Saturday 12th May 2012 ko 3pm

Scottish Football League Division Two Playoff Semi Final Second Leg

ALBION ROVERS 2 (Gemmell 62 Chaplin 89)

ELGIN CITY 0

Agg 2-1

Att 827

Entry £12

Programme £2

So, picture the scene. Its 1882 and there are two sides in the North Lanarkshire town of Coatbridge who want to merge. One called Albion the other called Rovers. Now you’d have thought the new side would have had “Coatbridge” in the name? Clearly not!

The town, 10 miles east of Glasgow comes with a rough, tough reputation. No Rangers shirts on show here, this is a former industrial town, built on Irish Catholic immigration in the 19th century. When the heavy industries of coal and iron became exhausted, the town moved from horrendous levels of pollution to even worse levels of deprivation. Since the 1970’s there have been numerous initiatives to regenerate the town but population levels have continued to fall and the town has been dubbed “The most dismal…in Scotland.” Pop act Hue and Cry hail from here.

It’s fair to say the local football team has struggled in much the same fashion as the town. The club has generally found itself playing at whatever the Scottish League has expanded downwards to include. Possibly Rovers’ finest hour was a losing finalist appearance in the Scottish Cup final of 1920, losing 3-2 to Kilmarnock. Local legend has it goalkeeper Joe Shortt had to be bailed out of police custody on the morning of the Final and that his subsequent performance at Hampden had been affected by the lingering effects of his alcohol consumption the night before! In more modern times Middlesbrough bought forward Bernie Slaven from Albion Rovers, and in 1983 confectioners Tunnock’s became the club’s shirt sponsor. The team shirt was altered to mimic the gold wrapper with red diagonal stripes of the caramel wafer bar the company produced, making Rovers perhaps the only club to wear a kit inspired by a sweet wrapper!

Cliftonhill is what the ground graders call a health hazard, and what groundhoppers call magical! With a capacity of just 1,249 there’s just one side open to the public, the main stand, and that has had its roof extended to cover the paddock at the front. Behind each goal are the overgrown remains of steeply banked terracing, and on the “Pop” side a covered terrace provided cover for only a cameraman and the ball boys. The club shop was closed and the pie stand had to repeatedly call for the stewards to stop the Elgin supporters from smoking in front of it. In one corner, taking advantage of a gap in the outside wall the local Neds gathered to drink Buckfast (or in these parts-Coatbridge commotion lotion) and watch the game.

A feature of Scottish playoffs is that only one side of the division concerned actually takes part. The competition is made up of the side finishing second from bottom, plus the sides finishing second to fourth from the division below. This is the first time the visitors have made the playoffs, in fact every time I’ve seen them, they’ve been dreadful, even losing to East Stirlingshire once!

With a one goal deficit to make up this was never going to be a classic. What we got was two highly drilled, highly fit sides, utterly lacking in any kind of inspiration. Elgin’s main outlet was the freakishly tall (6’10”) forward Paul Millar, but he proved to be an impotent presence, and was replaced towards the end. For all the world this looked to be heading to a dull nil nil draw, but then the best player on the pitch, Rovers forward John Gemmell fired home to open the scoring, and level the tie.

With a groundhop organiser to pick up from Hampden, and the small matter of a 300 mile drive to consider, the last thing I wanted was extra-time. Fortunately for me, and sadly for Elgin, who I thought were marginally the better team, Scott Chaplin’s deflected strike with a minute left settled the tie, and left Rovers facing a two-legged final against Stranraer to preserve their status.