A lot has happened in the world, not just football since Football Weekends boldly stepped out into the shelves of our local newsagents more than six years ago now. Just keeping it going throughout the recent lockdowns, with the added complexity of almost an entire season without fans, is celebration in itself, so chapeau to Jim Stewart the Editor for keeping the content varied and the quality of writing high.
Within the pages of the very first edition that I managed to buy (number 6, September 2015) was a story about Falkirk FC, an edition that inspired me to quickly snaffle the back catalogue as the magazine hadn’t infiltrated the Edinburgh area for the first few months. Having written articles predominantly for football programmes previously, I immediately thought I had something to bring to the table, and as you read this tale, it will be my 60th plus article for the magazine. I am especially proud of being able to help Jim during these difficult last 18 months or so. Whoever foresaw a virus would bring society, let alone football to its knees, but thankfully it seems to be receding, and I don’t know about you, but I will never take going to football for granted ever again.
Perhaps of all the towns, the intervening half dozen years since Football Weekends first hit the shops, time and fate have been less than kind to the Falkirk football scene. That inaugural magazine in March 2015 was just ahead of one of the recent high moments for Falkirk, beating Hibernian at Hampden on a Saturday afternoon in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final to set up a place in the Final versus the winner of the second game on the Sunday, Inverness Caledonian Thistle versus Celtic. The Falkirk victory was confirmed on my car radio just as I parked up outside Brunton Park, Carlisle, where a fabulous 4-4 draw with AFC Wimbledon was the warm-up act to ICT seeing off Celtic 3-2 after extra-time in a pulsating third “Super Caley” Scottish Cup win against them to set up the most unlikely Scottish Cup Final ever!
Ahead of that final however, Falkirk’s other league club East Stirlingshire, who were playing at nearby Stenhousemuir at the time, were on the cusp of losing their league status. Despite continued objections as votes showed during the pandemic, the instigation of a pyramid of sorts, where the bottom club in League Two must play for the right to retain its league status has been a great addition to the Scottish game. Shire as they are known had periodically suffered lengthy bouts of being the bottom club, and when the final league home match came versus Elgin City, a 5-1 thrashing, you could see the imminent play-out was going to be fraught with danger. And so it turned out, despite drawing at Meadowbank versus Edinburgh City, a 1-0 loss at home saw Falkirk lose one of its league clubs. East Stirlingshire were the first of three clubs now to suffer this fate, with Berwick Rangers and most recently Brechin City following suit. Cowdenbeath (twice) and Montrose have both managed to survive, and in the case of the Angus club, they have learned the lessons and thrived.
A couple of weeks later Falkirk would have their big day out at Hampden for the Cup Final versus my boys Inverness CT. Tied at 1,1 and the highlanders a man down, all the angst of yesteryear Falkirk clashes were starting to swirl within me again. It had been seven years since the clubs last met, but in that particular season The Bairns, as Falkirk are known, turned up the heat on a long running hoodoo, knocking us out of both cups and relegating us! There boss that season, John “Yogi” Hughes was now our manager, and as Falkirk piled on the pressure late in normal time, the ball broke to Marley Watkins who ran the length of the pitch, and shot weakly, but it was perhaps so weak it caught out Jamie MacDonald in goal who merely palmed the ball into the path of the onrushing James Vincent, who slammed it home having ran an incredible distance to get there. The joy was all Inverness, it added to the Falkirk angst of 2015.
A few seasons later Falkirk unthinkably slumped into the third tier of the Scottish game, and while they might have made it back at the first time of asking, Covid came along and so did the now legendary rift between the clubs and the fans along the lines of self protectionism, that saw matters even go to the courts. Falkirk were a mere point behind Raith at the point the season was called, with a mouthwatering last day home tie versus the Fifers lurking on the horizon. Raith were promoted, the play offs were cancelled, and despite the Raith chairman very quickly coming out and saying he hoped Falkirk could join them in a reconstructed league set up, days later he’d changed his mantra, and Falkirk, along with Inverness, Hearts, Partick Thistle, Stranraer and others, all found themselves on the wrong side of the argument, a new band of brothers was formed. If Partick and Falkirk have long been ICT bogey teams, the perceived wrongdoing unites us all now.
While no fans were around, Falkirk perhaps lost the edge that an intimidating atmosphere can bring at their stadium, and playing in an empty Falkirk Stadium (the Bairnabeu as we call it!) in League One, things started to unravel. They were always in the mix at the top end of the table, but with another of the “wronged” sides, Partick immediately putting matters right and going straight back up, a play off spot was as good as Falkirk were going to get. However, a late collapse saw the Bairns fall down to fifth on the last day, and they missed out altogether on the chance to get promoted. Now under the guidance of ex Inverness legend Paul Sheerin, he will be hoping for better days are ahead, but League One is now a league full of ambitious clubs, a full-time Queens Park, and ambitious Cove Rangers, as well as an Airdrieonians side that will wake up one of these days. In many regards, if it wasn’t for the “need” for the Glasgow giants to play each other as often as possible, the depth of quality in the Scottish league is now at such a point where the leagues could be slightly larger and playing each other less frequently.
While stepping down from League football has undoubtedly been a shock to East Stirlingshire, they have settled the ship well and are always jousting at the upper part of the Lowland League. Obviously the desire is to regain their league status, and that might well happen, but year on year this league is going to become even more congested with ambitious clubs, and with no automatic promotion place, just a play off route, it will take years for the whole thing to settle down, if it ever does, as more clubs start to desire a slice of the pie. The Lowland League is already a tremendous competition, and while a few struggle at the foot of the table, gradually they’ll be replaced by stronger sides. Everyone will eventually find their level.
East Stirlingshire have moved “home” now sharing the Falkirk Stadium with their bigger neighbours Falkirk. It is a great stadium, maybe disappointingly with just three sides, but so is Inverness, and neither really has a need to build another stand to sit empty most of the time. Indeed Falkirk have put two artificial training pitches over the wall where a fourth stand might have gone.
Falkirk Council have done lots of things in recent years to promote the area, with the modernistic Falkirk Wheel acting as a spectacular lift for barges and boats en route to a higher level waterway as they continue their journey along the Forth and Clyde Canal. This structure is on the other side of the town from the football stadium, but much closer, indeed a mere stroll over the road and through the new park from the ground will bring you to the now iconic Kelpies. These two enormous horses’ heads can be viewed if you are whizzing along the M9 towards Stirling from Edinburgh, but they are well worth a visit. Only when you are standing underneath them do you get a full appreciation of the sheer scale and craftsmanship gone into bringing these incredible pieces of art to life. Even after dark can be a nice time to visit as they are very often lit up by fabulous coloured lighting. They are also right beside the canal and there is plenty to see and do in and around these statues to wile away some time before or after a game.
Being a newish stadium, opened in 2004, it is an out of town venue, where sadly there are no bars or restaurants within an easy walk. Scottish rules regarding no alcohol sales within a stadium will also deny you a pint as you view. The old Brockville Stadium was right in the centre of the town at Falkirk Grahamston station, where a pub Behind the Wall is still the hostelry of choice for Bairns fans before and after a game if you fancy catching the local banter ahead of making your way to the stadium. With a capacity of just under 8,000, unless it is a big match, you’ll not struggle to get in, and while the two stands behind the goal are great, the main stand at Falkirk is a gem, and it puts the stand at Inverness to shame as the roof doesn’t even cover all the seats up there!
In 2009 the stadium hosted a European night when Falkirk narrowly saw off FC Vaduz from Liechtenstein 1-0, but didn’t progress going down 3-1 in the principality. It does however highlight the mere mothballed potential at this great club, and while they might have lost the 2015 Scottish Cup Final (also runners up in 1997 and 2009), they have won the oldest trophy in World football twice in 1913 and 1957. Yet another of these odd quirks of football occurred when, having beaten Kilmarnock to win the ‘57 edition, forty years later when they finally made another final, yes you guessed it, Killie were waiting for them in the final again. Falkirk have also won the lower league Challenge Cup four times.
East Stirlingshire returned to Fakirk to share the ground in 2018 having been nomadic for a number of years after Firs Park was lost to the world of football. It used to be one of my favourite places to watch a game, the fans were always charismatic. The venue might have changed but that hasn’t damped the Shire fans who add colour to any away game in the Lowland League. Sir Alex Ferguson cut his managerial teeth with Shire. The clubs heyday was probably in the ‘80’s when they were promoted, along with Falkirk to the second tier of Scottish football (only three tiers in those days), but they did have one mighty fine night at Tynecastle when I was there to watch, together a number of Meadowbank fans who had a great affection for Shire, when they famously won 1-0 against a struggling Hearts at the time. Shire may well have rarely troubled any cup semi final, let alone a final, but there have been passages of time when they were no push over, and that is very much the case now. The Scottish Cup gives them the chance to go toe to toe with clubs they once regularly played as well as having the only ever non league fixtures that used to be league matches in Scotland (so far) when they play Berwick Rangers.
One of my first games back watching football saw me along at the Falkirk Stadium for a match up with Lowland League whipping boys Vale of Leithen (who have dodged relegation more often than Brechin in recent years) on a balmy July evening. I had watched this match a couple of years previously when Shire thrashed the Innerleithen outfit 6-1, and rarely do I head to a match expecting a goal fest, but this was one of them! Alas, Vale surprised us all by digging deep and putting in stiff resistance, conceding merely one goal, in a narrow loss, but Shire were never in any danger of losing the match. Indeed, the time wasting antics from the borders even within the first ten minutes set their stall out early on. Perhaps that early season enthusiasm was still within the visitors, as they have come unstuck a few times since and the manager might well have been the first casualty of the new season. Shire will have stiffer tests ahead of them for sure.
There is undoubtedly a rivalry between the two Falkirk sides, but such is the infrequency of the fixture, I mean no disservice to Shire when I suggest it is more akin to a big brother, little brother joust, with the opportunity to beat the bigger Falkirk having much more meaning to East Stirling supporters.
The pandemic hasn’t been kind to the Falkirk clubs, unlike the Bairns, Shire would got no financial support from the authorities, and their league was closed down a lot longer than Falkirk went without playing. Making ends meet in the non league game has never been easy but these last two years it just got a whole lot worse. Scotland needs a strong Falkirk, the history and tradition runs deep amongst the Bairns fans and their rivalry with Dunfermline is the Scottish equivalent of Atalanta versus Brescia. I wish the Falkirk duo well in their quest for higher leagues and the return of greater glory.
Football Adventures with James Rendall 