension of the Saturday ritual.

Pedant’s corner:- “a 1,000” (either ‘a thousand’ or ‘1,000’. 1,000 does not stand for ‘thousand’, it is specifically ‘one thousand’; no one ever says, ‘a one thousand’,) “their 54 years of league football had ceased” (Berwick Rangers joined the Scottish League proper in 1955; 64 years, then; 68 if you count the Division C years,) Berwick fans in August “singing ‘Back to school tomorrow’ to visiting young fans of Scottish clubs” (unless it was a midweek game more likely ‘Back to school on Monday’,) Rangers’ (Rangers’s,) Rovers’ (Rovers’s,) “the club … are familiar” (the club … is familiar,) “the first senior league game at Cove’s Balmoral Stadium.” (Okay, the writer used a lower case ‘s’, but…. Cove have been Senior ever since they joined the Highland League, so, ‘their first game in a nationwide league,’) “Galashiels Fairydean Rovers FC” (the club’s name is Gala Fairydean Rovers FC.)

SPFL Tier 2, Ibrox Stadium, 5/4/16.

I meant to post about this yesterday but for some reason it slipped my mind.

This could have been worse. Given the significance of the evening for Rangers we could have been in for a doing and I feared that. I also feared the outcome even more when Livi went one up on Hibs, but that went our way as well in the end.

But how can a team go from an abject surrender to Queen of the South to what seems to have been a resolute performance against the best team in the division? Unless, of course the players tried harder on a bigger stage: but that would be a form of cheating all the other times.

Queen of the South up next on Tuesday, but we could be a point behind Livi by then.

On a more cynical note: how long will it be after Hibs get back to the top tier once again before we in the lower leagues are cut off once more (as we were by the SPL)? That’s the subtext I read into this “good for Scottish football” spiel which has greeted Rangers Tier 2 win. The way things were was only good for two clubs, not Scottish football as a whole.

Rangers attitude to Scottish football reconstruction has hardened. Their chief executive has suggested they should leave Scottish football if the plans go through.

It looks like they at least don’t believe the plans are designed to elevate them prematurely.

But where could they go? UEFA and FIFA against clubs playing outside their own country’s borders (special dispensation applies to Welsh clubs who historically plied their trade in England and Monaco is also a special case. I’m not sure where FC Vaduz – a Liechtenstein team in the Swiss league – comes in this regard.) England is a non-starter; even given UEFA blessing they would hardly be able to jump straight into the Football League nor even the Conference. (Sorry, the Blue Square Premier League.)

This is a blowing of hot air, perhaps as a reflection of relative impotence. Their absence from the highest echelon is obviously getting to them. (For the next Cup weekend I had planned a post – as yet unwritten – relating to this.)

I do agree the proposals are a dog’s breakfast. The solution to Scottish football’s financial problems is for the top clubs to take a tumble to their real status* and cut their cloth accordingly. Stop spending money they don’t have and don’t budget for TV deals; take them as a bonus.

*Piss-poor league in a piss-poor country on Europe’s periphery. Deal with it.

A poster on the Scottish football fans’ forum The Pie Shop – otherwise known as Pie and Bovril – has put up a link (which I copy here) to a new survey Supporters Direct is undertaking to ascertain fans’ views on various topics of concern/interest.

If you are at all interested in Scottish football – especially if you support a “small” club – please add your contribution to the survey. The more respondents there are the more weight Supporters Direct will have in discussions with the football authorities.

Carling Cup; Final. Wembley Stadium, 27/02/11

This game showed that dodgy offside decisions are not restricted to Scottish lower league football. Even in real time, on television, it was obvious that Lee Bowyer was onside when Zigic played him in very early on. The television replays only confirmed it. A penalty and sending off would have been the sure result of a correct decision.

Had Arsenal gone on to win this game it would have been an injustice for that reason alone. But then maybe if they had gone down to ten men they would have rallied and Birmingham might have relaxed. As it was Birmingham stuck at it and reaped their reward through another Arsenal defensive mix-up.

Arsène Wenger seems to have a blind spot as far as defence is concerned. At Arsenal he inherited a good one but he doesn’t seem to be able to construct one himself.

Now that I’ve said that they’ll probably win the three trophies they’re still contesting this season.

I’ve posted about their sheer damned nerve before. Twice over in fact.

But now we see it in all its naked self interest.

These proposals are not to the benefit of Scottish football as a whole.

They would do nothing – absolute zero – to improve the national team’s efforts to qualify for major championships.

They would do nothing to further the development of young players – quite the reverse: their appearance in first teams would be much less likely.

Neither would the base of the game be widened and strengthened. It would almost certainly mean the demise of the current SFL clubs who have little chance of ever reaching Division 1, far less the SPL. By and large these clubs live within their means and on occasion turn up players whom the bigger clubs have missed. They also have dedicated fans (albeit in small numbers) who are passionate about their allegiances and would be lost to the game if their clubs were to go under.

Any clubs who aspire to SFL membership will not gain from this either as very shortly there wouldn’t be an SFL to aspire to. The new SPL2 won’t let the likes of Spartans in, you can be sure of that.

What the proposals might do is ensure that the Old Firm continue to receive the lion’s share of television exposure – and monies – and entrench the current imbalance that is the true source of Scottish football’s malaise. (Two teams win most of the competitions and the rest barely get a look in.)

They will also make sure that the SPL1 and 2 is in fact a closed shop.

The SPL says it has canvassed thousands of Scottish fans about these proposals. Well; nobody asked me.

A discussion on the fan site Pie and Bovril did direct me to a survey (http://www.surveymonkey.com) after the proposals were announced, but this isn’t connected to the SPL, I believe. Just in case it is I urge you all to access this and opt against anything similar to an SPL1 and 2.

And as for regionalisation below the SPL, that would largely deprive me of the chance to watch my team as I no longer live in its area. At the moment I can attend lots of away games; under regionalisation that would probably change. From being a frequent attender at matches, I would become more or less a stranger to Scottish football.

The suggestion that SPL reserve teams should play in the regionalised league below SPL1/2 is simply outrageous. They had a reserve league of their own and disbanded it. Let them set it up again or else loan their reserves out to gain experience. Do not sully a totally different competition with teams you can’t be bothered to cater for otherwise. Foisting them on someone else is more than high-handed. It smacks of bullying.

I can’t tell you the despair that these proposals have engendered in me. Quite simply, without the prospect of promotion and relegation throughout the Scottish football system – I am by no means against a pyramid coming into being provided that there is a suitable league for demoted SFL clubs to play in – but, remember, for most of those located in West and Central Scotland there isn’t at the moment – then there is little point in carrying on.

The main things that would free up the current arrangements and lessen the staleness that abounds are either

1. immediately increasing the available promotion spots from SFL1 to the SPL, or

2. getting rid of playing teams four times a season (in other words increasing the size of the various divisions.)

That last would probably mean only one SPL league and two SFL divisions.

I do hope the teams at the top of the SFL Div 1 won’t be seduced by the mere possibility of games against the ugly sisters that they will go for this.

In fact, they’re probably going to do better in attendance terms if they are doing reasonably well in the SFL than if they were struggling in the SPL.

The response of the SFL to all this ought to be, “Two words; seven letters; three of them ‘f’.”