An unexpected post about football

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned my fascination with football?

No, of course I haven’t, because it doesn’t exist. I don’t think I have ever watched an entire football match in my life; I watched half of one my son was playing in. I’ve drawn World Cup teams out of a hat to support, but that’s it.

But so many very civilised and amiable people love football (including at least one reader of this blog) – maybe there’s something in it.

Anyway, one of my neighbours is a lifelong fan of the team of his childhood home (Kilmarnock, Ayrshire.) He wrote a book about his fifty years of fandom, 1972-2022, “Killie on Top!” by Douglas Lyburn, which was published by the club. So I bought a copy, and have been slowly following the ups and downs of a team which, it’s fair to say, is not one of the Scottish giants, probably barely known outside footballing circles in the UK – but which has in fact often punched above what one might call their weight.

Kilmarnock is not even the only club in Ayrshire, although Douglas teases their local less successful rivals Ayr United by constantly referring to Killie as “Ayrshire’s finest…” (This is the meanest thing he does, in a book shining with generous if occasionally angry spirit.)

The book goes through the last half century, year by year, in some detail. It’s written for fans, and not unnaturally doesn’t bother to explain the offside rule. (But at least the essence of football is simple to understand.) I am still a bit confused – I get the concept of winning the League, and winning the Cup, but what’s the League Cup? The joy of watching a good game, the frustration of being beaten although playing well; the dread of being in the wrong part of the table and calculating how many goals you need to score to be safe from relegation, the attempting to play in the top division with part-time players (not any more)… it’s all there.

From now on I may possibly remember that the Bairns are Falkirk, the Bankies Clydebank and the Doonhammers Queen of the South. (I knew the Accies and the Dons before.)

Douglas Lyburn is a very nice man, and he has time to sympathise with other clubs in trouble – for example with Falkirk when they were denied the promotion they’d earned due to nit-picky concerns about the size of their ground – concerns which didn’t seem to apply to some other teams. He has trenchant views, as I would guess many have, about the unhealthy domination of money, and of the few big clubs. During the years when Rangers were relegated from the Premier Division due to their financial catastrophies, it was particularly bad in Scotland, a fact which his English friends doubtless pointed out. In 2016-7 Celtic won the Cup, the League and the League Cup.

“Personally, I do not like to see any team win the Treble…  Celtic won the League by 30 points from second-placed Aberdeen. It was not a good look, I’m afraid.”

I haven’t finished the book yet; I’m just at the joyful years where Killie’s fortunes are transformed by manager Steve Clarke (later and currently manager of Scotland.) I don’t think, sorry Doug, that I’m going to become an avid football follower. But unselfish, fair-minded (on the whole) and joyful passion for the game and the tribe shine from its pages.

Kilmarnock won the Scottish League in 1964-5, so when young Douglas started his fandom the glory days were within recent memory. They haven’t won the League since, but they won the Cup in 1997 and the League Cup in 2012, beating Celtic in the final. The author was in the crowd to watch, and would have liked to carry on celebrating, but alas, he had work in Nottingham the next day.

He says or implies somewhere: why would anyone want to support one of the huge names with their seemingly inexhaustible funds and their endless trophies? And, speaking as an outsider, is he not right? It’s the strugglers and occasional giant-killers that touch the heart. (But I know nothing.)

So I’ve added Kilmarnock to the teams I sort-of want to do well: along with Hamilton Accies (husband’s hometown), Charlton Athletic (son-in-law’s support) and Plymouth Argyle (friend at church.)

Disclaimer: I know nothing, nothing, as will be abundantly clear from the above.

Love from the PPI Blogger