My interview with Lifelong Dundee fan Douglas Marsh

13:34:00 Unknown 0 Comments

Douglas spoke fondly of his early life in the City of Discovery.  “My father supported both Dundee and Dundee United and he took me to see the Dundee United v Berwick Rangers game in April 1960 when United who were a Division 2 club at that time gained promotion to Division 1. We were sitting in the Main Stand at Tannadice and I kept saying to my father that I wanted to go to see the football at the big stand "up the road" which of course was Dens Park home of Dundee Football Club. Therefore in August 1960 my father took me to Dens Park where I became a Dundee supporter for life.  One Saturday evening during the 1960-61 seasons my mother was giving me my bath and the soap slipped. I shouted out "Lord Jesus Christ" and my mother who was shocked at my outburst said to me, "where did you here that". I replied, the man sitting behind me at Dens Park shouted that! My father was in big trouble but fortunately he still took me to the Dundee home games at Dens until I was able to go to them on my own with my friends. We used to go the first team games one Saturday afternoon and the reserve games the following Saturday afternoon, which is something the fans can no longer do.”

Fascinated and a little perplexed that his father had been a supporter of both Dundee and Dundee United, teams historically with great city rivalry. I asked Douglas how on earth that could be the case?  “My father who was a teacher was not unique in supporting both Dundee teams as prior to the introduction of the 3 day working week around 1974. Men used to work on a Saturday morning finishing work at 12 noon with enough time to go for a pint and a pie before attending home games week about at Dens and Tannadice.  People did not have enough time to travel for away games or travel to support Rangers or Celtic. The introduction of the 3 day week meant that Rangers and Celtic supporters had plenty of time on a Saturday to travel from Dundee to Glasgow and attendances at provincial clubs such as Dundee and United fell.”
Attendances at Division 1 Provincial Clubs 1960-1980
Season                        Aberdeen   Dundee       Dundee Utd    Heart          Hibs            Kilmarnock       Total    
1960-61
12,617
12,835
11,382
20,294
15,470
12,450
14,175
1961-62
7,761
15,933
9,362
13,827
9,762
10,477
11,187
1962-63
11,740
11,421
9,038
12,778
9,095
8,777
10,475
1963-64
9,084
13,926
9,047
13,834
11,714
8,891
11,083
1964-65
8,161
12,057
9,050
16,785
13,860
10,475
11,731
1965-66
8,275
9,025
8,779
12,109
11,954
8,706
9,808
1966-67
11,786
9,035
7,342
10,241
12,796
8,439
9,940
1967-68
10,055
7,608
6,267
11,228
11,959
5,693
8,802
1968-69
11,325
7,003
8,307
11,546
11,205
8,293
9,613
1969-70
10,730
6,946
8,328
12,475
13,615
6,724
9,803
1970-71
15,916
6,745
6,986
11,667
10,541
5,933
9,631
1971-72
18,014
8,024
6,765
11,196
14,057
5,716
10,629
1972-73
13,572
7,883
6,924
10,261
16,100
4,488
9,871
1973-74
8,656
6,949
5,469
11,732
14,339
3,639
8,464
1974-75
9,673
7,335
6,629
12,224
13,720
7,021
9,434
1975-76
11,773
8,767
7,616
12,676
13,796
4,239
9,811
1976-77
13,797
4,517
7,127
11,716
10,003
5,848
8,835
1977-78
16,115
6,729
8,410
9,862
9,646
2,833
8,933
1978-79
14,156
5,970
9,102
10,886
9,794
3,033
8,824
1979-80
12,968
9,433
10,236
5,733
9,564
6,990
                  9,154

















Table 1.0: Data Source: David Ross- The Roar of the Crowd
Although the 3 day working week which was introduced by the Conservative government at the beginning of 1974 appears to have had no immediate effect on the attendances of provincial Division 1 clubs, the data confirms that average attendances of clubs other than the old firm began to steadily decline during the mid to late 70’s.  It is entirely plausible that the substantial economic and political instability of the 70’s were a major contributor to attendance decrees. Dundee’s average attendances appear to have been particularly affecting with average attendance reaching as low as 4,517 in the 76-77 season.

Douglas was lucky as a youngster, being one of the very few current Dundee fans to have witnessed the team winning the league.  I wanted to know more about his early experiences and memories that had led him to be so committed during so many difficult years.  “ Lawrie Smith was the Dundee FC physiotherapist in the early 1960's.  My father was a PE student at Jordanhill with Lawrie Smith's brother-in-law and they shared digs together. He arranged for me to have a tour of Dens Park. Craig Brown who was a Dundee FC player at that time was also a part-time PE teacher at Macalpine Primary School and he picked me up in his car after I had finished school at Downfield PS to take me to Dens Park for my guided tour. Needless to say I was "star struck" to be given a tour around Dens Park including the Board Room and players changing rooms. Lawrie Smith also arranged for me to receive a player's jersey. I was supposed to receive Ian Ure's but unfortunately it got ripped so I received Gordon Smiths instead. Surprisingly Gordon Smiths chest size was only 36 inches and I remember wearing the jersey as an eight year old. The jersey went down to my ankles!”

Douglas still has the jersey and confesses that it now has paint stains on it as in 1968 he wore it painting a wall, at the time he did not understand the significance of the jersey. Perhaps the most profound thing that Douglas said about his life as a Dundee fan  was, “It is very hard being a Dundee supporter whether attending games at Dens or elsewhere, as nothing is simple. You go from ecstasy to despair from one week to the next and sometimes during the game as well.” I’m sure most football fans can identify with this sentiment in one way or another, perhaps in a mad way it’s why we love football.

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Flying the Flag

05:39:00 Unknown 0 Comments

The orthodox British football season is a nine month marathon; cup finals are contested in the month of May. As fans travel the length and breadth of the country week after week, the trips, games, and emotions, can blend together to form a haze of unmemorable routine, partiality exacerbated by the alcohol consumed. Fans remember cup finals, if your luck enough to have a team that reaches a cup final in your lifetime that is. Watching your team’s captain lift a trophy above his head at the national stadium is a moment that lives in the memory forever. In Scotland, this emblematic act of triumph, was reserved for the Scottish and league Cup winners. 

The league winners didn’t receive the trophy at the end of the season. In fact, the Dundee league winning team didn’t lay eyes on the trophy all summer.
At that time, the administration department at the Scottish league had the trophy sent from their head office in West Regent Street, Glasgow. Perhaps these logistics seem a little prehistoric through 21st century eye, although probably entirely logical given the resources and technology at their disposable. Goal scoring hero Gilzean accounts on the Dundee FC official website that he first caught a glimpse of the silverware as he walked by the boardroom on the 6th of August. The rest of the squad finally got their hands on the trophy three days later, where they were pictured in front on an empty main stand at Dens, the trophy proudly held by Captain Bobby Cox. This subdued meeting of trophy and players is worlds apart from the events of the 04/05 season climax, which any well versed Scottish football follower knows as "helicopter Sunday".
“
Rangers quite casually playing it about at Easter road, they know that all they can do is wait and hope that Motherwell can put a sting in Celtics championship bid. Davie Clarcksons coming on for Motherwell, it’s going to be Mark Fitzpatrick coming off. 87 and a half minutes on the clock, now we will stay at Fir Park because Rangers have a 1 goal advantage at Easter road, Craigen’s going to play this, it’s a long one up in the air, Varga, Foren, shot!, heres Foran, hes Scored! hes scored! McDonalds scored for Motherwell! Scott McDonald has scored; the Celtic players can’t believe it, their dead on their feet, 1-1 at Fir Park. The title will be heading to Easter road to Rangers, The helicopter is changing direction!”

These words from Radio Clyde’s, excellent sports broadcaster, Peter Martin, have gone down in Scottish football folk law.  An iconic moment which for the younger generation can be described as Martyn Tiler esca, as he shouted the name of Manchester City’s Argentinian goal scorer, Sergio Aguero, as they won the 2012 English Premiere league title with a last gasp goal, coincidently from their city rivals. For the neutral, the best finish to a long league season Scotland has ever and will in all likelihood ever see (which is quite a feat considering the finally of the 2003 campaign). The SPL championship trophy had been boarded onto a helicopter and headed for Fir Park, the rest you could say, is history!

Dundee’s league title win of 61/62 was formally celebrated with the then traditional flying of the league title flag at the opening match of the following season, in which the champions are honoured with the privilege of playing at home. In spite of the considerable advances in resources and technology, which enables the Scottish football authorities to fly silverware around the country in mesmerizingly quick time, Scottish football continues to respect and honour the tradition of flying the league title flag at the first game of the league champions in addition to the trophy presentation which is now plausible.

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Throw Back to that not so glorious day in the Faroes Islands

10:09:00 Unknown 0 Comments

As Rangers and St Johnstone crashed out of Europe over the past fortnight and Aberdeen on the cusp of elimination, it made me think of Berti's side in the Faroe Islands in 2002. Most Scotland fans old enough to have seen it will remain emotional scared forever, England in Euro 16 doesn't even compare, it was without doubt scraping the barrel of despair for the tartan army. But have we really made progress since?

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Play for the sake of playing! (part1)

09:41:00 Unknown 0 Comments

A little trivia to begin. The oldest club currently still in the English Football League is Notts County 

Formed in 1867, Queen’s Park were to very quickly become ground breakers within the Scottish game. Despite the impact that the club was to have on the infancy of Scottish football, their creation was markedly humble. The quote that adorns the club website (history), reads “tonight at half past eight o’clock a number of gentlemen met at No.3 Eglinton Terrace for the purpose of forming a football club.” This brief, matter-of-fact statement summarises the meeting headed by club president Mungo Ritchie and tells the story of a community looking to simply give football to its people, and nothing more.
A year later Queen’s Park played their first game, beating Thistle FC 2-0, as they began their long journey in association football.
In March 1873, they – along with eight other Scottish clubs – formed the Scottish Football Association, having already been members of the Football Association in London since 1870. Despite some alterations along the way, the Scottish FA, jointly formed by Queen’s Park, is still the same institution that governs Scottish football to this day.
As part of their role in formulating and creating the Scottish FA, Queen’s Park also took on the role of providing a Scottish national team. In fact, in Scotland’s debut international game against England in September 1872, Queen’s Park provided all eleven Scottish players for the 0-0 draw against the Auld Enemy. For the ‘return leg’ in London in March 1873, Scotland were beaten 4-2, with seven of those in the team for that game Queen’s Park players, all selected by club captain Robert Gardner. In contrast, the English team that day had representatives from eight different clubs, thus demonstrating Queen’s Park’s prominence in Scottish football.
Symbolically, the national team for those games also sported Queen’s Park’s original dark blue jerseys, which the national side continues to wear today. This was another example of Queen’s Park’s pioneering role in the early history of Scottish football. Perhaps in deference to the new national team, the members at Queen’s Park voted to change the club colours just six months later to the black and white inch striped jerseys that inspired their nickname – The Spiders – as it is said to resemble a spider’s web.
In the same year as the colour change, Queen’s – with the other founder members of the Scottish FA – created the Scottish Cup; the Hoops won the inaugural version of the competition in 1874.
Indeed, the latter part of the nineteenth century proved to be a period of dominance for Queen’s Park, winning the Scottish Cup ten times between 1874 and 1893, a record only bested since by Celtic and Rangers.
Curiously, during this period Queen’s Park also competed in the English FA Cup as did Third Lanark, Partick Thistle, Hearts, Rangers, Cowlairs, Renton and Gretna – the latter’s participation came almost a century after the SFA’s ban on Scottish clubs participating in the FA Cup because – due to their location on the England/Scotland border – it was more convenient to play in England’s Northern League; a Berwick Rangers situation in reverse, if you will. Queen’s, however, are the only Scottish club to reach the final, finishing as runners-up to Blackburn Rovers in both 1884 and 1885.
As standard bearers of the Scottish game, Queen’s Park were invited to play in the FA Cup from 1872, however, financial constraints restricted them to just one appearance prior to the 1883-84 season.
It was at this point, after years of dominance in the Scottish Cup, that the club wanted to test themselves against England’s best. Their first full campaign was an eye-opener for those English sides that faced them as they hammered established teams such as Crewe Alexandra (10-0), Aston Villa (6-1) and Blackburn Olympic (4-0) en route to their final defeat. The following season continued in the same vein, as they beat both Notts County and Nottingham Forest on their way to another runners-up finish.
Queen’s Park had established themselves as a force, not just within Scotland, but across Britain with these victories over clubs with much greater resources. However, in the following two seasons in the FA Cup the club failed to match these achievements and in 1887 the Scottish FA banned all member teams from playing in English competitions, extinguishing any chance of Queen’s Park ever winning the trophy.
Despite their success in Scotland, the turn of the century was to see a real change in the club’s fortunes as domestic football continued its process of significant change.
In 1890, the Scottish Football League was formed, becoming a professional structure in 1893. Queen’s Park declined an invitation to join as they were determined to adhere to their strict amateur principals.
This decision to remain as an amateur club was a fundamental one for Queen’s Park, their initial opposition was borne out of concern that smaller clubs would eventually be driven out of the League through the advent of professionalism. Given their role as early governors of the game it would have been hypocritical of the club to support a move that they deemed as potentially harmful.
However, the decision to abstain from the newly formed League left them in a difficult position, as regular football against quality opposition was difficult to come by, with most ‘top’ clubs now League members.
Therefore, at the start of the 1900-01 season Queen’s Park swapped the Glasgow League for the professional Scottish Football League – joining Division One – but preserving their amateur status in the process.
Certain literature on the history of the club states that Queen’s Park believed that, due to its position as a ‘premier’ Scottish club, their ability to beat acclaimed English sides in the past, and their strong position within the Scottish FA, they could survive as amateurs. In fact, other members of the Scottish FA encouraged the club to alter its stance, warning that they could descend into oblivion, such was the chasm between professional and amateur outlooks.
Retaining their code of ‘amateurism’, which Queen’s Park still abide by to this day, means that the club holds not only the proud record of the oldest football club in the country, but also the only amateur side in the current SPFL.

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